Action alert
Ask your MP if s/he will acknowledge the role of environmental risk factors in breast cancer incidence
You will probably already be aware that, despite our best efforts, the Government chose not to include environmental risk factors in its Cancer Reform Strategy, published last year.
Further, at the all-party Britain Against Cancer conference in December 2008 the same old 'lifestyle' factors were trotted out including diet, exercise, smoking etc. The only mention of the role hazardous chemicals might play was made by our own representative and other like-minded individuals.
However, we do not intend to quietly accept this, especially in the light of the recent landmark EU resolution and the latest figures from the Office of National Statistics showing a further rise in breast cancer incidence.
With a general election on the horizon, the time is ripe for us to ask our MPs where their party stands on the issue. You can find out who your MP is by going to www.writetothem.com. For our recommended wording see below – or you may prefer to compose your own.
Please also copy your letter to the Government’s ‘Cancer Tzar’:
Prof. Mike Richards
National Cancer Director
Department of Health
Richmond House
79 Whitehall
London SW1A 2NS
or email the Department of Health: dhmail@dh.gsi.gov.uk
You could mark it "Open Letter" and send a copy to your local newspapers, national press and/or anyone else you think may be influential.
We would be very interested in receiving a copy of any responses you receive so please forward them to:
NMBC Campaign at Breast Cancer UK,
BM Box 7767, London WC1N 3XX
Fax 0870 1617293
Email info@nomorebreastcancer.org.uk
Please take action and make your voice heard on this issue. Thank you.
Sample lettler
House of Commons
Westminster
London SW1A 0AA
Dear (insert name of your MP)
1 in 9 women get breast cancer: what is your Party going to do about it?
The omission of environmental pollutants as breast cancer risk factors from the Government’s Cancer Reform Strategy was very disappointing.
However, the European Parliament’s resolution, recognising environmental and occupational links to cancer, together with the proposal for an EU Cancer Task Force, reflects the growing awareness that the usual suspects such as genetic predisposition, diet, exercise etc., give far from the whole picture. It is widely accepted that conventional risk factors account for only around 50 per cent of cases, which includes the minority of cases attributed to genetic predisposition.1
There are a number of chemicals, used in cosmetics, household and industrial products, which have been linked to breast cancer. Of particular concern are those known to be endocrine disruptors, which mimic natural oestrogen.2 Studies have shown such chemicals accumulating in mammary tumours in rodents as well as in human breast milk. While it is difficult to isolate the effects of a particular substance, there are two strands of growing scientific concern: a woman’s lifetime exposure to a low-dose cocktail of chemicals and exposure during “critical windows of vulnerability” especially in-utero and during puberty.3
The interaction of environmental and conventional risk factors is an additional feature of this complex jigsaw.
While the present Government has been slow to take a lead on this issue, other countries are more proactive: for example, Canada took quick action this year to ban Bisphenol-A from the manufacture of babies’ bottles, after it was declared capable of altering human development by the US National Toxicology Program. In contrast, the UK Food Standards Agency has proposed no such ban.
In its Health Statistics Quarterly (Winter 2008), the Office of National Statistics reports a further rise in breast cancer incidence, showing that breast cancer now affects over 45,000 women a year. As your constituent and in view of a general election on the horizon, I would like to know your Party’s position on the breast cancer issue. In particular I am keen to find out whether your Party is prepared to include in its manifesto an undertaking to acknowledge hazardous chemicals/environmental pollutants as breast cancer risk factors and what steps it would then take to reduce our exposure to such chemicals.
Yours sincerely
(insert your name here)
Supporter of the No More Breast Cancer Campaign, Breast Cancer UK.
www.breastcanceruk.org.uk
www.nomorebreastcancer.org.uk
1 McPherson Steel & Dixon, Breast Cancer – Epidemiology, risk factors, and Genetics, pp1003-1006 British Medical Journal (BMJ) 309 1994
2 State of the Evidence 2008, Breast Cancer Fund: www.breastcancerfund.org
3 Prof. Andreas Kortenkamp, Head of Centre for Toxicology, School of Pharmacy, University of London, briefing paper Exposure to Hormonally Active Chemicals, April 2008 www.chemtrust.org.uk