Mammograms Don’t Save Lives

A huge new study from Canada that followed about 90,000 women for almost 25 years has told us what we already knew: mammograms don’t save lives.

Raymond Francis has been arguing for more than two decades that not only do mammograms not save lives, ionizing radiation, as found in mammograms, is one of the things that we know for certain causes cancer. Chest X-rays are known to increase the risk of cancer, and mammograms expose your body to 1,000 times more radiation than a chest X-ray. Before you get a mammogram, please read his article, Mammograms Are a Bust.

In the new study, 15 different screening centers throughout Canada collaborated in providing 5 yearly mammograms to women ages 40-59. The women were then followed for up to 25 years and compared with similar aged women who had been given only physical breast exams. At the end of the study period 500 of the women who had received mammograms had died of breast cancer compared with 505 of the women who had had breast exams only, not a meaningful difference.

In their conclusions, the researchers wrote, “. . . mammography should be urgently reassessed by policy makers . . . our data show that annual mammography does not result in a reduction in breast cancer specific mortality for women aged 40-59 beyond that of physical exam alone or usual care in the community.”

Although previous major studies have drawn similar conclusions, as the Alliance for Natural Health points out, the breast cancer industry, including the American College of Radiology, is huge and powerful, and will make sure the “mammograms save lives” message is the loudest message most of the public hears.

At Beyond Health, we recommend thermography as a safe and effective alternative to mammography. Thermography is a way of measuring the temperature of the breast and detecting changes in temperature as a tumor begins to receive its own blood supply. A cancerous tumor will be warmer than the surrounding tissue and will stand out when the temperature of the breast is measured. Thermography appears to be a far more accurate way of detecting tumors, and at a much earlier stage.

References

1)    Miller AB. Twenty five year follow-up for breast cancer incidence and mortality of the Canadian National Breast Screening Study randomized screening trial. British Medical Journal. 2014;348:g366.

2)    Francis R. More on mammograms. Beyond Health News, March-April 2009.

3)    Alliance for Natural Health. The breast cancer industry is deceiving women. April 22, 2014.