Abortion Lobby in Australian Press Shaken Up About Dr. Angela Lanfranchi's Speech at World Conference of Families

Karen Malec
Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer August 13, 2014
Reproduced with Permission

Much to the chagrin of hardened abortion enthusiasts in Australia, a firestorm has erupted in that nation over scientific evidence supporting the abortion-breast cancer (ABC) link and an internationally renowned expert who will speak at the upcoming the World Congress of Families conference. The abortion lobby is unnerved because the conference features as one of its speakers Angela Lanfranchi, MD, FACS, a respected breast cancer surgeon and expert on the link. She and Patrick Fagan, Ph.D. authored a 50,000 word paper in 2014 that reviewed the biological reasons why women who have abortions are left with more places for cancers to start and analyzed nearly 60 years of epidemiologic research on the cancer connection.[1]

The abortion lobby's propagandists in the mass media are pressuring politicians not to acknowledge the link publicly (i.e. Member of Parliament for Stretton Freya Ostapovitch ), even though accepted breast cancer risk factors include delayed first full term pregnancy, small family size, childlessness and little or no breastfeeding.[2] Even an eighth grader could recognize that abortion causes women to forfeit the risk-reducing effects of full term pregnancy, but somehow cancer authorities, like the U.S. National Cancer Institute and the American Cancer Society, can't seem to grasp that simple fact. They should hire a few eighth graders.

Furthermore, Joel Brind, Ph.D., a professor of biology and endocrinology at Baruch College, City University of New York, recently authored an article for the Australian e-journal, On Line Opinion , indicating that he knows of at least a dozen studies in South Asia published in the last six years.[3] All of them, but two are statistically significant; and the twelve studies report an average risk increase of 5.54-fold among women who'd had induced abortions. Brind observed that South Asia is an ideal place to examine the ABC link because the women there do not generally practice a Western lifestyle, i.e. cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, delayed first full term pregnancy, little or no breastfeeding, small family size, and use of contraceptive steroids, such as the birth control pill. Breast cancer rates are low and few variables have to be controlled in studies conducted on women living in South Asia, contrary to studies conducted here in the West. For these reasons, the ABC link comes across loud and clear in South Asia when women with abortions are compared with traditional women in these countries.

Senior minister Eric Abetz backed off his statement , "I think the studies, and I think they date back from the 1950s, assert that there is a link between abortion and breast cancer."[4] However, heavy criticism was leveled at him by other cabinet ministers and the Australian Medical Association, which "has a dog in this fight" because five women in the U.S. and Australia have successfully sued abortionists who failed to warn them about the risks of breast cancer and emotional harm.

According to the Australian Associated Press (AAP) even Health Minister Peter Dutton denied the link. Either he has neglected to educate himself about the grave risks associated with what is perhaps the most common elective surgical procedure, or he's lying to the public for the sake of political expediency. In either case, he is failing the women whose health he's supposed to protect.

The AAP repeatedly states in its story that Dr. Lanfranchi's views are "not medically accepted." That has little importance in light of the historical record. Countless medical and science experts have been persecuted by their colleagues for their revolutionary scientific findings which contradict established views. Medical and science authorities have historically "dragged their feet," and watched thousands die; and very often, decades pass before they have finally accepted cutting edge research. History is replete with examples of maverick scientists and physicians who were severely ridiculed and called "charlatans" and "crackpots" by their colleagues, before their research was accepted. Some of them include:

Gerard Nadal, Ph.D. lamented in an article posted on his blog how the very people the public trusts and pays to protect their health have allowed themselves to be influenced by political orthodoxies. He repeated Nobel Laureate and chemist, Dr. John Polanyi's warning that scientific discovery takes place only in societies that allow the freedom of intellectual pursuit of the truth. Where induced abortion is concerned, the U.S. and Australia do not fit the definition of that kind of society.[5]

Efforts have been mounted to embarrass State Attorney-General Robert Clark into not attending the World Congress of Families conference. An article in the newspaper, The Age , by Josh Gordon includes a headline that labels the conference as a "hardline pro-life event."[6] You really have to watch out for those hardline families these days. They are extremely dangerous people!

Gordon trumpeted a 17-year-old Danish study as evidence that abortion doesn't raise risk, although far more epidemiologic studies, two meta-analyses conducted in 1996 and 2014, and biological and experimental evidence support an independent link between abortion and the disease (meaning that, aside from causing women to lose the protective effect of childbearing, abortion raises risk beyond that by leaving the breasts with more places for cancers to start). Gordon conveniently neglected to inform his readers that, although the Danish study showed no overall increase in risk, researchers found a statistically significant 89% risk elevation among women with abortions after 18 weeks gestation. In addition, the study received considerable criticism for having had serious flaws, i.e. misclassifying 60,000 women who'd had abortions as not having had abortions.[1,6-8]

Wendy Tuohy at Melbourne's Herald Sun was also bent out of shape over the World Conference of Families. She, too, called delegates to the conference "hardline," thereby raising the suspicion that both she and Gordon were relying on abortion lobby talking points. Her headline screamed, "Why are we supporting abortion scaremongers?"[9] Members of the press didn't label doctors and scientists, who reported on alcohol and obesity as risk factors for the disease, as "scaremongers." When did it become disgraceful to warn people to avoid a preventable risk factor for the disease? Tobacco executives used the scaremongering label against their critics in an attempt to silence them about the tobacco-cancer link.

Undoubtedly, efforts will be made to embarrass South Australia Senator Bob Day, too. He had the temerity to announce in a press release on August 9, 2014 that "Abortion-breast cancer claims must be investigated." He said:

"I have a science background. One of the central principles of science is not to prove something is right, but to prove something is wrong....As a former Science Technician and now Parliamentarian, I call upon the medical science community to disprove this claimed link....I acknowledge that breast cancer happens for a great many reasons. I am not for a moment suggesting all cases of breast cancer arise for this reason - nobody is saying that, and I am challenging the medical community to disprove this particular alleged linkage to some cases of breast cancer."[10]

The Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer applauds Senator Bob Day's courage.


References:

Top