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Poisoned By the Pill

January 19, 2011

 

As Catholic medical students, it is important that we are able to explain our reluctance (and some may say abhorrence) at prescribing contraceptives.  In order to penetrate the societal fog that has engulfed our generation, we must be able to explain our position from medical and experiential perspective.  I hope that this article will help elucidate some of those points.

Poisoned by the Pill: Truths about Chemical Contraception

January 17th, 2011 by Mary Anne Moresco 

Do we know what are we doing?  Obstetricians, whose job it is to help usher new life into the world, display birth control advertisements on their waiting room end tables and walls, the way one’s Aunt Matilda might once have displayed dear family photos.  The secular news media, whose job it is to objectively report information, has exalted 50 years of “the pill” as an emancipating wonder for women, dismissing the mass suffering connected to this pill—and acting as if there were not multitudes of women right now agonizing on their deathbeds as a direct result of having taken this drug.  It is as if our culture has blindfolded its eyes, as if we could not bear to see the truths connected with this potentially deadly pill.

The recent conference “50 Years of the Pill,” held in Washington D.C. on December 3, 2010, and sponsored by Human Life International, was about bringing forth these truths.  For me, attending this conference was like going on an expedition—an expedition to unearth the truths about the birth control pill and its impact upon women and society.  The conference featured great Catholic scientists, nurses, doctors, priests, teachers and other professionals to guide us along the way.

One startling truth which was brought to light was that hormonal contraceptives have been declared a Group 1 carcinogen[1] by the World Health Organization (WHO).  A carcinogen is a substance that causes cancer, by causing changes in the DNA structure of cells.  Estrogen-progestogen contraceptives have achieved the dubious distinction of sharing this carcinogenic ranking with such toxic substances as arsenic, asbestos and plutonium.  But unlike arsenic, asbestos, plutonium and other Group 1 carcinogens, this is one carcinogen for which doctors will gladly write prescriptions for perfectly healthy women.  It may be true that some women can take the pill with no ill effects.  But for many otherwise healthy women, these drugs are deadly.

Dangers and Statistics

Many of the dangers of the pill are listed on the package insert.  One conference speaker suggested we visit our local “friendly” pharmacy and ask to see this insert for ourselves:  “If you hold one end of the insert high up, the other end will drop to the floor,” she warned.
A nurse at the conference described her visit to a stroke unit.  Amidst the elderly faces, there were also young girls.  “Why are they here?”  She inquired.  She was then told that they “had been on the pill.”  How easy it is to ignore that there are real lives that will ultimately succumb to the side effects listed on the pill’s package insert.   The statistics are startling:

• According to the Journal of American Medicine, using birth control doubles one’s risk of stroke.
• According to the National Cancer Institute one in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer at some point in their lives.[2]
• The National Cancer Institute estimates that in 2010, 39,840 women will die of breast cancer.  The institute also estimates that in 2010, 207,090 will be diagnosed with breast cancer.[3]
• According to the Mayo Clinic Research, if a woman uses hormonal contraception for at least four years before her first full-term pregnancy she is at a 52% greater risk for developing breast cancer.[4]
• According to the International Agency of Research on Cancer, if a woman uses a hormonal contraceptive for more than five years, she becomes four times more likely to develop cervical cancer.
• According to the National Cancer Institute, black women, who are between the ages of 20 and 50, are twice as likely to die of breast cancer as white women with the disease.  This is because black women are more vulnerable to “triple-negative” cancers which are more deadly.[5]
• Breast cancer has increased 660 percent since 1973.  At the conference, Dr. Angela Lanfranchi[6] (breast cancer surgeon) linked this increase with the use of hormonal contraception.[7]

Defenders of the pill like to retort that hormonal contraceptives can lower the risk of ovarian and endometrial cancer.  But comparatively few women get endometrial and ovarian cancer to begin with compared to the one in eight who will get breast cancer.  The numbers are far from an even exchange.  If a woman is eager to lower her risk of endometrial and ovarian cancer, this can be done through exercise and diet.  Specific research indicates:

• The risk of endometrial cancer can be reduced through a diet high in fiber, retinol, b-carotene, vitamin C and vitamin E, and by avoiding animal fats and proteins.[8]
• The risk of ovarian cancer[9] can be reduced through a diet high in vegetables, fruits, beans and tea.

We women don’t need to ingest carcinogenic drugs to lower our risk of endometrial and ovarian cancer.  (For women already battling breast cancer, an excellent book entitled: A bend in the Road: A Year’s Journey Through Breast Cancer, by Karen Kelly Boyce, provides important nutritional information for healing of this disease.)

Poisons are Profitable

Hormonal contraception is a carcinogenic and potent drug.  High doses of these drugs are needed to mimic pregnancy in the body and thus prevent pregnancy.  It’s not normal for the body to function with such high levels of these hormones, especially over a prolonged period of time spanning many years.[10]

Webster’s defines poison as: “Any agent which, when introduced into the animalorganism, is capable of producing a morbid, noxious, or deadly effect upon it.”  The pill is poisoning many women.  Hormonal contraception poisons women in one of two ways.  They:

• Cause Growth in breast tissue which in turn causes cellular mutations and ultimately cancer.
• Act as a Direct Carcinogen directly causing cancerous cells to form.[11]

Each year, thousands of cases of cancer can be attributed to hormonal contraception.[12]Any other drug (or heaven forbid natural supplement) which had been linked to so much cancer would have been yanked from the market long ago. But evil can grow strong roots once an industry falls in love with profit.

Now that this has happened, yanking (or even more carefully prescribing these carcinogenic drugs) might seem impossible.  Birth control pills carry an economic incentive that has blurred society’s desire to do right.  The billion dollar pharmaceutical business is booming.

Read the rest at Catholic Exchange.