Friday, April 20, 2007

More Makeup = More Ugly Cancer?

(sorry, I don't know what's up with this font)
Yesterday, I attended a celebration for one of my heroes, Rachel Carson. There were two great presenters, Dianne Dumanoski
is the co-author of Our Stolen Future (www.ourstolenfuture.org), which continues the story begun by Carson in Silent Spring by describing (it's depressing!) how a wide range of synthetic chemicals can disrupt delicate hormonal systems. The other presenter was Dr.Julia Brody, the
Executive Director of Silent Spring Institute, a non-profit scientific research organization dedicated to identifying links between the environment and women's health (www.silentspring.org)

They were both pretty convincing showing how Rachel Carson's hypothesis that chemical exposure can cause DNA breaks that lead to breast cancer and other cancers has now been epidemiologically confirmed. That is, even if you have the "breast cancer gene" it's not a death sentence, first, the gene needs to get "switched on." And how do you do that? Pesticides! Plastics!

Chemicals in your cosmetics!

Check out this article from the Seventh Generation newsletter here.

5 comments:

  1. Stumbled across your blog and enjoyed....good to see dangers of cosmetics are starting to be taken more seriously. See Ecologist website for five beauty products to avoid:
    http://www.theecologist.org/archive_detail.asp?content_id=879
    And more on fragrances here:
    http://www.theecologist.org/archive_detail.asp?content_id=676

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the comment. And yes, the chemicals in fragrance can also screw up your hormones (besides giving you cancer) because they use pheremones. Ugh.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous5:32 AM

    Breast Cancer fundraisers
    Common Breast Cancer Myths

    The first myth pertaining to this disease is that it only affects women.

    Second myth that is associated with this disease is that if one has found a lump during an examination, it is cancer.

    Third is that it is solely hereditary

    The next myth associated with breast cancer is downright ridiculous. Would you believe, that in this day and age, some individuals still think that breast cancer is contagious?

    Conversely, some individuals foolishly believe that breast size determines whether or not one gets cancer.

    Finally, another myth that is associated with this disease is that it only affects older people. This is not so. Although the chance of getting breast cancer increases with age, women as young as 18 have been diagnosed with the disease.

    You can find a number of helpful informative articles on Breast Cancer fundraisers at breast-cancer1.com

    Breast Cancer fundraisers

    ReplyDelete