Contraceptive pill could reduce risk of breast cancer

SYDNEY - Young women who have a family history of breast cancer could substantially reduce their risk of developing the disease by taking the contraceptive pill, according to new research.

The study of some 2,000 women with a genetic mutation placing them at high risk of developing breast cancer showed they were about four times less likely to contract the disease if they used the pill, lead Australian researcher Professor John Hopper said on Thursday.

The research found that women with the BRCA1 genetic mutation, and therefore a 40 to 80 percent chance of developing breast cancer, reduced their risk to 10 to 20 percent if they used oral contraceptives.

The study surveyed women in Australia, the United States and Canada found that the results were the same in each country.

Researchers say they don’t understand how the hormones present in the pill interact in the body to lessen the risk of the cancer but they are supported by a previous study, which found that use of the pill reduced the risk of ovarian cancer.

“These findings are important because women who carry a mutation in BRCA1 or BRCA2 (another gene linked to breast cancer) are also at increased risk of ovarian cancer,” Hopper said.

The finding has surprised researchers at the University of Melbourne who had presumed the pill would have a harmful influence.

“We conducted the study expecting the effect in the opposite direction,” said Hopper, who works at the university’s Centre for Genetic Epidemiology.

While Hopper is cautious about the findings, he said they could have major implications for those women whose genetic make-up places them at high-risk of developing breast or ovarian cancer and currently have no other means of preventing the disease except surgery.