October is breast cancer awareness month and everywhere you look you'll see the pink ribbon along with products to sell and corporate logos. Breast cancer is a popular subject these days. That's because it strikes so many women and very often, the cause is unknown.

This year, a new message will be added to the old familiar ones. Pro-life groups across Canada have launched a national advertising campaign to alert Canadians about the increased risk of breast cancer for women who have had abortions.

The billboards, in 35 cities across Canada , have a simple message: “Stop the cover-up. AbortionBreastCancer.ca.” The signs are designed to send Canadians to the website to learn more about the biology, the research and the cover-up surrounding the ABC risk.

Cover-up?

That's right. There are over 10,000 abortions done each year in Alberta , more than 105,000 nationally, and yet it's a good bet that none of those women are told about the risk. There are over 50 studies that have demonstrated the ABC risk yet none of the cancer agencies, medical groups or government health agencies include abortion as a risk factor.

Abortion increases a woman's breast cancer risk by about 30% although among very young women, or women who have never had a child or those with a family history of breast cancer, the risk is even higher.

What possible link could there be between abortion and breast cancer? First, it is an undisputed fact that women who delay their first full-term pregnancy increase their risk of breast cancer. Obviously, any childless woman who has an abortion is delaying a full-term pregnancy. Beyond this well-established risk, however, is another that has been identified by researchers.

Exposure to estrogen is a risk factor for breast cancer. When a woman gets pregnant, her breasts are flooded with estrodiol (a form of estrogen) in preparation for transforming the immature, undifferentiated cells to mature, milk-producing ones. This process is only completed after 32 weeks of pregnancy. If the pregnancy is terminated earlier—and most abortions occur in the first 12 weeks—the breast tissues are left in an immature state and vulnerable to cancer. (Pregnancies that end in early spontaneous abortion or miscarriage, are not associated with an increased cancer risk because hormone levels are generally not elevated to the same degree as in 'normal' pregnancies.)

If all this is true and there are over 50 international studies from peer-reviewed journals, why don't women know about it?

That is a great question and one which should be directed to every provincial and federal health minister, every provincial College of Physicians and Surgeons, every cancer group that talks about breast cancer and every doctor and clinic that performs abortions.

Health Canada , for example, in a long list of risk factors, advises women to avoid pesticides even though it admits there is no compelling evidence that they increase the risk of breast cancer. Yet it ignores the dozens of studies that show an elevated risk from abortion.

The Canadian Cancer Society denies any link between abortion and breast cancer and in doing so ignores its own precautionary principle which states: “When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause-and-effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.”

Abortion is a sacred principle in Canada . Anyone who challenges its benefits is hounded and reviled. Big corporate donors, professional organizations and government officials all want to be seen as caring and supportive of women and their “rights.”

In this case, however, they are abandoning women, patronizing them and denying them life-saving information. Where will they all be, I wonder, when the lawsuits start? Three lawsuits, two in the U.S. and one in Australia , have resulted in awards to the plaintiffs because they were not warned of the ABC link. Several U.S. states now require doctors to tell women about the increased risk.

It's called informed consent and it is a well established principle in Canadian common law and in most provincial statutes. Well-established, that is, unless you are female and considering abortion. Then, the presumption is, “Don't worry your pretty little head.”

Canadian women deserve better.