ENVIRONMENTAL AND OCCUPATIONAL POLLUTANTS ARE AVOIDABLE CAUSES OF BREAST-CANCER

For over three decades, evidence has accumulated relating avoidable ex posures to environmental and occupational carcinogens to the escalatin g incidence of breast cancer in the United States and other major indu strialized nations. This evidence has until very recently been totally ignored by the cancer establishment, the National Cancer Institute, a nd the American Cancer Society, despite expenditures of over $1 billio n on breast cancer research. Recognition of these environmental and oc cupational risk factors should lead to the belated development of publ ic health policies directed to the primary prevention of breast cancer . Their recognition should also lend urgency to the need for radical r eforms in the priorities and leadership of the cancer establishment.