I read an interesting article today in On Fitness magazine about bras and breast cancer. The opening line was pretty compelling: "If 100 years ago, you went around announcing that smoking or sunlight causes cancer, you'd be laughed right out of the room - even by doctors."
The author interviewed Sydney Ross Singer, a medical anthropologist and director of the Institute for the Study of Culturogenic Disease in Hawaii. Singer says that bras restrict the lymphatic system and this constriction inhibits the ability of that system to remove toxins from the body. (The lymphatic system has no internal pressure and the tiny vessels are known to be easily compressed). Lymph blockage is known to cause some types of cancer.
Women tend to wear bras that don't fit right - if yours leaves red marks and indentations when you remove it, then you're constricting your lymphatic system in your breasts.
Singer and a team studied bras and breast cancer in 1991-1993, with over 4,700 US women participating in the study. Their results suggested that women who wear bras over 18 hours per day have 100 times greater risk of developing breast cancer than bra-free women. Where did they find the bra-free women to compare them to? Think National Geographic magazine! Aboriginals in Australia who have not been westernized, therefore do not wear bras, seem to have no problem with breast cancer. Maori women of New Zealand, who were completely westernized DID have the same high breast cancer rates as white New Zealand women. International statistics show that breast cancer is only a problem in cultures where there are bras.
Why isn't this being studied more? Apparently it is because the big pharmaceutical companies do a lot of the research funding - and there isn't money to be had in this. It's not developing a drug to line the pockets. What money is to be had in saying "don't wear your bra" even if it works? Many government funding sources are controlled by the drug companies as well (think lobbyists), and since studying whether something as simple as NOT wearing a bra can prevent breast cancer isn't a money-maker, no one is interested in funding that research.
I immediately thought of John Adams' daughter, Abigail, who died of breast cancer in 1813. Bras, as we know them, weren't invented yet - but here Nabby died of breast cancer. Well then, does this discount the bra theory? No - a small percentage of women (and even some men) do have a genetic predisposition to breast cancer. It appears that breast cancer did not become the epidemic that it is until the use of 20th century lingerie.
Singer says that it took 30 years for experts to believe in the smoking/lung cancer link and that we probably have another 18 years or so before they will accept the bra/breast cancer link.
Dr. Kerry Bennett, a breast cancer surgeon from Caritas St. Elizabeth's Medical Center in Boston agrees that bras compress the lymphatic system and that toxins build up in the breasts, that the lack of blood or lymph flow can increase that build up. She recommends that women wear bras that fit properly, that we stop wearing underwires, that we only wear sports bras during a sport activity and that we have a bra-free time each day.
So do you burn your bra now... or do you, again, think of National Geographic and those saggy-boobed natives? This is one of those things were vanity might just get the best of us! Now, I'm sure a bit of that sag is because those bra-less women aren't doing chest presses, pec flys and pushups to hold the girls up - and they probably just don't have our western drive to keep them perky. I'm leaning toward the vain side - the thought of sagging, bagging and bouncing un-neatly just isn't super appealing. However, thinking back to Singer's research, it was the women who wore their bras 18 hours a day that had the greatest increase in risk.
If you want to help the fight against breast cancer, consider buying a T-shirt from Save the Tatas which gives a portion of their gross sales "to carefully researched cancer fighting organizations."
If you're not going to burn your bra, Champion is having their semi-annual sports bra sale. $19.99 - and they are GREAT. Coupon code XC18BB will get you free shipping.
~o~
Today's workout: 1 hour 32 minutes P90X yoga. It felt GREAT.
 | Sports bras are great...comfortable and non-restrictive. See the flower children in the 60s were being very sensible! Not to mention healthy!! LOL. |
 | If I'm at home, my bra is not to be found. It goes on when I have to go out. Yes, I'm aware of boob sag, but, hey, I'm 55 years old, they already sag, but that's my problem. I'd rather have saggy ones than diseased ones. I have fibro cystic breast disease, and I certainly don't need to clolg up the lymph system. Both times I had flare-ups, were during periods where I had to wear a bra for hours every day, and didn't bother to take it off when I got home. So, it seems like there might just be some logic in this study. I haven't had a problem in years because I haven't had to weara bra for hours every day in years. |
 | Nice blog. I'm not ready to burn my boulder holders but I try not to wear bras when I'm at home doing nothing. |
 | I am with lowercase, I wear the bra strickly when out in public... other times I am free to bounce or sway any way I please. I hate bras no matter whether or not they fit...
I am not going to burn my bra... just tuck it neatly in a drawer on hang it on the peg, till I need it. |
 | I read something like this awhile back and since I hate wearing one I decided not to unless I have to. This makes sense. It constricts parts of your body right around your breast. Lymph nodes are there too and they remove the toxins and stuff in our systems. I never thought of a bra being the cause of that but once I read that , it made total sense. So now around the house I dont wear one and if I can get away with it when Im out I just wear a camisole. There are a few things that you just need a bra for so then Ill wear it but I hate the darn things . They are NEVER comfy. |
 | Being a man i may have less chance than a female of getting breast cancer but we are still subject to the same diease, it is unfortunate that anyonehas to die of any form of cancer. Remember back when in victorian times and beyond just before the invition of the modern bra there was that nasty thing called the corest. So women then may have been dying of breast cancer but they may have not known what it was. My wife also lets eveything hang when at home and wheres one in public. And as explained to me by the females in my family that pride has to do with how a bra is picked. I hope in time that the medical filled and the designers or that torture devise will get together and design a bra that not only does it job but also does not compremise the health of women. |
 | The flower children were being sensible...but I bet gravity wasn't kind to them! I do have to agree that saggy is better than diseased...but I'm not ready for mine to head south. :) Therefore, natural support is necessary:
chest press - flat bench, decline and incline
pec flys - flat bench, decline and incline
push ups in many varieties
dumbbell pullovers
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| It would be great if designers were into doing more than creating attractive cleavage!
Thank God corsets went out of style. |
 | Going braless, for my ta tas would be just as dangerous, because of the black eyes I'd get! :) |
 | riihele wrote on Apr 15, edited on Apr 15 Hei Glynis
Very interesting article indeed.
Hmmm, the food and diet, as in what one eats, the environment and how pure it is, et cetera,
are more causes to diseases of all kinds, i'd say than the bra itself -- in this case - breast cancer.
I have days when at home when i do not wear the thingie; great to know that it is sooo healthy! :)_)
Take good care. Rii :)
PS
I worked in the hospital in Sweden that is connected to the Nobel Prize in medicine, and in this hospital the dietician always came to 'see' all the patients -- even before the doctor, to find out what the people were eating. One time i asked the dietician for the 'why' to this custom of seeing the patients before the doctor, and the answer was that people eat themselves ill gettin all kinds of diseases due to the foods they stuff down their gullets!
Every patient's diet was drastically changed, and they got detailed instructions home what to eat and so on with recipes and all. I too changed my own eating habits then and there, actually. |
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Going braless, for my ta tas would be just as dangerous, because of the black eyes I'd get! :) 