Breast cancer fall linked to women abandoning HRT

Millions worldwide have abandoned hormone replacement therapy to treat menopausal symptoms since safety scares five years ago.

Scientists at the University of California looked at breast cancer rates among women who had received screening between 1997 and 2003.

They collected data on more than 600,000 mammograms performed on those aged 50 to 69, says a report in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

And they found HRT use declined by 7 per cent a year between 2001 and 2002, then by 34 per cent between 2002 and 2003.

Over the same period, breast cancer rates declined annually by 5 per cent, with forms of the disease sensitive to hormones dropping by 13 per cent a year from 2001 to 2003.

The report says: "Our results suggest that a decline in postmenopausal hormone therapy use has contributed to the decline in breast cancer incidence in the U.S."

The U.S. Women's Health Initiative claimed in 2002 that women using HRT were at higher risk of heart disease and strokes - contrary-to previous research which suggested oestrogen could protect them from heart problems.

A British study the following year found a higher risk of breast cancer in women taking HRT for more than five years.

Last year a team from Texas University suggested the scare led to a 7 per cent fall in new breast cancer cases in 2003 because women gave up HRT.

There was a drop of 12 per cent among women aged 50 to 69 diagnosed with forms of the disease that are sensitive to hormones.

However, there has been no similar fall in breast cancer rates in the UK despite an estimated one million women giving up HRT.

Figures from the Office of National Statistics show a rise in breast cancer between 2003 and 2004.

In 2003 there were 36,509 cases in England and Wales, a rate of 120.3 per 100,000 women, which went up to 36,939 cases in 2004, a rate of 120.8.

Dr John Stevenson, consultant metabolic physician at the Royal Brompton Hospital London, warned that the U.S. study did not actually show a pivotal moment in 2002 when breast cancer fell at a faster rate.

He said: "The figures don't prove the case they are making, which also relies on the biologically impossible premise that if HRT is responsible for the breast cancer it disappears when women stop using it."