Deodorants parabens aluminum and cancer

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Parabens and Aluminum are common ingredients in cosmetics particularly deodorants. In the laboratory these can stimulate breast and uterus cancer cells. This stimulation causes them to grow faster and become more aggressive. Two clinical studies have demonstrated greater quantities of parabens and aluminum in the outer upper part of the breast (near the arm pit) in regular users of deodorants.

 
Although there is no direct evidence that these can contribute to the risk of breast or uterus cancer many people are understandably concerned that their regular use over long periods of time could be harmful. Of course we are are constantly surrounded similar chemicals, collectively called xenoestrogens and other carcinogenic chemicals so the risk has to be put in perspective with other lifestyle factors.

Other sources of xenoestrogens

More details It is difficult to avoid these chemicals in a modern environment and as they are ingested in small quantities over long periods of time, many researchers feel they could contribute to some of the hormone effects which are becoming more common in humans. Dr. Devra Lee Davis, a toxicologist, and researchers from five other USA academics centres demonstrated that if the same estrogenic pollutants in our environment are given in higher quantities to laboratory mice, they induce and promote mammary cancers. A further study in 1993 showed that rhesus monkeys developed a thickened uterus (the first stages to develop cancer) and endometriosis after being fed food that contained dioxin, a xenoestrogen, over a four-year period. A fact worth noting is that 70 years ago, when the environment was free of estrogenic pollutants, there were only 21 reported cases of endometriosis versus the current 5.5 million in North America alone. Both endocrinologists (specialists in disorders of endocrine glands such as ovaries and testes) and reproductive biologists have suggested that long-term exposure to xenoestrogens might underlie the rise in endometriosis, fibroids, infertility and breast cancer in women. In men, many scientists believe that estrogenic pollutants underlie some disturbing trends such as decreasing sperm count and function, decreasing testosterone production and rise in the rate of testicular cancer. 

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