Growth Hormone and Milk
Re “A Needless New Risk of Breast Cancer,” Commentary, March 20:
It was an egregious disservice to all consumers, and especially to women concerned about breast cancer, for The Times to have provided a forum for Samuel S. Epstein’s widely rejected attacks on the safety of bovine somatotropin (BST).
Epstein has so little credibility in the cancer research community that its major scientific organizations tire of responding to his many charges. Prompted by his most recent statements on BST, the American Cancer Society recently issued a statement declaring: “Extensive testing and research has shown that rBST is indistinguishable from natural bovine growth hormone and thus entails no risk for consumers. There are no valid scientific findings to indicate a risk of human carcinogenesis.”
In a written response to Epstein, the Food and Drug Administration was equally direct: “Claims that IGF-1 in milk could result in premature development of breasts in young children and breast cancer in adults are not only not substantiated in the scientific literature, but, in fact, have no basis in science.”
The harmless but scary-sounding insulin-growth factor (IGF-1) Epstein refers to is simply a medical term for a protein that is naturally found in cow’s milk, human milk, and saliva and other human body fluids. (All milk contains several natural, safe and completely digestible hormones.) But more to the point, the FDA has concluded from detailed studies that IGF-1 is not increased.
In short, neither BST nor IGF-1 poses any breast cancer health risk. But in printing Epstein’s latest pseudoscientific charge, The Times has caused untold scores of women to mistakenly believe something is dangerously wrong with their milk. The “needless new risk,” as your paper titled the article, isn’t BST or IGF-1--it’s the misinformation printed by newspapers that are either unwilling or unable to determine the veracity of the facts they provide their readers.
VIRGINIA V. WELDON MD
Senior Vice President, Monsanto
St. Louis
