Breaking news on breast cancer

One of the most frightening facts of breast cancer is that two people may have the same diagnosis at the same stage, get the same treatment and then have remarkably different outcomes. One consequence of this is that while there is a lot of talk about cures for breast cancer, many women regard the diagnosis as a conditional death sentence.

An article published today online in Nature looks as though it will give us the tools to understand why outcomes vary and what different treatments can help those headed toward a worse outcome. The findings seem also to be well explained in the New York Times.

Two other types of breast cancer, accounting for most cases of the disease, arise from the luminal cells that line milk ducts. These cancers have proteins on their surfaces that grab estrogen, fueling their growth. Just about everyone with estrogen-fueled cancer gets the same treatment. Some do well. Others do not.

The genetic analysis divided luminal cancers into two distinct subtypes. The luminal A subtype had good prognoses while luminal B did not, suggesting that perhaps patients with luminal A tumors might do well with just hormonal therapy to block estrogen from spurring their cancers while luminal B patients might do better with chemotherapy in addition to hormonal therapy.

In some cases, genetic aberrations were so strongly associated with one or the other luminal subtype that they appeared to be the actual cause of the cancer, said Dr. Charles Perou of the University of North Carolina, who is the lead author of the study. And he called that “a stunning finding.”

“We are really getting at the roots of these cancers,” he said.

It looks as though there are going to have to be clinical trials, but there are a number of breast cancer types with discouraging statistics, and now we can hope those can be much more effectively treated soon. As far as I can see, these include ones for which some women have prophylactic mastectomies, since if you carry the gene for them having your breasts removed may be the best option.

Should we give them credit for trying?

A famous celebrity gains 25 pounds. Anderson Cooper seems to maintain a fairly reasonable attitude; some others try. Some of the youtube videos are sickening. Unfortunately, this seems to be a good case in which tHe media attention is the main message:



From Lady Gaga herself, sort of:

Anderson Cooper:

Notice the negative words in the beginning of this one:

A woman US presidential candidate in 1872!

From the NY Times:

On Sept. 23, 1838, Victoria Clafin Woodhull Martin, who ran for United States president in 1872, was born. Following her death on June 9, 1927, her obituary appeared in The Times

The obituary describes a remarkable woman.

New limits on women’s access to education in Iran

Women have achieved great educational attainment in Iran, and currently make up about 60% of univeristy students, but new restrictions seem to be aimed at undercutting this.

More than 30 universities have introduced new rules banning female students from almost 80 different degree courses.

These include a bewildering variety of subjects from engineering, nuclear physics and computer science, to English literature, archaeology and business.

While only some of Iran’s universities have actually instituted the limits, this will surely have more wide-ranging effects, as women interested in the relevant majors will be competing for spots at other universities. It’s unclear why the limits have been instituted, but several news sources have cited the Iranian administration’s concern about declining birth rates and the prominent role women played in the Tehran protests.

Read more here.