A black and white look at breast cancer mortality
African and African-American women are more likely to die of breast cancer than their white counterparts because they tend to get the disease before the menopause, suggests new research from the University of East Anglia and the Children’s Hospital Boston in collaboration with researchers in the United States and Italy.
A racial disparity in mortality rates from breast cancer in the United States first appeared in the 1970s coinciding with the introduction of mammography. The new research, published in The International Journal of Surgery, posits that the reason for this is not reduced access to medical care, but because surgery in pre-menopausal women could encourage growth of the cancer.
The average age of breast cancer diagnosis in African-American women is 46, compared with 57 for European-Americans.
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