Study of environment link to cancer urged

WASHINGTON -- A congressional hearing on breast cancer research overflowed Wednesday with young women waiting to glimpse Sheryl Crow -- but the Grammy winner said the real "rock star" in the room was Rep. Sue Myrick.

Crow praised the Charlotte Republican's efforts to draw attention to cancer research. Both women survived breast cancer, and Myrick is a co-leader of a congressional cancer caucus.

"I want to know what causes this disease," Crow said in testimony before the House Energy and Commerce Committee's health subcommittee. "We need to put more resources into figuring out what the environment has to do with breast cancer."

Crow, who was diagnosed with cancer in 2006, joined Myrick in supporting a bill that would allow more federal money to be directed toward studying environmental influences on the second-leading killer of women.

"It is critical that we examine potential environmental causes of breast cancer," said Myrick, who fought the disease in 1999 and has since championed more funding and better access to prevention and early detection.

Researchers are studying whether people become more susceptible to developing breast cancer from unknown environmental factors during certain periods of their lives.

"This approach stems from the knowledge that there are specific windows of time that physiologic changes to the mammary gland occur," said Dr. Deborah Winn, associate director of the Epidemiology and Genetics Research Program at the National Cancer Institute. "Exposures that occur during gestation, puberty, pregnancy and lactation may influence the risk of developing breast cancer."

Nearly 200,000 American women are expected to be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008.

The National Cancer Institute partnered with the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in 2003 to fund four centers that examine the link between breast cancer and the environment. Researchers there are focusing on exposure during early life.

One study involves Bisphenol A, a chemical added to plastics like water bottles.

"Trying to determine what in our environment causes breast cancer is challenging," said Dr. H. Kim Lyerly, director of the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center. "It is important to focus significant resources on these issues."