Great Lakes Article:

A new study finds that Wisconsin women who eat sport-caught fish are no more likely to be diagnosed with breast cancer than those who don’t.

But the study of 1,481 women suggests that if PCBs and other contaminants in sport-caught fish are causing breast cancer, pre-menopausal women may be at the greatest risk.

"Something about their exposures may have a different effect on their risk of getting breast cancer - it’s completely hypothetical," said Jane McElroy, a scientist at the University of Wisconsin Comprehensive Cancer Center in Madison.

McElroy led a team of researchers in the survey study of the self-reported fish-consumption habits of women ages 20 to 69 diagnosed with breast cancer between 1996 and 2000.

The researchers determined that the cancer victims were overall no more likely than members of a similarly sized control group of noncancer victims to report eating sport-caught fish from the Great Lakes and inland Wisconsin waterways.

But researchers identified a small subset of 98 women under the age of 40 in the study whose fish-consumption habits appeared statistically correlated to their breast cancers.

"If you’re going to do more sophisticated research this would be a good group to focus on," said Dr. Henry Anderson, chief medical officer with the state Division of Public Health and one of the study’s co-authors. "It’s an interesting finding that we think deserves follow-up."

A more sophisticated study might include blood or tissue samples to determine the presence of contaminants in cancer victims - a step that was beyond the scope of the current study, the researchers said.

The average age of menopause is 51. Hormonal changes that take place in menopausal women may play a role in mitigating the effects of contaminants that isn’t yet understood, the researchers said.

"I think the take-home message is that people should pay attention to the fish advisories," McElroy said.

Wisconsin issues annual fish advisories for waters polluted with mercury, which hasn’t been implicated in human cancer, and polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, which the federal Environmental Protection Agency lists as a probable human carcinogen.

Polychlorinated biphenyls are persistent, manmade chemicals that were widely used by industry. Paper companies along the Fox River released them into the river in the manufacturing and recycling of carbonless paper in the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s.

The state issues no fish advisories for polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs - flame retardants that are turning up in Great Lakes fish in levels that have alarmed biologists.

McElroy and Anderson said the study method they employed means researchers can’t say for certain whether there is a link between sport-caught fish consumption and breast cancer.

"That isn’t to say that PCBs or others might not be correlated in a more sophisticated study," Anderson said.

Rebecca Katers, who directs the Green Bay-based Clean Water Action Council of Northeast Wisconsin, pointed to a growing body of evidence that implicates PCBs and similar contaminants in human diseases.

"We can’t continue to play games with these chemicals, release them into the environment and hope for the best," Katers said.

Anderson, the chief medical authority behind Wisconsin’s fish advisories, successfully lobbied for toughened standards for mercury contamination in 2001, but said that nothing in the present study would cause him to recommend more changes.