Breast cancer activism shifted from cure toward prevention via EJ alliances

Evidence

In the San Francisco Bay Area, the women’s organization Breast Cancer Action has shifted from focusing on a cure for breast cancer to focusing on prevention of the disease. Its members are women who have had breast cancer, and they recognize that the cure can be as devastating as the disease for many women. In a fusion that has national implications, the group is linking up with environmental justice activists to challenge the use of endocrine-disrupting chemicals by industry. Breast Cancer Action has worked with Bay Area environmental justice groups like Greenaction and Communities for a Better Environment to sponsor an annual “Cancer Industry Tour” of downtown San Francisco, including stops at Chevron (accused of dumping dioxin, a carcinogen, into San Francisco Bay), Bechtel (accused of constructing polluting nuclear reactors), and the EPA (accused of not stopping pollution). — Luke W. Cole and Sheila R. Foster, From the Ground Up, 720 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

The decline in many diseases after World War II, thanks to the development of vaccines and powerful new antibiotics, both raised public expectations in health and longevity and shifted the public’s focus to preventive care and to diseases, such as cancer, potentially linked to environmental pollution. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 255 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Environmental problems manifest larger structural problems, so EJ must fuse movements; Women’s health groups shifted from cure to prevention by allying with EJ activists — Luke W. Cole and Sheila R. Foster, From the Ground Up: Environmental…, 720; Postwar vaccine-driven disease declines turned public fear toward pollution-linked cancers. — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 255

Related

• Women’s health groups shifted from cure to prevention by allying with EJ activists (similarity 0.93)

Broader Connections

• Women’s health groups shifted from cure to prevention by allying with EJ activists #corroborates (0.98) — Luke W. Cole and Sheila R. Foster, From the Ground Up, 720
• Postwar vaccine-driven disease declines turned public fear toward pollution-linked cancers. #expands (0.72) — Richard J. Lazarus, The Making of Environmental Law, 255