The pill and cervical cancer risk

LONDON - Women taking the birth control pill have a slightly higher risk of cervical cancer, but that risk disappears a decade after they stop taking it, scientists say.

International researchers reported Friday in the British medical journal The Lancet that women who took the pill for at least five years had nearly double the cervical cancer risk of women who had never taken the pill.

But that risk is small and outweighed by the fact that the pill reduces the threat of other forms of cancer, The Lancet report said.

Full story here.

This news story brings me back to the issue of giving out contraceptive pills to middle school girls as young as 11.

When you start taking the pill at 11, how long do you think they will be taking it for? As long as they are sexually actually active and that could be till they are in their 30s or even later.

Have there been studies conducted on the effects of taking the pill at such an early age?

Women who have had multiple sex partners are more at risk to cervical cancer than those who have had one or two. Imagine girls being sexually active since they were 11? How many sex partners do you think they will have had by age 30?

So now, not only do young sexually active girls have to worry about contracting cervical cancer due to their promiscuous lifestyle, the pill which is supposed to protect them from unwanted pregnancies, increases their risk of contracting cervical cancer too.

I may be old-fashioned but being old fashioned and abstaining from a promiscuous lifestyle is a lot safer than the alternative.