Is Susan G. Komen Denying the BPA-Breast Cancer Link?

Title: Is Susan G. Komen Denying the BPA-Breast Cancer Link?

Author: Amy Silverstein

Publication:  Mother Jones

Publication Date: October 3, 2011

If you’ve ever bought something pink to support breast cancer research, there’s a good chance a portion of the money went to Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the largest nonprofit in the world solely dedicated to eradicating the disease. Famous for its fundraising races and pink gear, the foundation has been fighting breast cancer for three decades. So it may come as a surprise that Komen has posted statements on its website that dismiss links between the common chemical bisphenol A (BPA) and breast cancer, even while funding research that explores that possible connection.

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Mammograms, diet & exercise will not end the epidemic

Title: Mammograms, diet & exercise will not end the epidemic

Author: Karuna Jaggar

Publication: Think Before You Pink blog / Breast Cancer Action

Publication Date:  September 13, 2011

In anticipation of National Breast Cancer Awareness Month this October, Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s CEO Nancy Brinker is calling for “less talk, more action” on breast cancer. I am struck by how similar the urged “action” looks to what the organization has been advocating for years. Komen’s “take action” emphasis continues to be on individual women getting annual mammograms.

At Breast Cancer Action, we bring a markedly different understanding of what action we all need to take—for ourselves, each other, our mothers, daughters, and granddaughters—to truly end the breast cancer epidemic. Komen’s faith in mammograms to bring the “end to breast cancer” is misplaced.

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Greed, Cancer and Pink KFC Buckets

Title: Greed, Cancer and Pink KFC Buckets

Author: John Robbins

Publication: Huffington Post

Publication Date: May 17, 2010

“We live in a world of profound contradictions. Some things are just unbelievably strange. At times I feel like I’ve found a way to adapt to the weirdness of the world, and then along comes something that just boggles my mind.

The largest grassroots breast cancer advocacy group in the world, a group called “Susan G. Komen for the Cure,” has now partnered with the fast food chain KFC in a national “Buckets for the Cure” campaign. The program began last month and runs through the end of May.

KFC is taking every chance it can manufacture to trumpet the fact that it will donate 50 cents to Komen for every pink bucket of chicken sold.”

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Escape from the Heartland – Atrazine, Susan G. Komen, and KFC

Title: Escape from the Heartland – Atrazine, Susan G. Komen, and KFC

Author: Sandra Steingraber

Publication: Huffington Post

Publication Date: May 5, 2010

“The pesticide atrazine – with its possible links to breast cancer – is making headlines as the EPA opens a new investigation and a member of Congress calls for its outright abolition. What does the leading breast cancer advocacy organization say about atrazine? Nothing. It’s busy peddling pink buckets of deep-fried chicken breasts. Really.

Silence gives consent.
– Thirteenth-century Roman Catholic canon law

In the middle of the nation sit three states all beginning with the letter I: Indiana, Illinois, Iowa. The middle of the middlemost one – central Illinois – is where I come from.

Living in the center of an entire continent was comforting when I was a child, and I was perplexed by newcomers who claimed to feel trapped here. Clearly, the compass points all extended to the cornstalk-edged horizon, the roads shot out in all four directions with equal ease, and neither oceans nor mountain ranges prevented escape. (So feel free to leave any time.)”

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Pink Washing the Dangers of Bottled Water

Title: Pink Washing the Dangers of Bottled Water

Author: Lisa Kaas Boyle

Publication: Huffington Post

Publication Date: January 17, 2010

“pink washing: the deceptive marketing practice of promoting association with a cancer charity (often using pink ribbon symbol) in order to suggest a company’s commitment to battling cancer, when according to independent scientific testing, a marketed product has potential to cause cancer.

Pink Washing Sparkletts’ BPA Plastic Bottles

Sparkletts’ water delivery trucks, previously known for their flashy sequins, have been pink washed. They are decorated with a big pink bow for breast cancer research and a large advertisement heralding a partnership with the Susan G. Komen for the Cure breast cancer charity.”

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Cure? They Don’t Want No Stinking Cure!

Title: Cure? They Don’t Want No Stinking Cure!

Author: Christina Pirello

Publication: Huffington Post

Publication Date: October 1, 2009

“It’s October and we all know what that means. Pink! From ribbons, to kitchen appliances, workout wear to M & M’s (ah, the irony…), we are bombarded with creating awareness of breast cancer (like there’s one woman unaware of it), promoting mammograms and raising money for the Cure. For more than 25 years, we have been marketed the idea that if we just run one more race; write one more check; buy one more pink ribbon adorned tee shirt, they’ll find the elusive cure they dangle in front of all women. Did you know that National Breast Cancer Awareness Month was created by a drug company (currently known as Astra Zeneca), who not coincidentally produces breast cancer treatment drugs?

As women, we need to stand together and ask the question that no one wants asked (certainly no one at Susan G. Komen for the Cure). With all the money raised, why are we no closer to this Cure? The statistics tell the truth. This year, more than 192,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer, accounting for more than one in four cancers diagnosed. And while it’s true that from 1997 to 2006, there has been a steady decline in breast cancer deaths (1.9 percent a year), breast cancer rates have remained the same since 2003. A woman’s chance of developing breast cancer sometime in her life is a little less than 1 in 8.”

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The Selling of Breast Cancer Is corporate America’s love affair with a disease that kills 40,000 women a year good marketing–or bad medicine?

Title: The Selling of Breast Cancer Is corporate America’s love affair with a disease that kills 40,000 women a year good marketing–or bad medicine?

Author: Susan Orenstein

Publication: CNN Money

Publication Date: February 1, 2003

In the summer of 2000, ice cream and frozen yogurt maker Dreyer’s decided to try to link its name to the hugely popular cause of fighting breast cancer. It had watched other companies conduct campaigns backing the search for a cure–and had seen their logos displayed at well-attended rallies and their products festooned with the cause’s signature pink ribbons. Dreyer’s figured it might sponsor the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation’s Race for the Cure events, which are highly emotional and popular–in other words, a marketer’s dream. But when Dreyer’s approached Komen, it ran into an unexpected snag: Yoplait was already a big sponsor and had an exclusive contract to be the only yogurt manufacturer involved in the races. Dreyer’s, the Komen people suggested, could create some sort of in-store promotion, but it was frozen out of the high-profile Komen events. Dreyer’s wasn’t interested in in-store promos. “We would have been out of the loop,” says Julie Linting, who handles the ice cream maker’s special promotions. “It wasn’t worth our while to do that.”

Dreyer’s had just encountered one of the many pitfalls in the increasingly crowded and competitive realm where business and charity meet–and discovered, as many companies have, that people play rough in there. More and more, U.S. businesses see tying their corporate identities to good causes as a powerful marketing tool, and breast cancer has become the queen of all good causes. It generates a staggering array of promotions and company tie-ins: During Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October, for instance, you could “Cook for the Cure” using a pink KitchenAid mixer, “Clean for the Cure” with a Eureka vacuum cleaner, be “Fit for the Cure” through a custom Wacoal bra fitting, “Sip for the Cure” with the Republic of Tea’s pink grapefruit green tea blend, and “Charge for the Cure” with your American Express card. You could’ve shopped for the cure until you dropped.

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The Marketing of Breast Cancer

Title: The Marketing of Breast Cancer

Author: Mary Ann Swissler

Publication: AlterNet

Publication Date: September 16, 2002

“Judy Brady has little use for the limelight. Yet, as someone with a lot on her mind, she has much to say about what she terms “the marketing of breast cancer.” One of the worst examples, she says, is the Dallas-based Susan G. Komen Foundation and its annual fundraiser, the 5K Race for the Cure.

Now held year-round in 110 U.S. cities and abroad, the festivities offend Brady and the group Toxic Links Coalition. The races, they say, merely focus women on finding a medical cure for breast cancer, and away from environmental conditions causing it, the problems of the uninsured, and political influence of corporations over the average patient.”

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