MORE ON "THE PILL"

 Linda and her mom on our patio in Borrego Springs

I have written several times about the beneficial side effect of relying on birth control pills to prevent undesired pregnancy.  Here is statistical proof, courtesy of a massive study performed in the UK, that it really works.  OVCA deaths are down 17% in that country, over a five year period.  This apparently is much greater than the equivalent statistic for the rest of Western Europe (~7%).  Part of these declines is attributable to advances in treatment and early detection, which presumably are substantially equivalent all over Western Europe; the difference here is attributed to the greater use of oral contraception in the UK.  Differences in the use of hormone replacement also contribute.  Statistics for the U.S* are more in line with continental Europe than with the UK.  The practical message then seems to be:  pill, good; hormones, bad.

And so, all you parents with young, unmarried daughters – if you find birth control pills in her purse, she may have a legitimate prophylactic excuse.  Or not.    (That was an attempt at humor which probably fell flat.  Sorry.)

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/26/uk-ovarian-cancer-death-rate-down-17-since-2017-study-suggests 

*I dug this fact out using the SEER statistical system, which I have written about several times previously.  It wasn’t easy.  In an heroic effort to be inclusive and digitally sophisticated the SEER people also have done - in my opinion - a very fine job of gumming up the works!.