Don’t think the National Organization has given up in its battle to get the federal Food and Drug Administration to ban silicone breast implants (see my post on the subject on Nov. 19). Just because the FDA, following a raft of medical studies, has discovered no link between the implants and a host of claimed disabilities ranging from rheumatoid arthritis to chronic exhaustion, that doesn’t mean the ladies from NOW are giving up. They’ve uncovered a brand-new claimed problem with the implants: “toxic platinum” that supposedly shows up in the breast milk of women with implants:
“A possible culprit could be a toxic form of platinum found in breast implants that is known to be harmful to humans. Recent whistleblower disclosures about platinum in implants and falsified data, plus an FDA report on deformities and illnesses in children born to women with silicone implants have heightened safety concerns. The FDA, under great pressure from implant makers, has refused to undertake further research or query implant makers about fraudulent data.”
Problem is, the toxic platinum that is supposedly running rampant inside women’s breasts (according to a study funded by an anti-implant group), is found hardly anywhere in nature:
“Michael Brook, a chemist and silicone manufacturing expert at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said the new study contained some data and conclusions about platinum that he said were very hard, if not impossible, to accept. He said, for instance, that the researchers reported finding platinum in a highly unstable form never before known to exist in the presence of air or water, as existing in the human body.
“‘Because that finding seems so questionable, it’s hard to know how to read other findings presented,’ said Brook, who has worked as a consultant to Inamed.”
Nonetheless, NOW is already trying to pressure the new Dem-dominated Congress to override the FDA and ban the implants.
I’ve stated my views on breast implants before, and I’ll state them again: They’re really stupid, but in the absence of evidence that they’re actually unsafe, I support women’s right to control their own bodies by doing really stupid things to them.