Although the Secretary of State for Health does not seem to have any experience with cancer patients (according to his resume, posted on the Ministry of Health website, he had developed his health career as a Primary Care doctor in different health centers in the Community of Madrid), he has always shown himself publicly as a kind of reckless scientific disseminator for many. Not only was he very critical of breast cancer screening on social networks, as this newspaper reported yesterday, but on his blog he invited women to stop practicing the so-called breast self-examination as a first step for a possible early detection of a tumor.
The portal of Javier Padilla Bernáldez, now “number two” of the Ministry of Health, was called “Médico critical” and its header already warned: “Rearguard activists. To open our eyes to the complex health (and socioeconomic) reality of our close (and not so close) environment. His intention was, as stated in the entry of each post: «reactivate the economy and the Spain brand. Sorry if we expropriate you or just screw you over. Meanwhile, we will continue talking…”
In a controversial entry published in October 2012 and titled “If you touch your breasts, let it be just for pleasure,” explained some data on breast self-examination extracted from a search in PubMed with the terms “breast self-exam” and “breast cancer” selecting meta-analyses and clinical trials. According to Padilla, of the 85 articles found, the majority try to study whether teaching women to self-examine their breasts makes women do it more frequently. “Very few studies try to see if this serves any purpose (so that people live longer and better, wow),” reflects the now head of Health, but of the “three best” that he found to try to question whether breast self-examination reduces overall mortality and breast cancer mortality in particular, his conclusions, citing medical literature, were resounding about this practice that they try so hard to spread.
«Breast self-examination is not useful to reduce the overall mortality rate or the mortality rate from breast cancer. Of 388,535 women studied, 3,406 underwent a biopsy in the group of women who performed self-examination while only 1,856 women underwent a biopsy in the group of women who did not perform self-examination. This did not make the women who self-examined live longer (or better), it just made their breasts sting more.
According to Padilla, in his review of the medical studies, one could read phrases as clear as: “Intensive instruction in breast self-examination did not reduce breast cancer mortality” or “women who choose to perform breast self-examination should be informed that its effectiveness is unproven and that it may increase their chances of having a benign breast biopsy.” A dangerous conclusion that the political leader even wanted to clarify: “Translation: they increase the number of biopsies for benign processes without reducing mortality.” And he concluded: “If you want to reduce the risk of suffering from breast cancer, act on avoidable risk factors: alcohol, obesity and a sedentary lifestyle.”
However, Padilla not only wanted to make his position clear in medical terms and even made some comments of dubious taste that may outrage breast cancer patients since he dared to compare breast self-examination with female masturbation. “At ‘Médico Crítico’ we have always liked people to touch themselves, but without selling them benefits that do not exist,” he explains, without leaving room for medical debate and directly assuring that breast self-examination is “useless.” “If we have to advocate for some breast self-examination, at ‘Médico Crítico’ we declare ourselves firm defenders of masturbation over breast self-examination and we are convinced that the healthy effects of this (masturbation) are greater than those of self-touching the breasts.” He also took advantage of the post to mess with the then president of the Community of Madrid, Esperanza Aguirre. “If you want to read about breast cancer beyond the article by an opinion leader like Esperanza Aguirre, we leave more links.”
Mónica García’s “number two” expressed the same type of opinions on her social networks, highly questioned by the community of oncology doctors. From 2011 to 2015 on her profile on the social network “X”, then called “Twitter”, Padilla was already talking about the lack of effectiveness of these studies and the “false certainties” they offered to women. «Clinical sessions with radiologists who say that “more and more, we see that breast cancer screening is useless”» and adds with the hashtag «fan», implying that he agreed with the statement. On another occasion, in 2012, on the occasion of October 19, he posted: “October 19: World Breast Cancer Day, also known as “World Day of Selling False Certainties and Overestimating the Benefits of Screening,”” the political leader posted.