Everything You Want to Know About Sex and Cancer
Two cancerophobes from South Boston
Used frequent sex as a precaution.
They indulged night and day,
In every known way,
And expired from chronic exhaustion.
How does your sex life affect the chances of your getting cancer? Does the sensuous woman have more or less cancer than the celibate? And how
about the man? Does circumcision help; and whom does it help? And what about orgasmic frequency? There is very little need to answer these
questions, because an increase or decrease in cancer is not likely to deter those who are enjoying sex, nor encourage those who aren't. Nevertheless,
with a "modern" book, we have to have something about sex in it. I will deal with women and men separately because, although their sexual
interaction is a thing in common, the types of cancer that are related to it are not.
Cancer of the breast appears to be influenced to some degree by reproduction. It has been known for some time that there is a relatively high
incidence of breast cancer among nuns, and that marriage, having children, and nursing them appears to reduce the incidence. Since marriage,
having children and nursing are interrelated, it is very difficult to separate these factors. The early work suggested that long-term nursing reduced the
incidence of breast cancer. This has never been substantiated, but we can still say that having children reduced the chances of getting breast
cancer, and having children at a relatively early age appears to reduce the chances of getting breast cancer even more. It is also reasonably certain
that having children and nursing them does not, as it does in mice, increase the incidence of breast cancer. In mice, the more pregnancy, the more
breast cancer. No one has ever satisfactorily explained this discrepancy.
Cancer of the uterine cervix has its highest incidence in prostitutes, and its lowest in nuns. That ought to tell you something.
You can't win, ladies, because what increases the risk of breast cancer decreases the risk of cancer of the uterine cervix: pregnancy reduces the
incidence of cancer of the breast and increases the incidence of cancer of the cervix, while celibacy increases the incidence of cancer of the
breast and reduces the incidence of cancer of the cervix. You might as well do what you enjoy, because in the long haul it makes little difference in
terms of cancer risk |
