Truth or Scare?:Does antiperspirant cause breast cancer?

WHERE IT CAME FROM: This myth flourished on email. "Antiperspirant prevents you from purging toxins from below the armpits," it read. "These toxins do not disappear, they are deposited in the lymph nodes and lead to cell mutations, aka cancer." The last two years have seen similar stories. People said shaving opened up pathways for harmful chemicals like aluminium to enter the bloodstream, and that women get cancer in the left breast more often than the right because right-handed women squirt more heavily under the left armpit.

THE FACTS: It might make intuitive sense that a log-jam of toxins in your armpit could poison cells, but it does not make scientific sense. Toxicologist Chris Flowers says just one per cent of sweating is through the armpit, and very few toxins are removed this way (80-90 per cent of toxins leave through the liver, while the rest are dispersed by the kidneys and lungs). There is no evidence as yet that deodorant ingredients can cause cells to mutate.

The two studies which sparked recent rumours seemed to show links, but on closer inspection, they aren't conclusive. Dr Phillipa Darbre from Reading University reported in 2004 that parabens (preservatives in food and cosmetics) were found in 20 breast tumours, and in 2003 Kris McGrath at Northwestern University, Chicago, found that the more often a woman shaved and used sprays and roll-ons, the younger she was when she got cancer.

But neither study looked at women without breast cancer it's likely we all have parabens in our breast tissue, but this does not mean they cause cancer. And the simplest explanation of McGrath's study is that younger women shave and use deodorants more regularly than their mothers. "The only study which investigated this properly found no link to cancer," says Cancer Research UK's Professor Stephen Duffy.

The study, in Seattle in 2002, compared the underarm habits of 1,600 women with and without breast cancer. It found those who used antiperspirants or deodorants did not have a greater risk of breast cancer.

As for the left/right story? There is a slight variation in left and right breast cancers (52/48 per cent) and no one knows why but it existed before deodorants. For the cautious, aluminium is not in deodorants but is in most antiperspirants, including some natural brands where it may be listed as 'alum'. If it's parabens you want to avoid, brands such as Sure, Right Guard, Nivea, Sanex, Dove and Vaseline Intensive Care are all free of them.