‘ 80% with cancer genes don’t know it’

Eight out of every 10 people that have genes that raise their risks for breast, pancreatic, ovarian and prostate cancers do not know it, a new study reveals.

Mutations of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes raise a woman's risk of developing breast cancer before the age of 80 by 72 per cent and 69 per cent.

On the same genes, mutations also increase pancreatic cancer for people of any gender, of ovarian cancer for women and prostate cancer for men.

Despite the fact that genetic testing offer a likely opportunity to predict a BRCA- related cancer, most people rely on their relatives to tell them if they have a family history of risk.

The authors of a new study from Yale University are urging people to get tested for the gene variations after discovering that only 18 percent of people they tested knew their DNA was dangerous.

It was discovered in the mid- 1990s that mutations on the BRCA1 and BRCA2 raised breast cancer risks for women.

Since then, we have learned that various mutations on those same genes can similarly affect the risks of ovarian, prostate and pancreatic cancers, as well as breast cancer for men.

In part because it is so common, the US government and institutions the world over have thrown their weight into breast cancer research.

One in every eight women in the US will develop breast cancer at some point in their lives.

Collectively, nearly 406,000 Americans are diagnosed pancreatic, prostate or ovarian cancer.

An international dedication to finding a cure have driven death rates for breast cancer down significantly.

But even in this age of curable breast cancer, more than 40,000 American women are expected to die of breast cancer this year alone.

As with any cancer, the best ' treatment' is prevention, and second to that is early detection.

A simple blood or saliva test at any age — even in infancy — can detect BRCA mutations.

After the discovery of the two BRCA genes in the 1990s, there was a surge in women getting their DNA tested.

But then an odd thing happened, beginning in 2004: there was a sharp increase in the number of low- risk with a minimal family history.

Meanwhile, women with significant family histories of breast cancer were not getting tested. When the authors screened the genomes of over 50,000 men and women, they found that 267 had one of the BRCA mutations that put them at risk for cancer.