higher ratio of type 2 lobules than existed prior to the pregnancy. Russo and Russo have shown that mature breast cells have more time for DNA repair with longer cell cycles, accounting for the slightly reduced risk of breast cancer for parous women against the baseline risk for women who have never conceived and those who have conceived and terminated their pregnancies. Later on, Russo et al. found that placental human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) induces the synthesis of inhibin by the mammary epithelium. Bernstein et al. independently observed a reduced breast cancer risk when women were injected with hCG for weight loss or infertility treatment. Contrary to the ABC hypothesis, Michaels et al. hypothesize since hCG plays a role in cellular differentiation and may activate apoptosis, as levels of hCG increase early on in human pregnancy, "an incomplete pregnancy of short duration might impart the benefits of a full-term pregnancy and thus reduce the risk of breast cancer." History The first study involving statistics on abortion and breast cancer was a broad study in 1957 examining common cancers in Japan. The researchers were cautious about drawing any conclusions from their unreliable methodologies. During the 1960s several studies by Brian MacMahon et al. in Europe and Asia touched on a correlation between abortion and breast cancer. Their 1973 paper published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute inaccurately concluded that "where a relationship was observed, abortion was associated with increased, not decreased, risk." Research relevant to the current ABC discussion focuses on more recent large cohort studies, a few meta-analyses, many case-control studies, and several early experiments with rats. Rat models Russo & Russo from the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia conducted a study in 1980 examining the proposed correlation between abortion and breast cancer. While analysing the effects of the carcinogen 7,12-Dimethylbenz(a)anthracene (DMBA) on the DNA labeling index (DNA-LI) in terminal end buds (TEBs), terminal ducts (TDs) and alveolar buds (ABs) of Sprague-Dawley rats in various stages of reproductive development, they found that rats who had interrupted pregnancies had no noticeable increase in risk for cancer. However, they did find that pregnancy and lactation provided a protective measure against various forms of benign lesions, such as hyperplastic alveolar nodules and cysts. While results did suggest that rats who had interrupted pregnancies might be subject to "similar or even higher incidence of benign lesions" than virgin rats, there was