Lauren Reuteler/ Winonan

Reactions ranged from the  presentation on abortion and breast cancer, put on by the Catholic Newman Center student club on Feb. 13, from being informative to it being “freaky,” according to students.

Every Thursday night the student club hosts community nights. This past Thursday, the club invited Sister Marie Paul Lockhard to give a discussion “The Scientific Research Connecting Abortion to an Increase in Breast Cancer.”

Tom Parlin, director of the Newman Center, said the center has a relationship with Sister Lockhard from previous presentations, and they wanted to discuss a topic on natural family planning.

Sister Lockhard, who has been practicing as a medical doctor and family practice physician for more than 20 years, said, “The information is not very well-known, so I wanted to make it more available to young people, so they have the information they need to make their life choices.”

The hour-long presentation’s main focus was on the amount of estrogen that goes into birth control pills and how that can affect a women’s body when trying to reproduce.

According to the presentation, the metabolites of estrogen directly damage DNA cells, which can lead to cancerous cells.

Before a full-term pregnancy, women’s breasts consist of type one and type two lobules, which lead to a high risk of cancer. After a full-term pregnancy, lobules move to type three and four which are cancer resistant.

The presentation stated that induced abortions that occur during a normal pregnancy double type one and type two lobules, which can increase the risk for breast cancer substantially.

Winona State sophomore Andi Sowieja said, “The presentation was just absolutely freaky to me, and I just want to go out and tell everyone how this is bad, like look at this, we have proof. I am just so blown away.”

Sister Lockhard discussed that the reason the risk for cancer is lessened after a full-term pregnancy is because the fetus produces certain hormones that induce full differentiation of breast tissue to type three and type four lobules.

After the presentation, Ann Kliszcz, freshman at Winona State, said, “I didn’t really get how abortion could make breast cancer more prominent other than just hearing about it from the Internet, but actually seeing the research put behind it and not having the religious bias is a lot more understandable,” Kliszcz said.

Along with the guest speakers and weekly activities, the Catholic Newman Center club is also trying a new endeavor called “Theology on Tap” where they go from bar to bar to teach about theology of the body.

Sowieja said, “It’s really just a time for everyone to get together and learn about something new, and I’m really interested.”

To learn more about the presentation given by Sister Lockhard, visit www.bcpinstitute.org.