Breast Cancer & Genetics: Can It Really Skip a Generation?
The answer to the proposed question, “Can breast cancer skip a generation?” has a two-layered answer. When you are talking about cancer and generations, you are generally referring to the genes of cancer being transferred from a mother to the child and so forth. So, can cancer skip a generation? No, the genes of cancer do not skip a generation. If your mother has cancer genes, specifically the BRCA genes, which are very closely linked to a high breast cancer risk, these genes are transferred from mother to child without fail. However, having these genes does not guarantee that you will have breast cance r . In fact, in most cases, genetic predisposition doesn’t fall among the top causes of breast cancer. Several other factors are considered more important and have higher weightage comparatively when it comes to breast cancer risks. So, since having a genetic predisposition doesn’t guarantee breast cancer, it may seem that breast cancer is skipping a generation w...