> What happened in the 70s that made it so much more common? In the 70's Doctors ramped up their prescriptions of Horse Estrogen because they were tricked into

> What happened in the 70s that made it so much more common? In the 70's Doctors ramped up their prescriptions of Horse Estrogen because they were tricked into thinking it helped. PREMARIN is made from PREgnant MAres' uRINe: >> In response to the 1962 Kefauver Harris Amendment the FDA had [Premarin's] efficacy reviewed, and in 1972 found it effective for menopausal symptoms and probably effective for osteoporosis [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premarin#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premarin#History Premarin prescriptions fell off a cliff in response to the preliminary findings of the Women's Health Initiative - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Health_Initiative#HT_component_findings_and_ensuing_events https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Health_Initiative#HT... Now doctors realize that excess estrogen -> cancer, and are using anti-estrogens for breast cancer: >> Other improvements have included tamoxifen, an anti-estrogen agent that was approved in the late 1970s; Herceptin, a drug used to treat tumors with a higher-than-normal level of a protein called HER2 and drugs called aromatase inhibitors. (quote from this article) Edit: yesterday I commented on a submission about cancer probably being a mitochondrial disease [1]. This is the old/new idea about cancer, that it's not actually caused by genetic mutations - the observed genetic mutations are actually caused by metabolic failure. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15382104 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15382104 Edit 2: DES was the first synthetic estrogen. It was used on women until 1971, when they realized it caused cancer [2]. Those women would've developed cancer in the 2-3 decades that followed their exposure to this drug. [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diethylstilbestrol#Adverse_effects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diethylstilbestrol#Adverse_eff...