Health Conditions A-Z Reproductive Health Birth Control The Pill May Protect Against Cancer for 30 Years or More A new study suggests that women who take the pill are less likely than other women to get ovarian, colorectal, and endometrial cancers for years, even decades, after they stop using oral contraceptives By Karen Pallarito Karen Pallarito Twitter Karen Pallarito tells stories grounded in science and backed by solid reporting. As Senior Conditions Editor for Health, she covers COVID-19 plus umpteen other health and wellness topics. Her freelance portfolio includes pieces for The Washington Post, U.S. News & World Report, Working Mother, Westchester Magazine, and the news syndicate HealthDay, among others. Karen started her career as a health policy reporter in the nation's capital, where she covered congressional hearings on Medicare and Medicaid. From the late 90s to the early aughts, she reported on health business for Reuters Health and contributed to its medical and consumer health newswires. Prior to that, she was Modern Healthcare's New York Bureau Chief. A fellow of the Association of Health Care Journalists' 2019 class on Comparative Effective Research, Karen is committed to helping people understand the benefits and harms of clinical interventions and exposing racial/ethnic disparities in healthcare. When not on deadline, you might find her whipping up something in the kitchen, working out, bingeing on cable news, or indulging in some form of mind candy (aka reality TV). health's editorial guidelines Published on March 22, 2017 Share Tweet Pin Email Women who take the pill may enjoy long-term health benefits well beyond preventing pregnancy. A new study suggests that using oral contraceptives protects women from certain cancers for at least 30 years. Researchers at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland found pill users were less likely than other women to develop colorectal, endometrial, and ovarian cancers. About one in three women taking the pill were protected from developing ovarian and endometrial cancers, the study found. For colorectal cancer, about one in five cases were avoided. It wasn't all good news. There was an increased risk of breast and cervical cancer in women who were currently or had recently been taking oral contraception, but that risk disappeared within 5 years of stopping the pill. And there was no evidence of a greater risk of these cancers appearing later in life. Study author Lisa Iverson, Ph.D., and colleagues concluded that using the pill doesn’t appear to expose women to long-term cancer risks, and it may reduce the risk of some cancers long after users have stopped taking the pill. Iverson is a research fellow in epidemiology at Aberdeen’s Institute of Applied Health Sciences. The findings come from the Royal College of General Practitioners’ Oral Contraception Study, the world’s longest-running study of the health effects of the pill. The new results are based on 46,000 women who were followed for up to 44 years. 7 Health Benefits of Birth Control Nobody Talks About When the pill was first introduced in the United States in 1960, people worried about its potential long-term consequences, especially cancer, the research team noted. Naturally occurring estrogen and progesterone have been found to influence the development and growth of some cancers, according to the National Cancer Institute. Most oral contraceptives combine man-made versions of those female hormones. Today, the pill is the contraception of choice for about 16% of reproductive-age women in the United States, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and overall 100-150 million women around the world take it. The Ovarian Cancer Signs You Need to Know, Even If You’re Young Research on the association between birth control pills and cancer risk has been mixed. Encouragingly, though, this new study revealed no evidence of new cancer risks popping up later in life among women who had ever used oral contraceptives. “These results provide strong evidence that most women do not expose themselves to long-term cancer harm if they choose to use oral contraception; indeed, many are likely to be protected,” the authors wrote. The study was published in the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology. Was this page helpful? Thanks for your feedback! Tell us why! Other Submit