Zero Breast Cancer

Zero Breast Cancer helps individuals and communities understand scientific research on environmental risk factors and lifestyle variables that influence breast cancers. We promote disease prevention through targeted communication of evidence-based recommendations that support health and wellness at key stages of life.

Our strategies include understanding our different audiences and their personas. We focus on girls who are in puberty or pre-puberty and their caregivers, youth and teens, under-served populations who are socio-economically disadvantaged and breast cancer survivors. We adapt our core messages about exercise, diet, limiting alcohol, avoiding cigarettes, and managing sleep and stress to each of these groups. We inform these groups about alternatives to toxic chemicals that make their way into homes as cleaning materials, pesticides, cosmetics and beauty products etc. We take an approach that is positive, encouraging and empowering. We work with bold, modern, and confident graphics that are clean and simple but not simplistic or patronizing. When possible and appropriate we translate our materials into Spanish and other languages.

Our capabilities come from our staff, scientific advisory board, communications and digital media experts, and our partners. With expertise in public health, social sciences, research, oncology, epidemiology, event planning, and fundraising, we are effective and efficient.

We were founded to search for the environmental cause of high rates of breast cancer in Marin County California. We now know that breast cancer is a complex constellation of diseases and that socio-economic factors, the widespread (but now mostly discontinued) practice of prescribing combination HRT for long term use in post-menopausal women, and some over-diagnosis and over-treatment, mostly explained the 'spike' or 'cluster' of breast cancers at that time. Scientists can still only explain the causes of about half of all cases of breast cancer (5–10% due to inherited genetic mutations & 30–40% from lifestyle factors and exposures to radiation and carcinogenic chemicals). It may take another generation or two before they know more. In the meantime ZBC has shifted its focus to preventing breast cancer as much as possible in the next generation though awareness-raising, education and outreach to ensure people focus on health and wellness as well as reducing chemical exposures.