Widespread screening for breast cancer didn't do much to save women's lives, study finds

Breast cancer deaths have declined markedly in the Netherlands since a nationwide screening program began in 1989, but mammograms deserve little - if any - of the credit, a new study suggests.

In fact, the main effect of inviting Dutch women between the ages of 50 and 74 to get a mammogram every other year has been a steady increase in cases of early-stage breast cancers. More than half of these cancers were harmless and would have gone totally unnoticed if women