Marines’ message: Men can be struck by breast cancer

October 31, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON

As National Breast Cancer Awareness Month draws to a close this weekend, a cluster of men who once lived on a poisoned military base have this message for the public: The disease doesn’t just go away.

Thirteen men who suffer from breast cancer posed for a calendar to raise awareness of their situation. All served or lived on the Camp Lejeune, N.C., Marine base. All think their cancer can be traced to the decades in which toxic drinking water poured from the base’s faucets, carrying poisons such as benzene, trichloroethylene and tetrachloroethylene.

The 2011 calendar, “Men, Breast Cancer and the Environment,” became available online early this month; so far, about 350 have been sold.

The men gathered at a Boston hotel this summer for a unique photo shoot. Many had spoken with one another only on the phone or through e-mail chats. Few had ever laid eyes on another male breast-cancer patient.

In August, they stood among their own.

They exchanged stories and handshakes. Many of the Marine veterans sported graying buzz cuts. Some had had mastectomies.

“When we took our shirts off, we were all checking each other out,” said Peter Devereaux of North Andover, Mass.

“You’re basically so similar,” Devereaux said. “You’re all men. You’ve got what’s considered a woman’s disease. You’re all Marines or sons of Marines. It’s incredible.”

They posed, shirtless or clothed, for photographer David Fox, whose first wife died of breast cancer.

Fox sat down with each man and chatted a few minutes about their stories. He said he tried to capture the beauty of the person and the ugliness of the disease.

Male breast cancer makes up less than 1 percent of all breast-cancer cases, and mostly affects men in their 60s, according to the National Cancer Institute. The Camp Lejeune calendar will be used for a seed grant to study potential links between male breast cancer and the base’s water.