No, Switzerland didn’t ban mammograms

Swiss cheese has holes. So does the claim that Switzerland banned mammograms. 

"Congratulations to Switzerland for having enough big balls to ban mammograms," an Instagram user said in a video posted July 10. 

Similar claims circulated on TikTok. Another July 10 video featured a clip from "The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast," in which a guest said, "I feel like it was Switzerland, or there’s some European country that actually doesn’t recommend [mammograms]." 

Swiss health authorities say that’s not true. 

"Mammography is not banned at all in Switzerland," Daniel Dauwalder, a spokesperson from Switzerland’s Federal Office of Public Health, told PolitiFact in an email. "It is covered by health insurance and is recommended for women at age 40-59 yearly and from age 60-75 every two years."

Breast cancer screening programs are available in 14 out of the 26 Swiss cantons, or states, according to a map published by Swiss Cancer Screening, an organization that promotes early cancer detection. Four more cantons are in the process of implementing such programs.

The claim that Switzerland banned mammograms may have originated from a 2014 report by the Swiss Medical Board that called into question the efficacy of breast cancer screening programs and suggested abolishing them. However, Swiss experts and organizations labeled the report flawed and misleading. The Swiss Medical Board, established in 2009 by the Swiss government, evaluated the costs and benefits of medical treatments to improve care and resource efficiency in Switzerland but ceased operations in 2022 due to overlapping federal efforts.

The social media posts also said mammography poses dangerous health risks such as radiation exposure.

But according to the National Cancer Institute, mammograms involve very small doses of radiation, and "the potential benefits of mammography nearly always outweigh the potential harm from the radiation exposure."

Experts told PolitiFact last year that although mammograms have drawbacks such as false positives, they’re still a safe and effective cancer screening method. Mammograms can detect breast cancer in its early stages, when the prognosis is often better. 

Featured Fact-check

David Wolfe

stated on July 11, 2023 in a Facebook post

“Stop getting mammograms immediately as they are outdated and dangerous!” Thermography “is a safer way to test for breast cancer!”

The Instagram post also promoted thermography — a test that uses an infrared camera to detect temperature differences within breast tissue — as an alternative to mammography. 

In 2021, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it was "not aware of any scientific evidence" to support the claim that thermography is a proven alternative to mammography. 

The FDA approved thermography as a diagnostic tool to be used alongside primary screening tests such as mammograms. But it warned that people who rely solely on thermography "may miss the chance to detect breast cancer at its earliest stage." 

Mammograms remain safe and effective cancer screening tools, and they’re still widely available in Switzerland. Additionally, U.S. experts and organizations, including the American Cancer Society, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, National Comprehensive Cancer Network and the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, all recommend mammograms for breast cancer screening. 

We rate the social media claims False.