Actually, it strikes me as the English-language phrase best suited -- due its seven pithy, terrifying syllables, and the terrible clash of fashion values they imply -- to minimizing my exposure to whatever compound, or compounds, in manufactured fragrances (yes, and in some natural ones, too) gives me migraines.
I'm not going to say that it is not true because I, perhaps like you, Dear Reader, am not sufficiently equipped to assess the truth of such a statement. I do not know that it is not true; but I do not know that it is true. But I did make it up, . . . and do suspect, someday, that some such link will be acknowledged.
(And, on reflection, I guess, the number of women on the pill who continue to smoke, notwithstanding the well-publicized heightened risk of those two factors conjoined, and the ambiguity of the word "perfume" -- a conscientious woman gripped by whatever mania drives some women to coat themselves in those chemicals, avoid perfume in deference to her own health, may yet think that tawdry vanilla-scented body lotion is something other than perfume and wear it anyway -- make the prospects of even such a bold propaganda putsch appear a little dubious.)
In fact, I am aware of no studies assessing perfume in that or any other way. Perfume, to the best of my knowledge, has not been shown to cause breast cancer or any other cancer in any peer-reviewed controlled studies.
There are some studies linking compounds emitted by manufactured fragrances, generally in the air-freshener and cleaning supply realm, rather than lotions and perfumes, with adverse health outcomes such as asthma, migraines and COPD.
Now, Dear Reader, you might object, or interject, that air fresheners and lotions and cleaning products are not perfumes. And you would be mostly correct. These, while not perfumes, per se, are all perfumed:
Virtually all the smells in all the scented products in the world are manufactured by six huge companies that operate in carefully guarded anonymity: International Flavors & Fragrances (United States), Givaudan Roure (Switzerland), Quest International (Britain) [Quest was acquired in 2005 by Givaudan, whose link, above, does not work as I post this -ed.], Firmenich (Switzerland), Haarmann & Reimer (Germany) [now the Scent and Care unit of Symrise -ed.], and Takasago (Japan). These are the Big Boys. . . .
The Big Boys have two kinds of perfumers. The functional perfumers work with the Johnson & Johnsons, the Procter & Gambles, to scent Tide detergent and Palmolive soap and peach-vanilla candles and the fabric softeners that smell of a million mythical springtimes in distant countries we've never known. These corporate employees create the smell track of our everyday lives, which we barely notice and for which we pay billions of dollars. . . The Big Boys won't tell you who they work for. Their names never appear on the toilet-paper label, the shampoo bottle. But where they get positively paranoiacally secretive is perfume. Because, in fact, all the golden liquid scents sold by the Giorgio Armanis and Vera Wangs, the Ralph Laurens and Jean Paul Gaulthiers from their houses of fashion in New York and Paris and London and Milan, these expensive concoctions being sprayed on models and celebrities in the photographs and rip-open ads in teh glossies -- these scents are not, in fact, created by Mr. Armani or Ms. Wang or Mr. Lauren at all. They are made by professional ghosts working in the locked offices and labs of the Big Boys. These haute perfumers, carefully anonymous and discreetly faceless, are the ones who actually craft the fragrant elixirs in little jeweled five-ounce bottles slipped into boxes that are sole under the names Gaulthier and Wang in the department stores' glass cases. (Chandler Burr, The Emperor of Scent at 38-39, and see.)One thing they seem to all have in common is emission of volatile organic compounds of the sort that are of concern to the FDA and the EPA. Anyway, in the interest of having such resources at hand, I have, yet again, cherry-picked the comment thread over at Metafilter for these resources on such VOC-emitting products. (Special thanks, user handled "nickyskye"!)
The EPA's Inside Story: Guide to indoor air quality: Paradichlorobenzene, a "chemical . . . known to cause cancer in many animals," is "the key active ingredient in many air fresheners," which, like building materials and furnishings, "release pollutants more or less continuously."
The Natural Resources Defense Counsel's "Protect your family from the hidden hazards in air fresheners": Phthalates, known to interfere with hormones and linked to birth defects, "are released" by perfumes and air fresheners "into the air where they may be inhaled or may land on the skin and be absorbed."
Read the NRDC's full 2007 issue paper, "Clearing the Air: Hidden Hazards of Air Fresheners" here.
Environmental Health Perspectives, 2011, "Scented products emit a bouquet of VOCs": Prof. A.C. Steinemann and colleagues analyzed VOCs emitted by "25 air fresheners, laundry detergents, fabric softeners, dryer sheets, disinfectants, dish detergents, all purpose cleaners, soaps, hand sanitizers, lotions, deodorants and shampoos" using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, finding "Each product emitted 1-8 toxic or hazardous chemicals, and close to half (44%) generated at least 1 of 4 hazardous air pollutants."
Prof. Steinemann has a website, linking to Steinemann et al.'s 2010 paper in Environmental Impact Assessment Review, "Fragranced consumer products: Chemicals emitted, ingredients unlisted"
which can also be found at JournalistsResource.org.
If I were those six companies (or counsel for), I'd have reached out to certain tobacco companies to study their, ahem, best practices on failing to recognize and otherwise denying product-related health risks, and mitigating potential massive class action product liability litigation.