WHAT WE THINK WE KNOW IS WRONG
We are told that science is an endless and noble search for truth. But a number of books have shown that idea to be pure myth.
In truth, scientists have the same prejudices, foibles, and weaknesses as everyone else. They lie, cheat, sabotage and browbeat their competitors into silence, often with great relish.
But hidden in the scientific literature, beyond the public’s eye, are discussions of major scandals. In scientific publishing – articles are being ghostwritten, data being fudged and fake experiments being conducted and even published in some of the world’s most prestigious journals.
What does this have to do with cancer?
New research has discovered that much of what we thought we knew about cancer was wrong. For instance, for a long time we assumed that cancer was a purely genetic disease, with the damage to DNA either being inherited or caused by certain agents and environmental factors known as carcinogens. Though in recent years, researchers have discovered a common link between all types of cancer: a process called inflammation.
The problem is not just brief incidents of inflammation, but inflammation that last for years – that is, chronic inflammation.
#1 CAUSE OF ALL TYPES OF CANCER STARTS WITH INFLAMMATION
In the recent past, it was taught that cancer results from mutations to certain groups of genes or activation of special cancer genes, called oncogenes. There was also believed to be a correlation between the number of mutated genes and the aggressiveness of the cancer. We did know that many carcinogenic agents were also mutagenic as well – that is, they caused DNA mutations and some could specifically activate oncogenes. What was not known was why these mutations were happening, and if they could turn any cell into cancer cells.
Then, about 12 years ago, as articles appeared in a prestigious cancer journal that compared a group of cancer patients to people who did not develop cancer over a 20-year span. The researchers discovered that the people who went on to develop cancer most often had suffered from an inflammatory disease, such as arthritis, autoimmune disease, or a chronic infection, that preceded the appearance of cancer by more than 10 years.
It is clear that inflammation plays a major role in virtually all cancers. In addition, it has been shown that inflammation makes the cancer much more aggressive and invasive, and more likely to metastasize.
Once a cancer metastasizes, the chance for a cure is not better than 5 to 10 percent, even with the most aggressive conventional treatments, such a surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation.
Inflammation is the stimulus for conversion of normal cells to cancer cells and for the worsening of the prognosis of existing cancers. It is interesting to note that virtually everything that we know that is linked to cancer also causes inflammation. But why does inflammation have this effect? The answer lies in the relatively new field of cell signaling. When we are injured – for instance, by a cut – the tissues near the cut become inflamed. This accounts for the redness and hotness around the wound. White blood cells rush to the area and release “factors” that tell the cells to start growing, and to grow fast.
The same signals tell the new cells to invade the injury so that it can be healed.
Unfortunately, these inflammatory signals also tell cancer cells to grow fast and to invade the surrounding tissue. Until quite recently, it was thought that any cell in the body could become a cancer cell, including skin cells, lung cells, and ovarian cells. However, it now appears that the theory was wrong. In fact, most cells are quite resistant to becoming cancerous.
STEM CELL – A GREAT NEW DISCOVERY REGARDING CANCER
From 1905 to 1911, Dr. John Beard proposed a new theory of cancer called the trophoblastic theory. He observed that cancer behaves much like the embryonic trophoblastic cells that nourish the embryo during pregnancy. These cells grow rapidly, and sometimes become a very aggressive cancer seen in pregnant women called a choriocarcinoma.
According to Dr. Beard’s theory, these primitive cells can be scattered throughout the body and lay dormant until activated, at which time they transform into various types of cancer.
Until recently, his idea was completely ignored by the medical world. But today, we see this idea as a stroke of genius that explains a number of things scientists could not understand about cancer using the widely accepted theory of how normal cells become malignant cells.
New research has resurrected Dr. Beard’s breakthrough idea, renaming the trophoblast a “stem cell.”
It appears that stem cells lie dormant in all tissues and organs, even the brain, waiting to be stimulated to action. Under normal conditions, they can transform into any kind of cell found in the body – for instance an ear cell, a pancreas cell, brain cells or a lung cell. This is how our body repairs itself.
When the DNA of stem cells are damaged by mutation-causing events – such as we see with high levels of free-radicals and lipid peroxidation products -- they transform into cancerous stem cells.
Keep in mind that inflammation generates intense storms of free radicals and lipid peroxidation products.
That’s why chronic inflammation, even low-grade, smoldering inflammation (as occurs with osteoarthritis, prostatitis, and mastitis), is linked with a high risk of cancer.
The best way to visualize cancer stem cells in operation is to compare them to a bubble blower.
The film of soap on the ring of the bubble blower is the stem cell; the steady stream of bubbles that flows from the ring are the newly formed cancer cells.
The type of cancer that develops depends on were the stem cell is located. Prostate stem cells produce prostate cancer; breast stem cells, breast cancer; and so on.
The cells that are being produced from the cancer stem sells (the bubbles) are more mature than the original cancer stem cell. It is these more mature cancer cells that make up the bulk of a malignant tumor.
Newer studies have shown that cancer stem cells are highly resistant to conventional treatments such as radiation and chemotherapy. However, if the nidus, or point of origin, of the cancer stem cell is removed along with the bulk of the tumor, the cancer can be cured.
But if a cancer stem cell is not killed or removed, the cancer will recur, even years later. This explains why there are so many cancers that are not cured by chemotherapy.
This theory also explains why chemotherapy agents sometimes cause dramatic shrinkage of the tumor, yet still the cancer comes back, often growing faster and more invasively than before the treatment.
Basically, unless you destroy the bubble machine (the cancer stem cell) it will be there to generate more bubbles (cancer cell0 later.
Recent research has shown that several natural nutritional substances – including curcumin and quercetin – can either kill cancer stem cells or convert them back to normal stem cells.
I have always been intrigues by the idea of converting cancer cells to normal cells, which we see in some forms of cancer when they are exposed to certain vitamins and flavonoids.
WHY IS CANCER AN EPIDEMIC IN ALL DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
The cancer treatment orthodoxy would have us think that the war on cancer is being won by all the new chemotherapy treatment protocols and advanced technology that is available.
But what most people don’t know is that the incidence of most cancers is actually increasing dramatically.
Indeed, the rise has been described as epidemic in cancers such as:
- Lung
- Melanoma (skin)
- Lymph
- Brain
- Breast
- Prostrate
The only types to decrease have been cancers of the stomach, ears, nose, and throat.
With all the media attention given to pink ribbons and “awareness”, one of the best-kept secrets is that breast cancer has increased dramatically – from around 60 cases per 200,000 people in 1960 to 115 cases per 100,000 in 1974.
After a slight fall at that point in time, there was another steady climb until the year 2000, when the incidence reached 140 cases per 100,000 population.
Since 1945, cases of breast cancer among women have more than doubled.
Prostate cancer rates have increased even faster in men living in the United States and Europe.
Since 1978, prostate cancer rates rose 200 percent in several European countries and more than 258 percent in the Untied States.
Cancer of the pancreas and testicles has also increased dramatically and lymphoma is now the most common type of cancer in people under age 30.
The big question is why is a cancer epidemic occurring in the most advanced countries in the world and cancer rates are lowest in some of the least advanced.
SUGAR CONSUMPTION RAISES CANCER RATE
As noted, the rise in cancer incidence began in earnest somewhere around the 1960’s and accelerated even more after 1974 – a trend that has continued. The most obvious thing a medical detective would want to do is look for factors that have changed during that period.
Starting about 1945, the consumption of sugar in the United States increased dramatically, and has continued to increase in an upward curve.
In 1820, Americans consumed about 4 pounds of sugar (as honey) a year. We now consume 150 pounds a year, in forms such as refined sugars, high fructose corn syrup and sucrose.
Unlike healthy cells, which consume fats, carbohydrates, and proteins for energy, cancer cells’ only fuel is sugar.
In fact, you might think of sugar as a “cancer fertilizer.”
Asians, who eat very little sugar, have 5 to 10 times fewer endocrine-sensitive cancers, such as breast and prostate cancers.
A high intake of sugar also dramatically increases the risk of prostate, ovarian, colon and pancreatic cancers.
In addition, diabetics are at a higher risk of developing cancer, and when they do, it is much more aggressive and more likely to metastasize. They also have a higher mortality rate from conventional treatments.
Why is sugar intake related to higher incidence of cancer?
High intake of sugar leads to free radical production and extensive development of advanced glycation products (AGE’s), substances that clog up enzymes and cell function.
Consuming sugar, especially as a liquid, triggers a massive release of insulin and a related hormone-like compound called insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1), which stimulated inflammation and directly promoted cell reproduction.
When IGF-1 is given to animals implanted with human tumors, the tumors grow faster and become much more invasive, making them significantly more deadly.
Researchers found that men with highIGF-1 levels were nine times more likely to develop prostate cancer than those with low levels. Even worse, they were more likely to develop advanced, highly aggressive tumors.
David Servan-Schreiber (see “New Book Tackles Cancer Myths,” page 4) quotes studies that compared mice inoculated with human breast cancer cells to see if their sugar intake made a difference in growth of the cancer.
Of the animals given sugar, two-thirds were dead at the end of the study. Only one mouse on a low-glycemic diet died. That kind of result is very persuasive.
Most cancer patients are never told these vital facts. Indeed, many are still told to eat cakes, pies, cookies and other sweets.
One cancer patient I know was told to eat anything she wanted, because the most important thing was that she not lose weight.
` Such incompetent advice can kill.
HOW PREPARING FOODS WITH VEGETABLE OILS IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS
Before 1930, Americans did not use omega-6 oils for cooking or baking. The most commonly used oils were lard and beef tallow.
But after World War II, manufacturers began producing vegetable oils, mainly corn oil, on a large scale.
Because most people (mainly women, who were the primary cooks preferred solid oil over liquid, the manufacturers used a special hydrogenation process to turn liquid corn oil into a gleaming white solid known as Crisco.
This new product was called “partially hydrogenated vegetable oil”.
A major motivation for the use of corn oil was the mistaken idea that polyunsaturated oil reduced the incidence of atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), and hence reduced the risk of heat attack, stroke, and peripheral vascular disease.
It was quickly labeled a “heart-healthy oil”, and medical societies could not praise the product enough. Every patient was told to switch from using lard to vegetable oil.
Soon, we witnessed the production of other vegetable oil products, such as margarine. Butter, we were told, caused heart attacks and strokes – a total distortion f the research.
Consumption of these health-destroying oils increased steadily from approximately 4.5 pounds per person per year in 1940 to almost 2.5 pounds in 2000.
Government health agencies promoted vegetable oils and margarine heavily, and as a result store shelves are now lined with gallons of these processed oils.
The only real change has been from sold Crisco to liquid vegetable oils.
And keep in mind that virtually all processed foods – such as breads, desserts, cereals, many salad dressings and chips – are cooked in large vats of omega-6 oils.
Even worse, the amount of healthy omega-3 oils consumed has dropped precipitously over the same time period. It is now accepted that the ratio of these two types of oils, omega-3 to omega-6, plays a major role in disease of all kinds.
The principle reason is that most omega-6 oils are pro-inflammatory, while omega-3 oils are generally anti-inflammatory.
NO ONE BEING HELD ACCOUNTABLE
It is now accepted that a diet high in polyunsaturated vegetable oils and margarine – that is omega-6 oils – powerfully promotes the growth, invasion, and spread of all cancers.
Finally, after years of warning people about the cancer-promoting effects of these oils, I am now seeing orthodox medicine admit the truth.
Yet oncologists rarely tell their cancer patients to avoid these cancer-promoting oils – even though compelling research shows they make people die sooner.
One of the common errors I see, even in alternative health literature, concerns the importance of the ration of omega-3 to omega-6 oils. The problem is that is a person increases their intake of both types, the ratio may look good, but they will still be consuming too much omega-6 oil.
Research clearly shows that high levels of omega-6 oils can drive the beneficial omega-3 oils out of cells and tissues, even when the ratio is perfect.
The only healthy solution is to significantly reduce intake of the omega-6 oils and increase intake of omega-3 oils.
With most Europeans, Russians and a growing number of Southeast Asians, now consuming massive amounts of omega-6 and very little omega-3 oil, it’s no wonder that the rest of the world is catching up to the incredibly high American rates of:
- Cancer
- Heart disease
- Stroke
- Diabetes
- Degenerative brain diseases
One researcher remarked that if he designed the perfect diet to cause cancer, it would look exactly like the typical American diet.
Government health agencies, the medical establishment, and the media have been telling Americans for the past 70m years to eat a diet that caused the deaths of tens of millions and crippled tens of millions more.
And yet no one has been held accountable.
What many do not know is that during the entire 70 years of bad advice, there were researchers and physicians who tried to tell the truth. But they were ignored, and then attacked – and many reputations were destroyed.
Nothing has changed today. To speak out is to risk facing the full and insulting force of the purveyors of disinformation and propaganda – the media and the medical elite.
WHAT ABOUT THE ENTRME EXPOSURE TO CHEMICALS WE ALL FACE
Similar to omega-6 oils, beginning around 1945, the amount of chemicals produced in the U.S. rose from 1 million tons to close to 200 million tons today. In the United States alone, 1.1 billion pounds of pesticides and herbicides are used every year – and more than 4 billion pounds are used worldwide.
These toxic chemicals are carried allover the planet, in the air and the water, even to the polar ice caps.
Not surprisingly, the highest incidence of lymphomas and leukemias is among farm works and their families. These tumors are among the fastest growing in people age 30 and younger.
Contributing to this are the 150,000 to 500,000 cases of pesticide-related illnesses reported each year in the U.S. alone.
Exposure to potentially cancer-causing chemicals is further increased because tens of millions of people store dangerous pesticides and herbicides in their garages and homes. In addition, pest control services present another cancer risk.
As if all of that wasn’ t bad enough, conventionally grown vegetables and fruits are coated with pesticides, herbicides and fungicides – which eventually end up in our fat tissues, including the brain.
Taken together, all of these chemicals combine to greatly increase our risk of developing cancer.
Many of these industrial chemicals can also imitate certain hormones – such as testosterone or estrogen – increasing the risk of developing a hormone-dependent cancer, such as breast cancer or prostate cancer.
What all of the industrial chemicals have in common is that they induce inflammation, which lasts as long as the chemical is in your body.
Several studies have shown that fat taken from ordinary people contains anywhere from 50 to more than 100 industrial chemicals – which means that they’ve been there for a very long time.
Eating organically grown produce is critical.
Several studies have shown that people who eat conventional produce had dramatically higher levels of chemicals than those who consumed primarily organically grown produce.
In the same study, children fed conventional produce demonstrated high levels of pesticides in their bodies.
When the children were switched to an organic diet, their pesticide levels dropped precipitously. Then the children were switched back again to conventional produce – and to no one’s surprise, their pesticide levels shot up again.
Every time I hear someone mention that someone they know has a child who developed leukemia, I wonder if that poor child developed this terrible disease because he or she was exposed to chemicals.
It is a tragedy. Yet, the government, the media, and the medical establishment remain silent because, after all, profits are at risk.