As appeared in The Natural Healer, Summer 2002
President Richard Nixon declared War on cancer in 1971. Since that time the US has spent more than one trillion dollars on treatment and research. One trillion dollars! That is one thousand billion US dollars. Since that time the overall death rate from cancer has increased 5% and some cancers have increased several hundred percent.
The very basic concept of cancer is that cells of a certain type have gone amuck in large numbers. Cancer can be of two types: one benign (usually the good one) that is localized and only causes problems by its location and rate of growth; the second one is malignant which means it can move from one place to another (this is definitely the bad one). We all have cancer cells. I do. You do. Newborn babies do. Whether or not these cells will mutate depends on our immune systems ability to identify these cells as abnormal cells and kill them.
Cancer is caused by a number of things. The biggest causes are chronic stealth infections (microorganisms), chemicals, radiation and strong electromagnetic fields. Microorganisms causing cancer include adenoviruses, herpes viruses, hepadenoviruses, and papovaviruses which includes the now famous SV40 virus. The notorious and now famous SV 40 was found as a contaminant in the polio vaccines in the 60s and 70s. SV 40 is the cause of AIDS in monkeys and brain cancers in humans.
Investigating microorganisms as a cause for various cancers is only now being explored. Since 1967, when the US Surgeon General, William H. Stewart, made the statement “the book is closed on infectious disease,” the funding for the investigation of microorganisms as a causal factor for cancer and other diseases dried up. Then billions of dollars went into research on genetic causes of cancer. This research has made no appreciable difference to the life expectancy, quality of life or treatment of cancer or other diseases. Cancer-causing genes have been found. So what? Has this finding made any difference in life expectancy or quality of life? It is interesting to note the current biotech industry would not be where it is today without this research.
Chemicals are other cancer causing agents. In 1990 Elihu Richter and Jerry Westin of Hebrew University’s Hadassah School of Medicine observed that between 1976 and 1986, Israel was the only country among twenty-eight that showed a breast cancer rate drop. They were anticipating a 20% rise in breast cancer mortality consistent with other countries. In fact, they observed an 8% drop. In the youngest group, instead of a 20% rise, the rate dropped 34%. Statistically this is a 50% change. In the study of cancer, this is enormous. The reason for this drop in mortality rates was the 1978 ban on three organochloride pesticides: alpha benzene hexachloride, gamma benzene hexachloride (lindane which is typically used for lice treatment), and DDT. There are many studies showing the toxic effects of chemicals. Interestingly, chemical companies have paid for studies that come to the conclusion that chemicals are good. Yet independent, non-industry organizations show significantly that chemicals are harmful. This poses the question of whose interests are being served?
Radiation is yet another known carcinogen beyond a doubt. Electro Magnetic Fields (EMF’s) are known to cause cancer. Electricians are ten times more likely than anyone in the general population of developing cancer (leukemia).
The mechanism as to how cancer becomes established is always the same, oxygen deficiency. Two-time Noble Prize winner for medicine, Otto Warberg, theorized that cancer was caused by the replacement of oxygen with the fermentation of sugar. In an oxygen-deprived state, the normal tissue cells regress in their development and start to behave like bacteria utilizing sugar as their means to get energy. Cancer cells, when they behave like bacteria, lose their growth inhibition. They do not remain anchored to other cells and have an indefinite proliferative life span.
Conventional therapies for the battle against cancer include chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and surgery. Patients need to beware that what their medical doctor shares with them regarding cancer treatments does not present the entire picture and the doctor’s word should not be taken as gospel without further research. In 1978, for example, the Office of Technology Assessment, an arm of the US Congress, issued a major report concluding that only 10-20% of all procedures used in medical practices have been shown to be efficacious by controlled trial. In other words, 80-90% of what doctors implement as treatment is unscientific guesswork. Since then this study to my knowledge has not been repeated, as it would only serve to strengthen the case against these conventional therapies.
The pharmaceutical industry, which is the most profitable industry in the world, has a strong vested interest in what goes on in all countries’ governments but in particular the industrial nations. On Capitol Hill in Washington DC there are 625 registered lobbyists that are on the pharmaceutical industry payrolls. That is more drug lobbyists than senators and congressmen together. Unfortunately, I have not found similar statistics for Canada, though I have no reason to believe that the situation is much better here. In the US more than half of the pharmaceutical lobbyists were either former members of congress (21) or worked in congress or other federal agencies (295). These are hired guns are to ensure that the interests of the pharmaceutical industry are well served. In the 1999-2000 US federal election $262 million was spent by this industry for political influence. Governments are not immune to the influence of the long arm of the pharmaceutical industry. Pharmaceutical companies are not interested in winning the war on cancer. Their interests lie in waging the war on cancer, not winning the war. Why? In waging a war, maximum profits for pharmaceuticals are guaranteed by those convinced of victory over a bitter enemy, regardless of the evidence to prove otherwise.
Two- time Nobel Prize winner Dr. Linus Pauling wrote, “Everyone should know that the war on cancer is largely a fraud.” According to the US National Cancer Institute: a five-year survival rate for cancer for all nationalities was 49% in 1974 to 1975 and 50.7% in 1981 to 1986. This represents merely a 1.7% improvement in thirteen years. Even with a positive change this may be a statistical artifact as the trend towards earlier diagnosis is certainly a factor. However, from 1947-1984 the overall incidence of cancer in the general US population grew by 40%.
Over the years, official medicine has poured billions of dollars into radiation, chemotherapy and surgical research as the major weapons in the war on cancer. The overall cancer death rate has risen by 5% since the war on cancer began. (Richard Waters, “Options”, 1993.) Dr. Alan Levin of the University of California Medical School stated, “most cancer patients in this country die of chemotherapy”. According to Dr. John Cairn of the Harvard University School of Public Health, “Only 2-3% of the nearly one-half million Americans diagnosed with cancer every year are being saved by chemotherapy. ” In March 1971, a New York Journal of Medicine study found that 10% of 133 patients using the chemo drug 5FU (5 Flouro Uracil) died as a result of the drug’s toxicity. Some doctors jokingly refer to this drug as 5 Feet Under.
In February 1996, The WHO (World Health Organization) formally designated Tamoxifen as a carcinogen. According to Dr Samuel Epstien of the University of Illinois, the drug Tamoxifen is “a rip roaring liver carcinogen”. The National Cancer Institute and Zeneca Pharmaceutical lobbied to keep legislators from adding Tamoxifen to its list of carcinogens. (Science News, March 2, 1996). Zeneca’s annual revenues from Tamoxifen were $470 million. Interestingly enough, Zeneca Pharmaceuticals is one of the world’s largest producers of pesticides and industrial chemicals. Zeneca makes the carcinogenic herbicide acetochlor and other chlorine products creating annual revenues of over $300 million on these chemicals.
Acetochlor and all polychlorinated herbicides are estrogen mimickers, which is precisely what Tamoxifen is used to block. Not surprisingly, who would know more about estrogens effects on the body and how to block this than the company who produces estrogen mimickers. Estrogen mimickers on their own have a one to one estrogenicity factor. This means that one molecule of estrogen mimicker acts like one molecule of estrogen. Put two estrogen mimickers together and you have a compound that can have an estrogenicity factor of 1600. This means that the effects of two molecules of two estrogen mimickers can act like 1600 molecules of estrogen. It is broadly known that estrogen is a significant cause of breast cancer.
An NCI (National Cancer Institute) study followed 46,355 women and tracked the 2,082 cases of postmenopausal breast cancer that occurred among them. Women on estrogens only were 20% higher risk. Those on both estrogens and progestins had a forty- percent higher risk. A UCLA study found that women who received combined Hormone Replacement Therapy for five to ten years were 51% more likely to develop breast cancer.
Radiation is another weapon in the war against cancer yet radiation is also a major cause of cancer itself. According to internationally respected radiation expert Rosalie Bertells, her research provided evidence that mammographies cause more cancer than they detect. And regular mammographies cause cumulative radiation damage not to mention that as a diagnostic tool they are very ineffective. This crude method will detect cancers that are no less than seven years old. Yet radiation therapy is a cash cow for most cancer therapy hospitals and clinics. Not to mention, most doctors are lavishly treated by pharmaceutical companies with gifts. According to ABC Primetime Thursday night, (Feb 21,2002) doctors were coerced with $6 billion in parties, gifts and trips to “educate” medical doctors.
Surgery for cancer is, in my opinion, a good therapy. Yet radiation and chemotherapy are toxic substances which in turn can, and do, generate cancer. Adding a poison to kill a poison is not good math for our bodies. Yet government bows to the dictums of industry which supports and promotes these aggressive interventions.
Government institutions are generally against alternative medicine. As an example, the Ontario government proposed deregulation of Naturopathic Medicine in 1982 as one MPP explained, “Naturopathic Doctors are not a threat to the public and do not need to be regulated because since their legislative inception in 1925 they have not killed anyone. Therefore naturopathic doctors do not need to be regulated.”
This animosity has been prevalent in government for many years. As a response to proposed deregulation, naturopathic doctors and their patients created the most powerful lobby of the Ontario government for two years running. The Ontario government then succumbed to public demands and retained the Naturopathic Medicines Drugless Practitioners Act while promising to get naturopathic medicine inclusion into the Regulated Health Professions Act. After countless submissions by the Naturopathic profession and systematic delays by at first the Liberal government, then the NDP government, and finally the Progressive Conservative government, none have taken the legislative commitment to the profession nor to the public.
In the US, official medicine also stifles alternative medicine. The Office of Alternative Medicine was established within the National Institute of Health and given a mere $2 million research budget. Yet the same year, the National Institute of Health spent $68 million of taxpayers’ money on a single research trial for one drug. One chemical received 34 times more funding than an entire research department that funds non-patentable research.
The pharmaceutical industry not only coerces governments, it also coerces your monetary donations. The American Cancer Society claimed it reached 71 million Americans in 1991 (21 million more than it reached in 1988) with its public education programs. Yet from 1988 to 1991 cancer death rates rose 5.3%. In 1970 the American Cancer Society was accused of hoarding millions of dollars worth of publicly contributed funds. During the same time, wages and salaries accounted for 25% of all expenses. This is “a very unefficient voluntary organization,” says Burton Goldberg in his book, “Definitive Guide to Cancer”. Is the situation in Canada any different? It is important for you to be wary of where and what your donations are doing. Your donations may be ensuring maximum drug cartel profits. Has either cancer society ever mentioned anything about researching pesticides as a cancer cause and if so, were the results ever made public?
Imagine that your body is the house of your soul and you have been putting garbage in one room in your house for years. Eventually, this garbage finally attracts flies. Flies are like cancer. Chemotherapy and radiation therapy may kill the flies but they also contribute to the garbage. So if you don’t get rid of the garbage the flies will come back.
(Be sure to read the next installment of this article in our Fall 2002 issue of The Natural Healer, which will explore how to clean up this garbage in a safe, healthy, natural and effective way).