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What follows is an actual letter sent by the FDA to owners of a health food store in upstate NY. By reading it, you can see how the FDA literally uses words to make it a crime to share actual, scientifically-verified facts about nutritional and botanical supplements. I explain more about this after the letter.
From the FDA:
This is to advise you that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has reviewed your website..and has determined that the products "Kyolic Original Formula 100" (200 cap), "Nature's Way Sarsaparilla Root" (100 cap), "Nutrition Now PB 8 Pro-Biotic Acidophilus" (60 cap), and "Nature's Way Alfa-Max" (100 cap) are promoted for conditions that cause the products to be drugs under section 201 (g)(1)(B) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the Act) [21 U.S.C. § 321(g)(1)(B)]. The therapeutic claims on your website establish that the products are drugs because they are intended for use in the cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease. (emphasis added) The marketing of these products with these claims violates the Act.
Examples of some of the claims observed on your website include:
Kyolic Original Formula 100 (200 cap)
• "Kyolic Formula 100 ... may be beneficial for ... blood pressure, cholesterol levels, heart disease ... arteriosclerosis, arthritis, asthma, cancer ... infections of the eyes, ears, throat, respiratory infections ... flu ... fungal infections, viral infections ...."
Nature's Way Sarsaparilla Root (100 cap)
• "Sarsaparilla [an ingredient in your product] may help in the treatment of congestive heart failure, high blood pressure impotence ... swelling and discomfort from rheumatism and arthritis ... psoriasis ... syphilis ...."
Nutrition Now PB 8 Pro-Biotic Acidophilus (60 cap)
• "Acidophilus [an ingredient in your product] ... has anti-fungal activity ... and play [sic] a role in yeast infections, urinary tract infections, cancer prevention, cholesterol levels ...."
Nature's Way Alfa-Max (100 cap)
• "Alfalfa [an ingredient in your product] ... may be used for allergies, anemia, arthritis, asthma, blood disorders ... high cholesterol and diabetes ...."
Your products are not generally recognized as safe and effective for the above referenced uses and therefore, the products are "new drugs" under section 201(p) of the Act [21 U.S.C. § 321(P)]. New drugs may not be legally marketed in the U.S. without prior approval from FDA as described in section 505(a) of the Act [21 U.S.C. § 355(a)]. FDA approves a new drug on the basis of scientific data submitted by a drug sponsor to demonstrate that the drug is safe and effective. Furthermore, because your products are offered for conditions that are not amenable to self-diagnosis and treatment by individuals who are not medical practitioners, adequate directions cannot be written so that a layman can use the products safely for their intended uses. Thus, your products "Kyolic Original Formula 100" (200 cap), "Nature's Way Sarsaparilla Root" (100 cap), "Nutrition Now PB 8 Pro-Biotic Acidophilus" (60 cap), and "Nature's Way Alfa-Max" (100 cap) are also misbranded within the meaning of section 502(f)(1) of the Act [21 U.S.C. § 352(f)(1)] in that the labeling for these drugs fails to bear adequate directions for use. The introduction of a misbranded drug into interstate commerce is a violation of § 301(a) of the Act, 21 U.S.C. § 331(a).
The above violations are not meant to be an all-inclusive list of deficiencies in your products and their labeling. While reviewing your website, we noticed that you were promoting other products for disease treatment and/or prevention. The unlawful disease treatment and prevention claims on your website were too numerous to list in this letter. It is your responsibility to ensure that products marketed by your firm comply with the Act and its implementing regulations. We advise you to review your website, product labels, and other labeling and promotional materials for your products to ensure that the claims you make for your products do not cause them to violate the Act.
You should take prompt action to correct the violations described above and prevent their future recurrence. Failure to do so may result in enforcement action without further notice. The Act authorizes the seizure of illegal products and injunctions against manufacturers and distributors of those products [21 U.S.C. §§ 332 and 334].
Please notify this office, in writing, within fifteen (15) working days of the receipt of this letter, as to the specific steps you have taken to correct the violations noted above and to assure that similar violations do not occur. Include any documentation necessary to show that correction has been achieved. If corrective actions cannot be completed within fifteen working days, state the reason for the delay and the time within which the corrections will be completed.
My Comments
Note this sentence from the FDA's letter: "The therapeutic claims on your website establish that the products are drugs because they are intended for use in the cure, mitigation, treatment, or prevention of disease." By claiming the definition and usage of the word "drug", the FDA makes it illegal for any nutritional supplement company to share any health benefits related to their supplements without prior permission from the FDA (permission that will not be granted).
Also note that in the majority of examples the FDA cites, the website only said "may" in terms of the potential health benefits that the products might provide. More importantly, science does support the benefits attributed to the product. Kyolic, for instance, is a garlic supplement, and garlic has been shown to be beneficial for the conditions the website cites.
But as soon as someone shares these facts in conjunction with selling supplements, the FDA accuses them of a crime because doing so, they claim, means they are marketing "drugs."
But it's perfectly OK for drug companies to hawk their drugs to anyone without such FDA interference. Despite the fact that drugs, properly prescribed and taken, kill over 100,000 Americans each and every year, hospitalize another 2 million people, and cause additional harm to 20 million more, and these are conservative estimates.
This abominable double standard is just one example of how deeply the FDA is in bed with Big Pharma.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Some Facts About Addiction In Light of Whitney Houston's Death
In light of a variety of very judgmental comments about Whitney Houston’s death now appearing on Facebook and elsewhere, I thought I’d weigh in on the issue of addiction. Some people claim it’s a choice, others that it’s a disease.
The truth is that it’s both.
It begins as a choice, but it can very quickly become a disease. Not everyone who chooses to drink, smoke, do drugs, or engage in other addictive activities will develop the need (literally) to continue to do so. Those who do develop such a need are usually biologically predisposed towards addiction (due to biochemical imbalances in their brain and/or genetics) and most often suffering from some level of emptiness within their psyche. The addictive substance or substances they expose themselves to temporarily calm the biological aspects and provide an illusory relief of whatever mental/emotional issues are affecting the user.
In such people, a very vicious cycle soon develops. Each time they use whatever they are addicted to, receptor sites within the brain are formed which literally cry out for the substance or substances that they are linked to. The more the addictive substance is used, the more these receptor sites form, so that the brain increasingly demands more use of the substance (or activity, e.g., sex, gambling, and even running for those who are addicted to experiencing the “runner’s high”). This is why addiction treatments based on the AA model so often fail – because they do nothing to address the receptor sites.
As this cycle unfolds, the need for ever greater amounts of the addictive substance is also something that addicts typically experience, because there are now more receptor sites in the brain to satisfy. As an example, where once one or two beers each day was enough to leave someone satisfied, in alcoholics that level is nowhere near enough, and so drinking becomes heavier and the drinks themselves often change towards those with higher alcohol content. At the same time that all of this is happening, another equally insidious effect in occurring in the brain – namely a literal shutting down of the brains higher level centers that equate with choice, intelligence, and the ability to perceive and do “the right thing.” As these centers of the brain become impaired, simultaneously the “reptilian brain” that cares only about satisfying needs, grows increasingly stronger within addicts.
All of these facts have been proven for decades, as has the fact that addiction is most definitely a disease once it takes hold. As with any other disease, people can still get well, but it requires proper treatment that addresses all of the factors in one’s life that made addiction possible in the first place. Such treatments do not include judgment.
I know too many loved ones who suffer from some form of addiction. Every single one of them, at heart, is a very loving and kind person, and also very intelligent and creative. I’m convinced that they are also too sensitive to the harsh realities of this world.
When viewed from that awareness, the only appropriate response is compassion.
The truth is that it’s both.
It begins as a choice, but it can very quickly become a disease. Not everyone who chooses to drink, smoke, do drugs, or engage in other addictive activities will develop the need (literally) to continue to do so. Those who do develop such a need are usually biologically predisposed towards addiction (due to biochemical imbalances in their brain and/or genetics) and most often suffering from some level of emptiness within their psyche. The addictive substance or substances they expose themselves to temporarily calm the biological aspects and provide an illusory relief of whatever mental/emotional issues are affecting the user.
In such people, a very vicious cycle soon develops. Each time they use whatever they are addicted to, receptor sites within the brain are formed which literally cry out for the substance or substances that they are linked to. The more the addictive substance is used, the more these receptor sites form, so that the brain increasingly demands more use of the substance (or activity, e.g., sex, gambling, and even running for those who are addicted to experiencing the “runner’s high”). This is why addiction treatments based on the AA model so often fail – because they do nothing to address the receptor sites.
As this cycle unfolds, the need for ever greater amounts of the addictive substance is also something that addicts typically experience, because there are now more receptor sites in the brain to satisfy. As an example, where once one or two beers each day was enough to leave someone satisfied, in alcoholics that level is nowhere near enough, and so drinking becomes heavier and the drinks themselves often change towards those with higher alcohol content. At the same time that all of this is happening, another equally insidious effect in occurring in the brain – namely a literal shutting down of the brains higher level centers that equate with choice, intelligence, and the ability to perceive and do “the right thing.” As these centers of the brain become impaired, simultaneously the “reptilian brain” that cares only about satisfying needs, grows increasingly stronger within addicts.
All of these facts have been proven for decades, as has the fact that addiction is most definitely a disease once it takes hold. As with any other disease, people can still get well, but it requires proper treatment that addresses all of the factors in one’s life that made addiction possible in the first place. Such treatments do not include judgment.
I know too many loved ones who suffer from some form of addiction. Every single one of them, at heart, is a very loving and kind person, and also very intelligent and creative. I’m convinced that they are also too sensitive to the harsh realities of this world.
When viewed from that awareness, the only appropriate response is compassion.
Friday, July 29, 2011
The Cancer Profile Test
Last time, in addition to emphasizing the importance of detecting cancer as early as possible, I also told you how and why conventional diagnostic tests for cancer so often fail to do so. Today I want to tell you about a simple combination blood and urine test that is able to detect changes in your body’s biochemistry that are early warning signs that you may be on the way to developing cancer.
The test is called the Cancer Profile© and is available from American Metabolic Laboratories here in the United States. Developed by Emil Schandl, PhD, AML’s founder, who has a master’s degree in both biochemistry and enzymology and a doctorate in molecular genetics, the test is based on the scientific fact that certain detectable changes in biochemistry occur as the human body progresses from a healthy state towards states that are precancerous and cancerous.
How The Cancer Profile Test Works
The Cancer Profile test incorporates eight tests which, combined, provide a far more accurate indication of whether or not a person’s biochemistry is shifting towards an unhealthy state than if the tests were done separately. The test measures levels of thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), and indicator of thyroid function (low thyroid function, or hypothyroidism, can predispose one to developing cancer) ; DHEA-S, a hormone produced by the adrenal gland that serves as an indicator of adrenal and immune function, as well as a marker for cancer; gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase (GGTP), an enzyme marker for overall liver function (healthy liver function is essential for protecting against cancer); and the cancer markers CEA (carcinoembryonic antigen), PHI (phosphohexose isomerase enzyme), and HCG (human chorionic gonadotropin), the last of which is measured using three different methods to ensure the best possible accuracy.
Based on his many years of research, Dr. Shandl observed that the substances his Cancer Profile test measures tend to become elevated at least 10 or more years before cancer can be detected using conventional screening tests. This is not surprising, since we now know that, in the vast majority of cases, it takes years before cancer develops to the point where it becomes a threat to health. Because of this long timeline, alternative cancer specialists realize that, by looking for shifts in biochemistry such as those the Cancer Profile measures, they can help their patients actually avoid cancer before it gains a foothold inside their bodies, using highly effective approaches such as dietary and lifestyle changes, along with nutritional supplements, detoxification therapies, and other modalities, as necessary.
If you read my last article on the need for early detection, you will recall what I mentioned about the importance of sensitivity and specificity. Briefly put, sensitivity and specificity in combination with each other determine how accurate a cancer screening test is. Sensitivity refers to the probability that a test will show a positive result when cancer actually exists, while specificity refers to the probability that a negative test result will occur when no cancer exists. A test that has high sensitivity and high specificity is far more useful than tests for which one or both of these measures are lower.
Dr. Shandl developed the Cancer Profile test for precisely this reason. He wanted to ensure a high level of accuracy, which simply cannot be achieved when doctors rely on only one of the markers alone. For example, despite the fact that numerous scientific studies show that HCG levels in the body become elevated when cancer cells are present in the body, other studies have found that tests that screen for HCG alone can often fail to detect such increases in elevations, usually because, even though the levels have risen, they may not have done so at levels high enough to be detected. As a result, HCG screening tests by themselves account for approximately 30 percent false negative results. (A false negative reading means a patient is told he or she does not have cancer when in reality cancer is present but was not detected.)
Similarly, other studies have shown that screening for either CEA or PHI alone can also lead to false negative results, whereas when both of these markers are measured, the overall accuracy of such testing increases significantly.
Given these facts, you can understand the advantages that the Cancer Profile test offers in comparison to stand-alone marker tests. Simply put, what a single cancer market test can often miss, the combination of markers included in the Cancer Profile will usually find with far more accuracy. (Testing has shown that the Cancer Profile has an overall accuracy rate of between 87 and 97 percent, depending on the type of cancer that a person may be developing, which far exceeds the rates of most other cancer screening tests.) Even more significantly, as I said, it can detect cancer far earlier than conventional cancer tests.
Another significant advantage of Dr. Shandl’s test is that, unlike stand-alone marker tests that typically screen for only one type of cancer and therefore fail to detect others types of cancer that might be present, the Cancer Profile is able to detect whether cancer is present in general. This saves time and money and can potentially also save lives. As with other blood screening tests for cancer, however, the Cancer Profile by itself cannot definitively prove that cancer is present. Such confirmation can only be obtained with further testing methods, which also can determine which type of cancer a person has.
Finally, another major benefit of the Cancer Profile test is that is can not only be used to screen for cancer, but also to monitor how well patients’ cancer treatments are working. This is vitally important because no cancer treatment, whether alternative or conventional, works 100 percent of the time. This means that even the most promising treatments with the highest success rates are incapable of helping everyone. By using the Cancer Profile test to monitor how well their treatments are working, physicians can quickly know whether they are on the right track for each individual patient, or whether they need to change what they are doing before it is too late. In addition, if surgery is deemed necessary to remove cancerous tumors, the Cancer Profile can be used prior to surgical procedures to provide patients and their physicians with a benchmark to determine whether or not the surgery was successful. Following surgery, a follow-up Profile test can be given. If surgery was indeed successful, the Profile will confirm that by showing lowered levels of the cancer markers it measures. If the markers stay at the same level as before, or continue to rise, then doctors will quickly know that their patients need additional treatment.
Just as importantly, physicians can use the Cancer Profile to monitor how well their patients who achieve remission of their cancer are maintaining their health. As anyone who has had cancer knows (including me), once cancer strikes, it can strike again. Here too conventional cancer tests are often ineffective due to their inability to indicate in a timely fashion whether cancer is returning. For this reason, patients and their physicians alike are often forced to “watch and wait,” hoping that the patient’s remain cancer-free. Unfortunately, too many times cancer does return, and when it does so it is often worse than it was originally, making further treatment more challenging. By using the Cancer Profile, physicians don’t have to wait to detect signs of relapse. Instead, they can see from the Profile how well their cancer patients are doing and, if necessary, take appropriate action much earlier, before the cancer recurrence becomes more serious.
How You Can Obtain the Cancer Profile Test
Despite the benefits that the Cancer Profile test offers, as well as the fact that physicians and patients from all across the United States and around the world have made use of it, the test still remains relatively unknown. For this reason, I urge you not to wait for doctors to find out about it on their own. Instead, learn more about it yourself. You can do so by contacting:
American Metabolic Laboratories
1818 Sheridan Street, Suite 102
Hollywood, FL 33020
(954) 929-4814
http://americanmetaboliclaboratories.net
Your doctor can order the test for you, or you can do it yourself by contacting American Metabolic Laboratories directly. After you receive your results, you can also schedule a free phone consultation with one of the lab’s trained representatives.
The test is called the Cancer Profile© and is available from American Metabolic Laboratories here in the United States. Developed by Emil Schandl, PhD, AML’s founder, who has a master’s degree in both biochemistry and enzymology and a doctorate in molecular genetics, the test is based on the scientific fact that certain detectable changes in biochemistry occur as the human body progresses from a healthy state towards states that are precancerous and cancerous.
How The Cancer Profile Test Works
The Cancer Profile test incorporates eight tests which, combined, provide a far more accurate indication of whether or not a person’s biochemistry is shifting towards an unhealthy state than if the tests were done separately. The test measures levels of thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), and indicator of thyroid function (low thyroid function, or hypothyroidism, can predispose one to developing cancer) ; DHEA-S, a hormone produced by the adrenal gland that serves as an indicator of adrenal and immune function, as well as a marker for cancer; gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase (GGTP), an enzyme marker for overall liver function (healthy liver function is essential for protecting against cancer); and the cancer markers CEA (carcinoembryonic antigen), PHI (phosphohexose isomerase enzyme), and HCG (human chorionic gonadotropin), the last of which is measured using three different methods to ensure the best possible accuracy.
Based on his many years of research, Dr. Shandl observed that the substances his Cancer Profile test measures tend to become elevated at least 10 or more years before cancer can be detected using conventional screening tests. This is not surprising, since we now know that, in the vast majority of cases, it takes years before cancer develops to the point where it becomes a threat to health. Because of this long timeline, alternative cancer specialists realize that, by looking for shifts in biochemistry such as those the Cancer Profile measures, they can help their patients actually avoid cancer before it gains a foothold inside their bodies, using highly effective approaches such as dietary and lifestyle changes, along with nutritional supplements, detoxification therapies, and other modalities, as necessary.
If you read my last article on the need for early detection, you will recall what I mentioned about the importance of sensitivity and specificity. Briefly put, sensitivity and specificity in combination with each other determine how accurate a cancer screening test is. Sensitivity refers to the probability that a test will show a positive result when cancer actually exists, while specificity refers to the probability that a negative test result will occur when no cancer exists. A test that has high sensitivity and high specificity is far more useful than tests for which one or both of these measures are lower.
Dr. Shandl developed the Cancer Profile test for precisely this reason. He wanted to ensure a high level of accuracy, which simply cannot be achieved when doctors rely on only one of the markers alone. For example, despite the fact that numerous scientific studies show that HCG levels in the body become elevated when cancer cells are present in the body, other studies have found that tests that screen for HCG alone can often fail to detect such increases in elevations, usually because, even though the levels have risen, they may not have done so at levels high enough to be detected. As a result, HCG screening tests by themselves account for approximately 30 percent false negative results. (A false negative reading means a patient is told he or she does not have cancer when in reality cancer is present but was not detected.)
Similarly, other studies have shown that screening for either CEA or PHI alone can also lead to false negative results, whereas when both of these markers are measured, the overall accuracy of such testing increases significantly.
Given these facts, you can understand the advantages that the Cancer Profile test offers in comparison to stand-alone marker tests. Simply put, what a single cancer market test can often miss, the combination of markers included in the Cancer Profile will usually find with far more accuracy. (Testing has shown that the Cancer Profile has an overall accuracy rate of between 87 and 97 percent, depending on the type of cancer that a person may be developing, which far exceeds the rates of most other cancer screening tests.) Even more significantly, as I said, it can detect cancer far earlier than conventional cancer tests.
Another significant advantage of Dr. Shandl’s test is that, unlike stand-alone marker tests that typically screen for only one type of cancer and therefore fail to detect others types of cancer that might be present, the Cancer Profile is able to detect whether cancer is present in general. This saves time and money and can potentially also save lives. As with other blood screening tests for cancer, however, the Cancer Profile by itself cannot definitively prove that cancer is present. Such confirmation can only be obtained with further testing methods, which also can determine which type of cancer a person has.
Finally, another major benefit of the Cancer Profile test is that is can not only be used to screen for cancer, but also to monitor how well patients’ cancer treatments are working. This is vitally important because no cancer treatment, whether alternative or conventional, works 100 percent of the time. This means that even the most promising treatments with the highest success rates are incapable of helping everyone. By using the Cancer Profile test to monitor how well their treatments are working, physicians can quickly know whether they are on the right track for each individual patient, or whether they need to change what they are doing before it is too late. In addition, if surgery is deemed necessary to remove cancerous tumors, the Cancer Profile can be used prior to surgical procedures to provide patients and their physicians with a benchmark to determine whether or not the surgery was successful. Following surgery, a follow-up Profile test can be given. If surgery was indeed successful, the Profile will confirm that by showing lowered levels of the cancer markers it measures. If the markers stay at the same level as before, or continue to rise, then doctors will quickly know that their patients need additional treatment.
Just as importantly, physicians can use the Cancer Profile to monitor how well their patients who achieve remission of their cancer are maintaining their health. As anyone who has had cancer knows (including me), once cancer strikes, it can strike again. Here too conventional cancer tests are often ineffective due to their inability to indicate in a timely fashion whether cancer is returning. For this reason, patients and their physicians alike are often forced to “watch and wait,” hoping that the patient’s remain cancer-free. Unfortunately, too many times cancer does return, and when it does so it is often worse than it was originally, making further treatment more challenging. By using the Cancer Profile, physicians don’t have to wait to detect signs of relapse. Instead, they can see from the Profile how well their cancer patients are doing and, if necessary, take appropriate action much earlier, before the cancer recurrence becomes more serious.
How You Can Obtain the Cancer Profile Test
Despite the benefits that the Cancer Profile test offers, as well as the fact that physicians and patients from all across the United States and around the world have made use of it, the test still remains relatively unknown. For this reason, I urge you not to wait for doctors to find out about it on their own. Instead, learn more about it yourself. You can do so by contacting:
American Metabolic Laboratories
1818 Sheridan Street, Suite 102
Hollywood, FL 33020
(954) 929-4814
http://americanmetaboliclaboratories.net
Your doctor can order the test for you, or you can do it yourself by contacting American Metabolic Laboratories directly. After you receive your results, you can also schedule a free phone consultation with one of the lab’s trained representatives.
Friday, July 22, 2011
The Need To Detect Cancer Early: Why Conventional Cancer Tests Are Not the Answer
One of the main reasons that cancer is such a costly disease—both in terms of human suffering and in the financial cost involved in treating it—is because by and large it is not detected early enough.
When it comes to early detection, conventional medicine is well behind alternative cancer approaches. That’s because conventional diagnostic cancer tests look only for signs of cancer tumors. This is true whether the screening methods are measuring cancer markers or looking for signs of tumors directly, such as through CT scans, MRIs, x-rays, etc.
Most people do not realize that it takes years, and in some cases even decades before cancer develops into a visible tumor that conventional screening can detect. By then, the challenge of treating cancer successfully is more difficult and costly. That’s because, during all of the time that tumors are not detectable by conventional means, cancer is still active in the body.
Since the conventional cancer establishment often refers to its approach to cancer as a “war,” think of detection this way:
In war, doesn’t it make sense to be aware of your enemy before he can come ashore and strike, rather than to wait for years while he stealthily infiltrates your defenses before he strikes in full force? Obviously your chances of defeating your enemy are much greater if you can stop him in his tracks before he has a chance to leave his homeland. Similarly, alternative and integrative cancer physicians recognize that the earliest possible detection of cancer greatly increases the chances of their patients’ long-term recovery and survival. Just as importantly, early detection makes treating cancer far less costly, compared to when it’s detected later on.
Limitations of Conventional Cancer Tests
Conventional cancer tests have a number of limitations, starting with the fact that, as I said, cancer must have developed into a tumor before they can successfully detect it. (For the purposes of this article, I am referring here to “solid state” cancers, meaning those for which tumor formation is involved. Nearly all types of cancer fall into this category, with two notable exceptions: leukemias and lymphomas, such as Hodgkin’s disease and non-Hodgkins lymphoma.) As mentioned, this means that cancer has to be present in the body for a long time before conventional cancer tests can detect it. And even then, small tumors can be missed by such tests, escaping detection until they grow larger, by which time cancer has progressed even further.
In addition, as I’ve written about in the past, a number of conventional cancer tests, such as x-rays and CT scans, are capable of causing cancer themselves due to the radiation they emit when patients are tested.
For this reason, conventional cancer specialists also rely on cancer markers to screen patients for cancer. A cancer marker refers to any of a variety of blood tests that measure the level of a protein material or other chemical that is produced by cancer cells. Marker levels become elevated in the presence of a cancerous tumor.
There are different cancer markers for different kinds of cancer. For example, the marker CEA (carcino-embryonic antigen) is used to screen for colon cancer, while CA 15-3 or CA 27-29 are used to screen for breast cancer. Other common cancer markers are CA 125, used to screen for ovarian cancer, and the PSA (prostate-specific antigen) test for men, which until recently was commonly relied upon by conventional physicians to screen for prostate cancer. (Recent research has shown that the PSA test may not be an accurate indicator of prostate cancer, to the points where its developer has now called on physicians to stop relying upon it for this purpose. The PSA test continues to be an accurate indicator for enlargement of the prostate gland or BPH.)
The most obvious limitation of conventional cancer marker tests is the fact that each of them can only be used to screen for one particular type of cancer. This means, for example, that a woman screened for breast cancer may be given a clean bill of health if her cancer markers show a low score all the while that she may have colon or another type of cancer that the markers cannot screen for.
Nor is that the only problem. Cancer markers can produce inaccurate results known as false positives and false negatives. A false positive results in patients being told they have cancer when in fact they don’t, while a false negative can result in people with cancer being told they are cancer-free. Obviously, either type of false reading is not a good outcome.
False positive and false negative outcomes from cancer marker tests are related to two statistical measures that determine a screening test’s usefulness. These measures are known as sensitivity and specificity. Sensitivity refers to the probability that a test will show a positive result when cancer actually exists, while specificity refers to the probability that a negative test result will occur when no cancer exists. A test that has high sensitivity and high specificity is far more useful than tests for which one or both of these measures are lower. Unfortunately, too many conventional cancer marker tests fall into this latter category. They include the PSA test, as well as the CA 27-29 and CEA tests, among others.
False negative outcomes are also quite high with the traditional PAP smear test, which is used to screen for cancer of the cervix. This test examines stained cells from the mucous membrane of the cervix for signs of precancerous changes. Pre-cancer of the cervix is called cervical dysplasia. When detected early enough, it is almost always reversible, but once it progresses into malignancy and becomes invasive it is much more difficult to treat. It is estimated that a full one-third of women who die from cervical cancer do so because it was not accurately detected soon enough for successful treatment to begin.
Given all of the above, you are probably wishing that there were accurate and noninvasive tests that could screen for cancer in its earliest stages, far ahead of the conventional diagnostic tests I’ve mentioned, that could also screen for multiple types of cancer at once, instead of patients needing to have multiple types of tests to know whether or not cancer is present in their bodies.
Fortunately these types of tests do exist, and more and more alternative physicians are now making use of them even though both tests are still ignored by their conventional counterparts. In future articles I will tell you about two of these tests, one from Germany and one that is available right here in the United States, and I will also let you know how you can obtain them. Stay tuned.
Until then, remember this: When it comes to cancer, prevention is your best option, followed by the earliest possible detection methods.
When it comes to early detection, conventional medicine is well behind alternative cancer approaches. That’s because conventional diagnostic cancer tests look only for signs of cancer tumors. This is true whether the screening methods are measuring cancer markers or looking for signs of tumors directly, such as through CT scans, MRIs, x-rays, etc.
Most people do not realize that it takes years, and in some cases even decades before cancer develops into a visible tumor that conventional screening can detect. By then, the challenge of treating cancer successfully is more difficult and costly. That’s because, during all of the time that tumors are not detectable by conventional means, cancer is still active in the body.
Since the conventional cancer establishment often refers to its approach to cancer as a “war,” think of detection this way:
In war, doesn’t it make sense to be aware of your enemy before he can come ashore and strike, rather than to wait for years while he stealthily infiltrates your defenses before he strikes in full force? Obviously your chances of defeating your enemy are much greater if you can stop him in his tracks before he has a chance to leave his homeland. Similarly, alternative and integrative cancer physicians recognize that the earliest possible detection of cancer greatly increases the chances of their patients’ long-term recovery and survival. Just as importantly, early detection makes treating cancer far less costly, compared to when it’s detected later on.
Limitations of Conventional Cancer Tests
Conventional cancer tests have a number of limitations, starting with the fact that, as I said, cancer must have developed into a tumor before they can successfully detect it. (For the purposes of this article, I am referring here to “solid state” cancers, meaning those for which tumor formation is involved. Nearly all types of cancer fall into this category, with two notable exceptions: leukemias and lymphomas, such as Hodgkin’s disease and non-Hodgkins lymphoma.) As mentioned, this means that cancer has to be present in the body for a long time before conventional cancer tests can detect it. And even then, small tumors can be missed by such tests, escaping detection until they grow larger, by which time cancer has progressed even further.
In addition, as I’ve written about in the past, a number of conventional cancer tests, such as x-rays and CT scans, are capable of causing cancer themselves due to the radiation they emit when patients are tested.
For this reason, conventional cancer specialists also rely on cancer markers to screen patients for cancer. A cancer marker refers to any of a variety of blood tests that measure the level of a protein material or other chemical that is produced by cancer cells. Marker levels become elevated in the presence of a cancerous tumor.
There are different cancer markers for different kinds of cancer. For example, the marker CEA (carcino-embryonic antigen) is used to screen for colon cancer, while CA 15-3 or CA 27-29 are used to screen for breast cancer. Other common cancer markers are CA 125, used to screen for ovarian cancer, and the PSA (prostate-specific antigen) test for men, which until recently was commonly relied upon by conventional physicians to screen for prostate cancer. (Recent research has shown that the PSA test may not be an accurate indicator of prostate cancer, to the points where its developer has now called on physicians to stop relying upon it for this purpose. The PSA test continues to be an accurate indicator for enlargement of the prostate gland or BPH.)
The most obvious limitation of conventional cancer marker tests is the fact that each of them can only be used to screen for one particular type of cancer. This means, for example, that a woman screened for breast cancer may be given a clean bill of health if her cancer markers show a low score all the while that she may have colon or another type of cancer that the markers cannot screen for.
Nor is that the only problem. Cancer markers can produce inaccurate results known as false positives and false negatives. A false positive results in patients being told they have cancer when in fact they don’t, while a false negative can result in people with cancer being told they are cancer-free. Obviously, either type of false reading is not a good outcome.
False positive and false negative outcomes from cancer marker tests are related to two statistical measures that determine a screening test’s usefulness. These measures are known as sensitivity and specificity. Sensitivity refers to the probability that a test will show a positive result when cancer actually exists, while specificity refers to the probability that a negative test result will occur when no cancer exists. A test that has high sensitivity and high specificity is far more useful than tests for which one or both of these measures are lower. Unfortunately, too many conventional cancer marker tests fall into this latter category. They include the PSA test, as well as the CA 27-29 and CEA tests, among others.
False negative outcomes are also quite high with the traditional PAP smear test, which is used to screen for cancer of the cervix. This test examines stained cells from the mucous membrane of the cervix for signs of precancerous changes. Pre-cancer of the cervix is called cervical dysplasia. When detected early enough, it is almost always reversible, but once it progresses into malignancy and becomes invasive it is much more difficult to treat. It is estimated that a full one-third of women who die from cervical cancer do so because it was not accurately detected soon enough for successful treatment to begin.
Given all of the above, you are probably wishing that there were accurate and noninvasive tests that could screen for cancer in its earliest stages, far ahead of the conventional diagnostic tests I’ve mentioned, that could also screen for multiple types of cancer at once, instead of patients needing to have multiple types of tests to know whether or not cancer is present in their bodies.
Fortunately these types of tests do exist, and more and more alternative physicians are now making use of them even though both tests are still ignored by their conventional counterparts. In future articles I will tell you about two of these tests, one from Germany and one that is available right here in the United States, and I will also let you know how you can obtain them. Stay tuned.
Until then, remember this: When it comes to cancer, prevention is your best option, followed by the earliest possible detection methods.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Cancer and Your Immune System
It may surprise you to know that cancer cells are produced in your body each and every day, to the point where they even form tumors. That’s because each of us is constantly being exposed to carcinogens in our food, air and water supply. Fortunately, your body has a powerful weapon that is constantly on the alert for such abnormal cells and is quick to destroy them once they are found. What is this powerful weapon?
Your immune system!
When you are healthy, the cancer cells and tumors mentioned above never make it past the microscopic stage. Instead, they disappear before you even have a chance to know they exist. According to conventional oncologists, this disappearing act is known as “spontaneous regression.” But in reality it’s all due to the ability of the immune system to identify cancer cells early, before they can multiply, and quickly eliminate them as part of the overall protective role that the immune system performs as it helps to maintain your overall health.
Based on these facts, three things are very clear with regard to cancer:
1) The health of immune system is one of the most important factors that determine cancer patients’ survival.
2) The presence of cancer cells in the body is far less important than the immune system’s ability to properly identify and eliminate such cells, even when they are few in number.
3) Cancer takes hold in the body largely as a result of a functional breakdown or imbalance in the immune system, which can occur as a result of many factors, including poor diet, nutritional deficiencies, chronic exposure to toxins that over time overwhelm the immune system, unhealthy lifestyle choices (smoking, alcohol or drug abuse, etc), chronic stress, and unresolved emotional issues, to name just a few.
How Your Immune System Fights Cancer
When functioning properly your immune system protects against cancer in a number of important ways. First, it assesses whether normal cells have been transformed into cancer cells. This task is performed by specialized white blood cells known as T lymphocytes, or T cells. T cells are produced by the thymus glad and travel throughout the body where they seek out abnormal cells and foreign proteins known as tumor-associated antigens that are released by tumor cells.
If cancer cells are present, certain types of T cells signal other types of white blood cells to spring into action. These include B cells that produce antibodies that neutralize foreign matter in both blood and tissues, as well as other lymphocytes that produce anticancer chemicals known as cytokines. Cytokines act like a natural form of chemotherapy and include tumor necrosis factor, interleukin, and interferon. Unlike chemotherapy drugs, cytokines do their work without harming healthy cells.
Other cancer fighters in your immune system’s arsenal include natural killer (NK) cells and macrophages. NK cells are one of your body’s most immediate and powerful agents for protecting against cancer. A specialized class of lymphocytes, NK cells lock onto cancer cell sites and destroy malignant cells before they can multiply and spread. NK cells are especially important in the early stages of cancer, when they descend directly upon tiny tumors to devour them or cause them to disintegrate before the tumors can grow and start to harm the body. NK cells have little effect against large tumors, however.
Like NK cells, macrophages also destroy cancer cells by ingesting them. They also support your body’s detoxification system by scavenging for waste and debris, and help to regulate cell reproduction as well as the activity of other immune cells. Research has shown a direct correlation between increased macrophage activity and a decreased incidence of tumors and tumor growth. For this reason, macrophage function by itself can often accurately determine whether tumors will thrive or die.
Recognizing the Immune System’s Role in Fighting Cancer
Unlike conventional most conventional oncologists, alternative and integrative cancer doctors have long recognized the importance of the immune system when it comes to treating cancer effectively. For this reason, alternative and integrative doctors emphasize immune-boosting therapies as part of their overall strategy for addressing cancer. By contrast, most oncologists ignore immune function, focusing instead on simply killing cancer cells and tumors through the use of chemotherapy and/or radiation, both of which wreck havoc on cancer and healthy cells alike, especially immune cells. This difference in approach helps to explain why alternative and integrative approaches for cancer are often far more effective than conventional cancer treatments, both in the short-term and in the long-term.
What many people do not realize is that many cancer patients who are treated with chemotherapy or radiation actually do not die from their cancer, but from secondary infections such as pneumonia that are able to take hold in the body after conventional treatments have weakened and ravaged the immune system. That’s why helping to improve and maintain immune function is so vitally important when treating most cancers.
Alternative and integrative physicians accomplish this in a variety of ways, starting with improving their patients’ diet so that the foods they eat enhance all of the body’s functions, rather than impede them, which is what happens when you eat the nutritionally deficient standard American diet (SAD). Other therapies that may be employed to bolster the immune system are nutritional and orthomolecular medicine, herbal medicine, detoxification therapies, hyperthermia (heat-based therapies), and mind/body medicine (for stress relief and to heal painful emotions), to name just a few.
In addition, alternative cancer specialists, should they deem that chemotherapy or radiation is necessary, will use lab tests to help them determine the most appropriate chemo drugs to use that are most specific to each patient’s needs. By tailor-making chemotherapy treatments to match each individual’s unique needs, the chemo drugs that are employed are usually able to be administered at far lower doses than normal because they have been screened for their effectiveness. This not only increases their usefulness, but it also dramatically reduces the otherwise harmful side effects chemotherapy is noted for, sparing the immune system from harm.
The Cancer Establishment Is Catching On But Is It Enough?
Over the past few years drug companies and the mainstream cancer establishment has at long last begun to consider the immune system as part of their approach to treating cancer. Earlier this year, for example, an immune-stimulating cancer drug called Yervoy (ipilimumab) was hailed as “breakthrough” drug for combating late-stage melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. Developed by Bristol-Meyers Squibb, it has been approved by the FDA after studies showed that it nearly doubled the number of melanoma patients who survived for three years or more. Since its approval, the drug industry has increased its research into developing other immune-boosting drugs for cancer.
However, the news is not all good. In fact, some of it is downright frightening. That’s because in clinical trials nearly 13% of patients taking Yervoy had severe or fatal autoimmune reactions. In addition, the drug also causes a wide range of side effects, including fatigue, hormone deficiencies, diarrhea, skin rash, and colitis (inflammation of the intestines. Moreover, like many cancer drugs, it is expensive. Plus, because it is new to market, no studies exist showing whether it is safe and effective long-term.
While I applaud the cancer establishment for finally beginning to research immune-boosting drugs, just as I agree that both chemotherapy and radiation have their place as part of physicians’ overall cancer-fighting arsenal, I question the wisdom of relying on drug-based immune-boosting approaches that are not completely safe and also so expensive. Especially when proven safe and natural immune-boosting therapies, such as those I’ve mentioned above, already exist and have a long track record of efficacy.
That’s why I am such a strong proponent of cancer treatments that rely on the “best of both worlds” from both the alternative and conventional fields of medicine. And it’s also why I encourage all cancer patients to explore all of their options from both fields and to seek out doctors who are trained in how to best integrate them. There is no “magic bullet” when it comes to treating cancer, and there most likely never will be. But certainly your body’s immune system is a key part of the complete cancer care picture, and that’s a fact more cancer doctors and patients alike need to recognize.
Your immune system!
When you are healthy, the cancer cells and tumors mentioned above never make it past the microscopic stage. Instead, they disappear before you even have a chance to know they exist. According to conventional oncologists, this disappearing act is known as “spontaneous regression.” But in reality it’s all due to the ability of the immune system to identify cancer cells early, before they can multiply, and quickly eliminate them as part of the overall protective role that the immune system performs as it helps to maintain your overall health.
Based on these facts, three things are very clear with regard to cancer:
1) The health of immune system is one of the most important factors that determine cancer patients’ survival.
2) The presence of cancer cells in the body is far less important than the immune system’s ability to properly identify and eliminate such cells, even when they are few in number.
3) Cancer takes hold in the body largely as a result of a functional breakdown or imbalance in the immune system, which can occur as a result of many factors, including poor diet, nutritional deficiencies, chronic exposure to toxins that over time overwhelm the immune system, unhealthy lifestyle choices (smoking, alcohol or drug abuse, etc), chronic stress, and unresolved emotional issues, to name just a few.
How Your Immune System Fights Cancer
When functioning properly your immune system protects against cancer in a number of important ways. First, it assesses whether normal cells have been transformed into cancer cells. This task is performed by specialized white blood cells known as T lymphocytes, or T cells. T cells are produced by the thymus glad and travel throughout the body where they seek out abnormal cells and foreign proteins known as tumor-associated antigens that are released by tumor cells.
If cancer cells are present, certain types of T cells signal other types of white blood cells to spring into action. These include B cells that produce antibodies that neutralize foreign matter in both blood and tissues, as well as other lymphocytes that produce anticancer chemicals known as cytokines. Cytokines act like a natural form of chemotherapy and include tumor necrosis factor, interleukin, and interferon. Unlike chemotherapy drugs, cytokines do their work without harming healthy cells.
Other cancer fighters in your immune system’s arsenal include natural killer (NK) cells and macrophages. NK cells are one of your body’s most immediate and powerful agents for protecting against cancer. A specialized class of lymphocytes, NK cells lock onto cancer cell sites and destroy malignant cells before they can multiply and spread. NK cells are especially important in the early stages of cancer, when they descend directly upon tiny tumors to devour them or cause them to disintegrate before the tumors can grow and start to harm the body. NK cells have little effect against large tumors, however.
Like NK cells, macrophages also destroy cancer cells by ingesting them. They also support your body’s detoxification system by scavenging for waste and debris, and help to regulate cell reproduction as well as the activity of other immune cells. Research has shown a direct correlation between increased macrophage activity and a decreased incidence of tumors and tumor growth. For this reason, macrophage function by itself can often accurately determine whether tumors will thrive or die.
Recognizing the Immune System’s Role in Fighting Cancer
Unlike conventional most conventional oncologists, alternative and integrative cancer doctors have long recognized the importance of the immune system when it comes to treating cancer effectively. For this reason, alternative and integrative doctors emphasize immune-boosting therapies as part of their overall strategy for addressing cancer. By contrast, most oncologists ignore immune function, focusing instead on simply killing cancer cells and tumors through the use of chemotherapy and/or radiation, both of which wreck havoc on cancer and healthy cells alike, especially immune cells. This difference in approach helps to explain why alternative and integrative approaches for cancer are often far more effective than conventional cancer treatments, both in the short-term and in the long-term.
What many people do not realize is that many cancer patients who are treated with chemotherapy or radiation actually do not die from their cancer, but from secondary infections such as pneumonia that are able to take hold in the body after conventional treatments have weakened and ravaged the immune system. That’s why helping to improve and maintain immune function is so vitally important when treating most cancers.
Alternative and integrative physicians accomplish this in a variety of ways, starting with improving their patients’ diet so that the foods they eat enhance all of the body’s functions, rather than impede them, which is what happens when you eat the nutritionally deficient standard American diet (SAD). Other therapies that may be employed to bolster the immune system are nutritional and orthomolecular medicine, herbal medicine, detoxification therapies, hyperthermia (heat-based therapies), and mind/body medicine (for stress relief and to heal painful emotions), to name just a few.
In addition, alternative cancer specialists, should they deem that chemotherapy or radiation is necessary, will use lab tests to help them determine the most appropriate chemo drugs to use that are most specific to each patient’s needs. By tailor-making chemotherapy treatments to match each individual’s unique needs, the chemo drugs that are employed are usually able to be administered at far lower doses than normal because they have been screened for their effectiveness. This not only increases their usefulness, but it also dramatically reduces the otherwise harmful side effects chemotherapy is noted for, sparing the immune system from harm.
The Cancer Establishment Is Catching On But Is It Enough?
Over the past few years drug companies and the mainstream cancer establishment has at long last begun to consider the immune system as part of their approach to treating cancer. Earlier this year, for example, an immune-stimulating cancer drug called Yervoy (ipilimumab) was hailed as “breakthrough” drug for combating late-stage melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. Developed by Bristol-Meyers Squibb, it has been approved by the FDA after studies showed that it nearly doubled the number of melanoma patients who survived for three years or more. Since its approval, the drug industry has increased its research into developing other immune-boosting drugs for cancer.
However, the news is not all good. In fact, some of it is downright frightening. That’s because in clinical trials nearly 13% of patients taking Yervoy had severe or fatal autoimmune reactions. In addition, the drug also causes a wide range of side effects, including fatigue, hormone deficiencies, diarrhea, skin rash, and colitis (inflammation of the intestines. Moreover, like many cancer drugs, it is expensive. Plus, because it is new to market, no studies exist showing whether it is safe and effective long-term.
While I applaud the cancer establishment for finally beginning to research immune-boosting drugs, just as I agree that both chemotherapy and radiation have their place as part of physicians’ overall cancer-fighting arsenal, I question the wisdom of relying on drug-based immune-boosting approaches that are not completely safe and also so expensive. Especially when proven safe and natural immune-boosting therapies, such as those I’ve mentioned above, already exist and have a long track record of efficacy.
That’s why I am such a strong proponent of cancer treatments that rely on the “best of both worlds” from both the alternative and conventional fields of medicine. And it’s also why I encourage all cancer patients to explore all of their options from both fields and to seek out doctors who are trained in how to best integrate them. There is no “magic bullet” when it comes to treating cancer, and there most likely never will be. But certainly your body’s immune system is a key part of the complete cancer care picture, and that’s a fact more cancer doctors and patients alike need to recognize.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Conventional Medicine’s Blind and Ignorant Bias Towards Alternative Cancer Therapies
Today I want to share with you the story of a very brave young boy and his equally courageous family. His name is Connah Broom and his story is both a wonderful testament to the power of love and the human spirit and a sad indictment of the ignorance and bias to be found within the conventional medical community when it comes to alternative cancer therapies.
I recently became aware of Connah when I came upon a link to a feature article about him that appeared in the February 10 2009 edition of the Daily Mail, a major newspaper in England. The title of the article is:
The boy with 11 tumours who was sent home to die... and survives after grandparents' alternative therapy treatments.
Briefly, here’s Connah’s story.
In August 2006, after months of intermittent symptoms of pain and a general feeling of illness that physicians initially misdiagnosed, he was found to have a relatively rare and aggressive form of cancer known as neuroblastoma, which attacks the brain and nervous system running along the spinal cord. By the time Connah was properly diagnosed, his cancer was classed as neuroblastoma stage 4. Doctors found that it had spread through his chest near his heart, to his stomach close to several organs including his kidney and intestine, and down his left leg.
Connah received conventional cancer treatments for seven month, at which point his doctors told his family that there was nothing more that they could do for him and that they should “take him home to enjoy his final months” of life. That was in early 2007.
It was at this point that Connah’s grandparents took action. Instead of accepting the doctors’ prognosis, they refused to give up hope and began to educate themselves about any and all potential alternative options that might save their grandson.
The first thing they did was put Connah on an all-organic diet along with filtering his water, after they read doing so could reduce the amount of harmful toxins in his body. “Once we did this, Connah stopped becoming ill,” his grandmother reports.
As they continued their research, Connah’s grandparents (whom he lives with, along with his father) soon added other alternative therapies to his health-care regimen, including reiki, far infrared sauna, laser therapy, ultrasound, and other therapies, some of which they were introduced to when they visited an alternative cancer clinic in Mexico (the newspaper article does not identify which clinic they went to). After being instructed in the use of the therapies they learned about at the clinic, Connah’s grandparents returned home and built their own equipment devices in order to treat Connah on their own. All of the expenses involved were paid for out-of-pocket.
At the time that the Daily Mail article was written—a full two years after Connah’s doctors had given him up for dead—scans showed that ten of Connah’s 11 tumors had shrunk, had no blood flow and appeared to be dead. Today, more than four years after Connah received his death sentence, he is still alive and his latest scans show that “his disease is stable.”
Not only is Connah still with us, he is also living a normal, active life, including pursuing his passion for gymnastics, playing soccer, painting, and winning awards at dance competitions.
As I said, Connah’s story is wonderful.
But what isn’t so wonderful is how the conventional medical community has responded to it. In the same article, the Daily Mail reported that conventional cancer experts remained skeptical and “cast doubt on whether the alternative therapies had made any difference”.
Bear in mind, these are the same types of experts who had handed Connah a death sentence years earlier!
As if that isn’t enough, the article also reported the experts said “levels of toxins in food and drink are unlikely to be high enough to cause cancer”.
Such a claim is not only downright ignorant, it’s also entirely irresponsible. Numerous studies have shown a link between poor diet and cancer, and that includes consuming foods and drinks that contain cancer-causing chemicals. For conventional cancer experts to say otherwise—and for the Daily Mail to allow them to do so unquestioned—verges on criminal negligence.
But the height of the arrogance and ignorance of the conventional cancer establishment is revealed later in the article when the Mail reports that, rather than taking a serious look at the merits of the approach Connah’s grandparents have used to not only keep him alive, but restore him to an active childhood, “They say cancers often go into remission for unexplained reasons.”
In other words, they have no interest whatsoever in admitting that what Connah’s grandparents are doing is not only working, but is actually far superior to the conventional treatment Connah received—treatments which they themselves admitted had failed him!
I wish I could say that this example of ignorance about and bias against viable alternative cancer therapies was rare, but it isn’t. It’s the norm! And because it is, untold numbers of cancer patients around the world are denied the opportunity to explore nonconventional therapies that can quite possibly save their lives. All because they heed the advice of conventional doctors and conventional cancer organizations that say such alternatives are “un proven” and not worthy of consideration.
Fortunately for Connah, his grandparents were smarter than that. Instead of passively accepting the death sentence Connah was given, they did their own due diligence and by doing so, they saved Connah’s life.
My hope is that, should cancer strike you or your loved ones, you too will be like Connah’s grandparents, and also refuse to give up hope.
You can read the Daily Mail article about Connah here.
You can also watch a video about Connah and his grandparents here.
Finally, if you would like to be kept informed about Connah’s progress or make a donation to help support his grandparents’ work, you can visit this website set up in his name:
http://www.connahsappeal.co.uk
I recently became aware of Connah when I came upon a link to a feature article about him that appeared in the February 10 2009 edition of the Daily Mail, a major newspaper in England. The title of the article is:
The boy with 11 tumours who was sent home to die... and survives after grandparents' alternative therapy treatments.
Briefly, here’s Connah’s story.
In August 2006, after months of intermittent symptoms of pain and a general feeling of illness that physicians initially misdiagnosed, he was found to have a relatively rare and aggressive form of cancer known as neuroblastoma, which attacks the brain and nervous system running along the spinal cord. By the time Connah was properly diagnosed, his cancer was classed as neuroblastoma stage 4. Doctors found that it had spread through his chest near his heart, to his stomach close to several organs including his kidney and intestine, and down his left leg.
Connah received conventional cancer treatments for seven month, at which point his doctors told his family that there was nothing more that they could do for him and that they should “take him home to enjoy his final months” of life. That was in early 2007.
It was at this point that Connah’s grandparents took action. Instead of accepting the doctors’ prognosis, they refused to give up hope and began to educate themselves about any and all potential alternative options that might save their grandson.
The first thing they did was put Connah on an all-organic diet along with filtering his water, after they read doing so could reduce the amount of harmful toxins in his body. “Once we did this, Connah stopped becoming ill,” his grandmother reports.
As they continued their research, Connah’s grandparents (whom he lives with, along with his father) soon added other alternative therapies to his health-care regimen, including reiki, far infrared sauna, laser therapy, ultrasound, and other therapies, some of which they were introduced to when they visited an alternative cancer clinic in Mexico (the newspaper article does not identify which clinic they went to). After being instructed in the use of the therapies they learned about at the clinic, Connah’s grandparents returned home and built their own equipment devices in order to treat Connah on their own. All of the expenses involved were paid for out-of-pocket.
At the time that the Daily Mail article was written—a full two years after Connah’s doctors had given him up for dead—scans showed that ten of Connah’s 11 tumors had shrunk, had no blood flow and appeared to be dead. Today, more than four years after Connah received his death sentence, he is still alive and his latest scans show that “his disease is stable.”
Not only is Connah still with us, he is also living a normal, active life, including pursuing his passion for gymnastics, playing soccer, painting, and winning awards at dance competitions.
As I said, Connah’s story is wonderful.
But what isn’t so wonderful is how the conventional medical community has responded to it. In the same article, the Daily Mail reported that conventional cancer experts remained skeptical and “cast doubt on whether the alternative therapies had made any difference”.
Bear in mind, these are the same types of experts who had handed Connah a death sentence years earlier!
As if that isn’t enough, the article also reported the experts said “levels of toxins in food and drink are unlikely to be high enough to cause cancer”.
Such a claim is not only downright ignorant, it’s also entirely irresponsible. Numerous studies have shown a link between poor diet and cancer, and that includes consuming foods and drinks that contain cancer-causing chemicals. For conventional cancer experts to say otherwise—and for the Daily Mail to allow them to do so unquestioned—verges on criminal negligence.
But the height of the arrogance and ignorance of the conventional cancer establishment is revealed later in the article when the Mail reports that, rather than taking a serious look at the merits of the approach Connah’s grandparents have used to not only keep him alive, but restore him to an active childhood, “They say cancers often go into remission for unexplained reasons.”
In other words, they have no interest whatsoever in admitting that what Connah’s grandparents are doing is not only working, but is actually far superior to the conventional treatment Connah received—treatments which they themselves admitted had failed him!
I wish I could say that this example of ignorance about and bias against viable alternative cancer therapies was rare, but it isn’t. It’s the norm! And because it is, untold numbers of cancer patients around the world are denied the opportunity to explore nonconventional therapies that can quite possibly save their lives. All because they heed the advice of conventional doctors and conventional cancer organizations that say such alternatives are “un proven” and not worthy of consideration.
Fortunately for Connah, his grandparents were smarter than that. Instead of passively accepting the death sentence Connah was given, they did their own due diligence and by doing so, they saved Connah’s life.
My hope is that, should cancer strike you or your loved ones, you too will be like Connah’s grandparents, and also refuse to give up hope.
You can read the Daily Mail article about Connah here.
You can also watch a video about Connah and his grandparents here.
Finally, if you would like to be kept informed about Connah’s progress or make a donation to help support his grandparents’ work, you can visit this website set up in his name:
http://www.connahsappeal.co.uk
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Is the Profit Motive Harming and Killing Cancer Patients?
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” – Upton Sinclair
Here is a shocking fact you most likely did not know: Unlike other kinds of doctors, cancer doctors (oncologists) are allowed to profit from the sale of chemotherapy drugs. In fact, most of the annual income oncologists earn comes from the profit that they make from selling these highly toxic drugs to their patients.
That’s not supposition on my part. That’s a fact reported by NBC Nightly News back in 2006. You can watch the report here.
As NBC reported, oncologists buy chemotherapy drugs at wholesale prices and then sell them to their patients at “marked up prices.”
This absurd practice was made legal years ago after Medicare and health insurance companies decided it would be a good idea to move cancer patients out of hospitals and into the care of private practice oncologists. Their reasoning was that this was necessary in order to save money. What happened as a result of this misguided decision was the exact opposite.
Instead of saving money, the cost of chemotherapy drugs skyrocketed to tens of thousands of dollars a year, and in some cases, tens of thousands of dollars per month.
Medical ethicists have for years questioned the wisdom of allowing oncologists to continue to earn the majority of their incomes from the sale of chemotherapy drugs, correctly pointing out that doing so creates a serious conflict of interest between patient welfare and oncologists’ desire to prescribe the drugs that they are going to make the most money from even when they are not what their patients needs. This includes over-prescribing drugs beyond the point in which they are effective.
How many cancer patients have died because their doctors succumbed to the lure of maximizing their profits and administered chemotherapy drugs inappropriately?
No one can say, but in all likelihood at least some cancer patients did die because of their doctors’ desire for profits.
This is a travesty and it needs to stop!
Correctly this great wrong won’t be easy, however, nor can oncologists as a whole be blamed.
Although I strongly disagree with the use of chemotherapy drugs the way they are administered by conventional oncologists—for the simple reason that, in the majority of cases, they do not work—at the same time I recognize that most cancer doctors and their staffs are extremely dedicated professionals who are doing all they can, based on how they have been taught (persuaded, would be the better word) to treat cancer.
In short, it’s not oncologists who are at the root of this problem; it’s the system in which they are trapped!
This fact was admitted to by Dr. Peter Eisenberg, a conventional cancer specialist who was interviewed as part of the NBC report mentioned above. In it, he said, “Patients should feel that their physician has their best interest at heart, always. And the way the system is set up, because of the incentives [for selling chemotherapy drugs to their patients], does something to destroy that.”
So, what can be done about this?
The first step appears clear-cut. The profit motive for oncologists must be eliminated in the arena of cancer care, by eliminating their ability to buy drugs at wholesale and then to sell them at often much higher prices. (Note: Usually, it is not the cancer patients who pay these exorbitant prices; it is health insurance companies and/or Medicare/Medicaid. The end result is higher health insurance premiums for all of us, and a further drain of taxpayer money from our federal government’s already overstrained resources.)
Oncologists must return to administering their drugs in the same way that all other MDs do: Instead of selling drugs directly, they must simply prescribe them, as they once used to do.
But this step alone, will not fix the problem, and here’s where things get more complicated. And more suspect.
You see, the real reason cancer drugs cost so much has very little to do with how much it costs drug companies to develop them and bring them to market. Nor does their cost have anything to do with their potential to save lives. If that were the case for chemotherapy drugs, their price would be extremely low given how abysmal a track record they have for improving cancer patients’ quality of life and extending their survival rates, let alone actually curing cancer, which they most certainly do not (at best, they only temporarily put cancer into remission).
No, the real reason cancer drugs in the United States costs so much (well over $100,000 a year for a single patient in the case of many of the new generation of cancer drugs) is very simple:
Cancer drugs—especially the new generation of drugs—cost so much because they have no competitors.
In other words, drug companies can charge whatever they want for their cancer drugs, and they do exactly that!
You might think that such price-gouging by the drug companies could easily be curtailed if health insurance companies if they simply refused to pay the prices Big Pharma demands for their cancer drugs. In theory, this is correct, but the reality of this situation paints a different story. First, refusing to pay the cost of cancer drugs would garner a lot of ill-will towards health insurance companies by the public, and these companies already have enough of that as it is.
But the bigger issue has to do with Medicare. You see, when it comes to paying for the price of drugs, both cancer drugs and otherwise, health insurance companies take their lead from Medicare. Medicare does not provide coverage for most types of drugs, but it does cover the use cancer drugs. Most health insurance companies simply follow the guidelines for drug reimbursement that are established by the government’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). And when it comes to the price of cancer drugs, as far as CMS is concerned, anything goes!
This is in stark contrast to how CMS acts with regard to all other types of drugs. Aside from cancer drugs, CMS controls medical costs by establishing the fees that are paid under Medicare/Medicaid for nearly all other medical procedures, including drug usage, by both doctors and hospitals. Once CMS establishes these fees, health insurance companies set their own rates of coverage to coincide with them.
What this means is very simple to understand: If CMS dealt with the price of cancer drugs in the same way that it does for all other medications, the price of cancer drugs would quickly plummet, largely sparing oncologists of the temptation to try and profit from their use.
When it comes to cancer drugs, CMS must change its policies!
Then there is a third, and equally important factor to consider: The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). PhRMA bills itself as the pharmaceutical industry trade group. In plain English, it means that it’s a drug lobby. And since 1992 its work has paid huge dividends for Big Pharma, from which its funding is derived. You see, PhRMA convinced the US Congress and President Bill Clinton to enact a bill known as the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) of 1992. Once the act was passed and signed into law, Big Pharma effectively became the fox guarding the henhouse of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This came about because the act means that, since its passage, Big Pharma actually helps fund the FDA’s research and approval process of the very pharmaceutical drugs the FDA is supposed to be regulating on our behalf. Not only does Big Pharma’s funding of the FDA create a direct and serious conflict of interest, it also ensures that the FDA provides a speedier approval process of pharmaceutical drugs, many of which later prove to be ineffective, life-threatening, or both!
By now, I’m sure you can understand that one of the most serious underlying problems that have kept conventional cancer treatment in the US focused almost entirely on dangerous and ineffective cancer drugs is the fact that cancer is big business. Hundreds of billions of dollars are spent each and every year on behalf of cancer patients and their loved ones who are desperate to reverse this terrible disease. And all of that money winds up in the pockets of the doctors and clinics that treating cancer with these cancer drugs, and, most especially, the pharmaceutical drug companies who manufacture them and promote their use.
Human nature being what it is, it would be foolish to expect those who profit most from the use of these cancer drugs, including oncologists, will suddenly change course and start investigating the cheaper, safer, and far more effective cancer treatments that I have spent decades of my life investigating. Not when their livelihoods depend so greatly on the status quo of cancer care today.
Therefore, it is up to each and every one of us to pressure our elected officials to clean up this sad state of affairs that we are in. To do so, we must insist on the following:
• Oncologists must be prohibited from buying and reselling cancer drugs for profit.
• The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services must begin to establish the fees that are paid under Medicare/Medicaid for cancer drugs and cancer treatments, just as they do for all other drugs and medical procedures.
• The influence of Big Pharma and their lobbyist group the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America must end, both at the FDA, and within Congress (the drug lobby has more lobbyists in Congress and spends more lobbying money there than any other lobbyist group), and the Prescription Drug User Fee Act of 1992 must be rescinded.
If we as a nation can achieve these goals, then truly effective approaches for treating cancer in the United States may at last come into the full light of day.
Here is a shocking fact you most likely did not know: Unlike other kinds of doctors, cancer doctors (oncologists) are allowed to profit from the sale of chemotherapy drugs. In fact, most of the annual income oncologists earn comes from the profit that they make from selling these highly toxic drugs to their patients.
That’s not supposition on my part. That’s a fact reported by NBC Nightly News back in 2006. You can watch the report here.
As NBC reported, oncologists buy chemotherapy drugs at wholesale prices and then sell them to their patients at “marked up prices.”
This absurd practice was made legal years ago after Medicare and health insurance companies decided it would be a good idea to move cancer patients out of hospitals and into the care of private practice oncologists. Their reasoning was that this was necessary in order to save money. What happened as a result of this misguided decision was the exact opposite.
Instead of saving money, the cost of chemotherapy drugs skyrocketed to tens of thousands of dollars a year, and in some cases, tens of thousands of dollars per month.
Medical ethicists have for years questioned the wisdom of allowing oncologists to continue to earn the majority of their incomes from the sale of chemotherapy drugs, correctly pointing out that doing so creates a serious conflict of interest between patient welfare and oncologists’ desire to prescribe the drugs that they are going to make the most money from even when they are not what their patients needs. This includes over-prescribing drugs beyond the point in which they are effective.
How many cancer patients have died because their doctors succumbed to the lure of maximizing their profits and administered chemotherapy drugs inappropriately?
No one can say, but in all likelihood at least some cancer patients did die because of their doctors’ desire for profits.
This is a travesty and it needs to stop!
Correctly this great wrong won’t be easy, however, nor can oncologists as a whole be blamed.
Although I strongly disagree with the use of chemotherapy drugs the way they are administered by conventional oncologists—for the simple reason that, in the majority of cases, they do not work—at the same time I recognize that most cancer doctors and their staffs are extremely dedicated professionals who are doing all they can, based on how they have been taught (persuaded, would be the better word) to treat cancer.
In short, it’s not oncologists who are at the root of this problem; it’s the system in which they are trapped!
This fact was admitted to by Dr. Peter Eisenberg, a conventional cancer specialist who was interviewed as part of the NBC report mentioned above. In it, he said, “Patients should feel that their physician has their best interest at heart, always. And the way the system is set up, because of the incentives [for selling chemotherapy drugs to their patients], does something to destroy that.”
So, what can be done about this?
The first step appears clear-cut. The profit motive for oncologists must be eliminated in the arena of cancer care, by eliminating their ability to buy drugs at wholesale and then to sell them at often much higher prices. (Note: Usually, it is not the cancer patients who pay these exorbitant prices; it is health insurance companies and/or Medicare/Medicaid. The end result is higher health insurance premiums for all of us, and a further drain of taxpayer money from our federal government’s already overstrained resources.)
Oncologists must return to administering their drugs in the same way that all other MDs do: Instead of selling drugs directly, they must simply prescribe them, as they once used to do.
But this step alone, will not fix the problem, and here’s where things get more complicated. And more suspect.
You see, the real reason cancer drugs cost so much has very little to do with how much it costs drug companies to develop them and bring them to market. Nor does their cost have anything to do with their potential to save lives. If that were the case for chemotherapy drugs, their price would be extremely low given how abysmal a track record they have for improving cancer patients’ quality of life and extending their survival rates, let alone actually curing cancer, which they most certainly do not (at best, they only temporarily put cancer into remission).
No, the real reason cancer drugs in the United States costs so much (well over $100,000 a year for a single patient in the case of many of the new generation of cancer drugs) is very simple:
Cancer drugs—especially the new generation of drugs—cost so much because they have no competitors.
In other words, drug companies can charge whatever they want for their cancer drugs, and they do exactly that!
You might think that such price-gouging by the drug companies could easily be curtailed if health insurance companies if they simply refused to pay the prices Big Pharma demands for their cancer drugs. In theory, this is correct, but the reality of this situation paints a different story. First, refusing to pay the cost of cancer drugs would garner a lot of ill-will towards health insurance companies by the public, and these companies already have enough of that as it is.
But the bigger issue has to do with Medicare. You see, when it comes to paying for the price of drugs, both cancer drugs and otherwise, health insurance companies take their lead from Medicare. Medicare does not provide coverage for most types of drugs, but it does cover the use cancer drugs. Most health insurance companies simply follow the guidelines for drug reimbursement that are established by the government’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). And when it comes to the price of cancer drugs, as far as CMS is concerned, anything goes!
This is in stark contrast to how CMS acts with regard to all other types of drugs. Aside from cancer drugs, CMS controls medical costs by establishing the fees that are paid under Medicare/Medicaid for nearly all other medical procedures, including drug usage, by both doctors and hospitals. Once CMS establishes these fees, health insurance companies set their own rates of coverage to coincide with them.
What this means is very simple to understand: If CMS dealt with the price of cancer drugs in the same way that it does for all other medications, the price of cancer drugs would quickly plummet, largely sparing oncologists of the temptation to try and profit from their use.
When it comes to cancer drugs, CMS must change its policies!
Then there is a third, and equally important factor to consider: The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). PhRMA bills itself as the pharmaceutical industry trade group. In plain English, it means that it’s a drug lobby. And since 1992 its work has paid huge dividends for Big Pharma, from which its funding is derived. You see, PhRMA convinced the US Congress and President Bill Clinton to enact a bill known as the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) of 1992. Once the act was passed and signed into law, Big Pharma effectively became the fox guarding the henhouse of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This came about because the act means that, since its passage, Big Pharma actually helps fund the FDA’s research and approval process of the very pharmaceutical drugs the FDA is supposed to be regulating on our behalf. Not only does Big Pharma’s funding of the FDA create a direct and serious conflict of interest, it also ensures that the FDA provides a speedier approval process of pharmaceutical drugs, many of which later prove to be ineffective, life-threatening, or both!
By now, I’m sure you can understand that one of the most serious underlying problems that have kept conventional cancer treatment in the US focused almost entirely on dangerous and ineffective cancer drugs is the fact that cancer is big business. Hundreds of billions of dollars are spent each and every year on behalf of cancer patients and their loved ones who are desperate to reverse this terrible disease. And all of that money winds up in the pockets of the doctors and clinics that treating cancer with these cancer drugs, and, most especially, the pharmaceutical drug companies who manufacture them and promote their use.
Human nature being what it is, it would be foolish to expect those who profit most from the use of these cancer drugs, including oncologists, will suddenly change course and start investigating the cheaper, safer, and far more effective cancer treatments that I have spent decades of my life investigating. Not when their livelihoods depend so greatly on the status quo of cancer care today.
Therefore, it is up to each and every one of us to pressure our elected officials to clean up this sad state of affairs that we are in. To do so, we must insist on the following:
• Oncologists must be prohibited from buying and reselling cancer drugs for profit.
• The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services must begin to establish the fees that are paid under Medicare/Medicaid for cancer drugs and cancer treatments, just as they do for all other drugs and medical procedures.
• The influence of Big Pharma and their lobbyist group the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America must end, both at the FDA, and within Congress (the drug lobby has more lobbyists in Congress and spends more lobbying money there than any other lobbyist group), and the Prescription Drug User Fee Act of 1992 must be rescinded.
If we as a nation can achieve these goals, then truly effective approaches for treating cancer in the United States may at last come into the full light of day.
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