The majority of cancers cannot be cured by radiation
because the dose of X-rays required to kill all the cancer cells
would also kill the patients.
John Cairns

The Beginning of the Exotic Unknown Rays … the X-rays

Something unusual happened in the laboratory of Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen on the evening of 8 November 1895. A paper coated with barium, platinum and cyanide produced a glow when exposed to an electric discharge from a glass tube. Roentgen had no idea what this light ray was, so he called it X-ray. When he held his hands in the path of the X-ray beam, he could make out the bones of his fingers. Later, Roentgen produced the first X-ray record by capturing his wife’s hand with a ring in her finger. For discovering the X-ray, this German physicist was awarded the Nobel Prize for physics in 1901.

Ignorance

Soon afterwards, manufacturers saw the potential of this new discovery. The X-ray apparatus began to be mass produced. X-rays became a novelty and were widely and indiscriminately used.

Shoe shops installed X-ray machines so that customers could see if their feet fitted well into the shoes. Doctors used X-rays for treating all sorts of conditions. Children with fungus infections of the scalp were given X-ray treatments. Acne, birthmarks, tennis elbows, shoulder pains, shingles, enlarged thymus in infants, mumps, arthritis, keloid scars, skin diseases, etc. were all treated with X-rays.

None of these doctors had the slightest notion about the real dangers of exposure to X-rays.

Not long afterwards, it was found that the body parts exposed to the X-rays developed painful sunburn and ulcers, fingernails stopped growing, hair from the head fell out, etc.

Many X-ray workers died as a result of their practice and research and thousands of patients suffered as a result of the useless and dangerous treatments with X-rays.

The beginning of the 20th century saw the start of the use of radiation for medical purposes. Marie Curie, the famous French physicist, was the first person to be twice awarded the coveted Nobel Prize for her work on radioactive elements and the discovery of radium. Radium then was thought to be a panacea for more than 160 ailments. It was until radium had killed numerous people that its deadly effects were recognised. Among those who paid the price of ignorance was Marie Curie herself. She suffered bouts of weakness and nausea. Her fingertips were scarred and her bone marrow weakened. She eventually died on 4 July 1934.

Even today, what is not apparent to many people is that X-rays, even in small doses, can actually cause cancers. This fact is still hard to swallow or not visible to many people.

Points to Ponder: Today, such stupidity is obvious and easy to understand, but it was not so one hundred years ago. Compare this to the radiotherapy of today or the use of mobile phones without end? Will these be cases of stupidity in the next hundred years?

Robert Youngson and Ian Schott (in Medical Blunders) wrote:

• Not long after Roentgen’s discovery it was found that certain forms of cancers would seemingly “melt away” under the influence of X-rays. This was the beginning of radiotherapy. Many cures were claimed when, in fact, the tumours were merely reduced in size and soon recurred.

Dr. Richard Evans (in The Cancer Breakthrough You’ve Never Heard Of) wrote:

• Each part of the body can only tolerate a fixed amount of radiation. Once a therapeutic dose has been given, radiation is difficult to use again.
• It is my opinion that adjuvant radiation is used more often than necessary … it maybe preferable to defer postoperative radiation.
• The long-term risks of radiation therapy have not been completely determined.

Points to Ponder: What is holding back the medical researchers? It has been almost a hundred years since radiation was first used in medicine and still we do not know its long-term risk? Can this be possible? Or it is that some vested interests have been keeping the truth away from the public?

Read what John Robbins has to say in his book, Reclaiming Our Health:

It was August 1945. The atomic bombs were dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki resulting in the complete surrender of the Japanese Army,  thus ending World War II

• The issue of radioactivity had become an intense topic of debate internationally. However, as the US military was developing nuclear warheads, this project went against the rising tide of public opinion.
• Therefore, it would be a tremendous public relations advantage if the nuclear project could be sold to the public as a peaceful atomic programme.
• Indeed, the media were quick to chip in and hailed radiation cancer treatment as one of the most fantastic events that had occurred in human history.
• The American Medical Association, as early as 1947, had already laid claim that medically applied atomic science had saved more lives than were lost in the atomic explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
• Lewis Strauss, then chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, said: Focusing the powerful beams of deadly radiation on cancerous growth would be an example of the good use of atomic energy.

In his book, Robbins wrote:

• Documents uncovered in recent years reveal that the nuclear advocates deliberately covered up what they knew to be the real dangers of medical radiation and atomic fallout in order to sway public opinion in a pro-nuclear direction.

A Point to Ponder: What is being covered up? John Gofman, a medical doctor who worked on the Manhattan Project, was responsible for the production of plutonium-239 used in the production of the world’s first atomic bomb. He later established the Biomedical Research Division at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to study how nuclear activities affected human health. In his book, Preventing Breast Cancer, Dr. Gofman wrote:

• Our estimate is that about three-quarters (i.e., seventy-five percent) of the current annual incidence of breast cancer in the US is being caused by earlier ionising radiation, primarily from medical sources … breast cancer cases would not have occurred as they did in the absence of earlier medical irradiation.

Robbins had the following to say:

• Radiation is routinely recommended for cancer patients despite the fact that there is no proven benefit to survival.
• Although cancer specialists know that very few cancer patients are cured by radiotherapy, they continue to recommend it widely because they consider it to be a relatively harmless procedure.
• Doctors are desperate that they are losing the war against cancer and want to do everything they can to fight the disease.

“Extracted From – Cancer, What You Need To Know About… Dr. Chris KH Teo”

THE TOP TEN CANCER KILLERS
In all but a very few instances, the number of deaths from cancer have risen markedly since 1971. In addition, the incidence is also on increase.

Better detection and aging cannot adequately explain the phenomenal increase in cancers since 1971. It’s obvious that this increase is better explained by changes in exposure to various cancer-causing substances and lack of intake of cancer-preventing nutrition.
Japanese women have a totally different diet than do American women. If we had their breast cancer death rate, only 11,000 women would have died from breast cancer instead of the astounding 46,000. Is it genetics? When Japanese women move to America and assume our diets, they quickly attain the same breast cancer death rates as American women.
These data, taken alone, provide absolutely no evidence that some 35 years of intensive effort and billions of dollars aimed at attempting to improve the treatment of cancer have had much overall effect on the most fundamental measure of clinical outcome… death. Actually, with respect to cancer as a whole, we have slowly but surely lost ground in the battle. This is shown by the rise in age-adjusted mortality rates in the entire population.

Extracted From “Cancer” Dr. Bruce Miller

2. SARCOMAS. This type of cancer generally occurs in more slowly dividing tissues such as muscle and nerve tissues.

3. LEUKEMIAS. These are cancers of the tissues that form our blood cells or the cells themselves.
Cancer cells are not like normal cells. They divide wildly, reproducing abnormal cells, and invade and destroy normal tissue.

HOW CANCER BEGINS

There are several theories. The one most accepted is the “two hit” theory. Two phases of damage must occur to a cell before it has potential for cancer. Even then, an active immune system can offer much protection.
The “two hit” theory consists of an initiator and a promoter The nucleus of a cell contains all of the data for normal duplication of the cell.

These data are called DNA and are contained in the chromosomes. Enough damage to these “cell dividing” data can result in the formation of a cell made with bad data. This can be a wildly dividing and invasive cancer cell. The initiator is usually a free radical from radiation, cigarette smoke and other chemicals.

Here is how the ” two hit” theory works in practice:

1. A substance called an initiator causes some initial damage.

2. No cancer will form, but once initiated, all future cells will carry the initial damage.

3. The next step is promotion. A promoter causes additional damage to the DNA sufficient to give the cell cancer-forming properties.

4. Once initiated and promoted, the cell has the potential to become cancerous.

STAR WARS DEFENSE

Each of us comes in contact with initiators and promoters daily. We probably even develop cancer cells thousands of times in our lives. But our defense systems, when in proper condition, can give us tremendous protection. This is where nutrition comes into play in a big way.

We know some cancers are associated with low levels of certain nutrients. For instance, some forms of lung cancer are associated with low levels of vitamin A or beta-carotene, vitamin C and vitamin E. We also know that all of the nutrients are intimately associated with various functions of the immune system. So one key to cancer prevention is to maintain the immune systems in optimal nutritional condition. We will cover a number of nutrients proven to enhance our systems.

Extracted From “Cancer” Dr. Bruce Miller

June almost agreed to this operation but she was cautioned Icy her husband to think things over properly and seek further opinions. She ended up taking herbs instead. On 16 April 2001, / went to see a Dr. R of D-Medical Centre because of the discomforts I experienced on the right side of the rib region. Even before examining me, Dr. R said: Well, is it time to have your gall bladder removed? I felt very disappointed, sad and angry within. I felt all that the doctor wanted was money and I was sent for an ultrasound. I was amazed and happy when Dr. X, the radiologist told me that the polyp had shrunk to 3.9 WM. I am still taking the herbs and praying that the polyp will (trove smaller with time. As of this writing, June is still doing fine and has no complaints.

Story 2:
Doris was a 46-year-old lady. A CT scan showed a huge mass in her liver. On 30 December 2000, Doris had seventy percent of her right liver resected in Singapore. Then she underwent a course of chemotherapy. All in, her medical hill came to about S$40,000.
Doris felt well after all these treatments. She was optimistic having been given such a high hope by her. Unfortunately, a CT scan done on 29 March 2001 showed at least three, less than 10 mm round hypodense nodules in the left lobe of the liver. In short, the cancer had come back to the remaining thirty percent of her liver. In the first week of August 2001, barely eight months after everything was done, Doris died.

Story 3:
Suria was a 38-year-old man from Indonesia. A CT scan done in Penang on 2 March 2001 indicated a mass in the left lobe of his left liver. It was diagnosed as a hepatoma. He returned to Indonesia and started to search for a cure for his liver cancer. A doctor in Jakarta referred him to a specialist in Singapore. On 5 May 2001, Suria was operated on and had part of his liver removed. Before the operation, the surgeon told Suria that he had a ninety-eight percent chance of success. Unfortunately, this assurance was misleading. A scan done on 21 August 2001 (i.e., about three months after the surgery) showed the presence of more tumours in the liver.
Suria was very upset and frustrated. The surgeon told him that the ninety-eight percent chance of success was meant to be a guarantee that Suria would not die because of the operation. It was never meant to be a cure or non-recurrence of the cancer!

Medical “Truths” About Liver Surgery
My reading of the medical literature indicates the following:
• If detected early and if the tumour is still very small, patients may survive one or two years after surgery.
• The 5-year survival rate after surgery is ten to thirty percent.
• Surgery is the only treatment option that offers a chance of cure with a very small tumour at the time of diagnosis.

Unfortunately, such patients are rare to find. About eighty percent of patients with hepatoma also have liver cirrhosis. For such cases, the 5-year survival is low.
• Surgery is not possible for patients with advance cirrhosis.
• Liver cancer is NOT responsive to chemotherapy.

Story 4: Siah is a 40-year-old female. A cervical biopsy and ondometrial curetting done on 8 October 2002 indicated:
(1) CIN III asociated with HPV infection,
(2) early secretory endometrium.

The doctor suggested immediate removal of her cervix, possibly followed by radiotherapy. Siah declined further medical intervention and was started on herbs on 14 October ‘1002. She benefited from the herbal consumption. Her headaches and mood swings disappeared (PMS). A pap smear done on 6 March 2003 (i.e., about six months on the herbs) indicated normal epithelial cell morphology.

Story 5:
Lina is a 51 -year old lady. She was diagnosed with molar pregnancy in 1999. A cervical punch biopsy done on 17 August 2002 indicated HPV associated carcinoma-in-situ with glandular involvement. A cone biopsy done on 13 September 2002 indicated focal moderate dysplasia (CIN II HGSIL). She sought the advice of three doctors and all of them suggested total hysterectomy. She declined further medical intervention and took herbs instead. A pap smear done on 23 January 2003 indicated normal epithelial cell morphology. As of this writing, Lina still has her uterus and ovaries intact!
A Point to Ponder: Dr. Stephen Fulder wrote: .. the highly skilled professionals have … little understanding of the real causes of illness. Can the followiing story substantiate this conclusion?

Story 6:
May is a 50-year-old lady. She had a bloated stomach for the past six months and suffered severe discomforts when sitting down. As the problem became worse, she decided to seek medical help. She saw many doctors in FOUR different hospitals in Penang. They did all sorts of medical examinations (blood test, scanning, endoscopy, etc.) but did not know what was wrong with her. Then a CT scan done on 5 March 2003 indicated a solid lesion in the upper pole of the right kidney. The ultrasound of 13 March 2003 showed a cyst in the right lobe of her liver and a gall bladder polyp.
All the doctors of the different hospitals suggested that May underwent surgery immediately otherwise she would die within six months. May enquired if the surgery would cure her bloated problem. The doctors were unable to answer that question.
Desperate, May came to see us on 14 March 2003 and was prescribed liver herbs and Stomach Function Tea for wind in the stomach. Three days on the herbs, May’s problem vanished completely. She had no more complaints. As for the surgery? She decided, no thanks!

“Extracted From – Cancer, What You Need To Know About… Dr. Chris KH Teo”

Radical Mastectomy Based on a Wrong Perception
Since medical practice does not tolerate dissenting views, nor encourage practitioners to think but expect them to follow established procedures (or face expulsion from the exclusive membership), radical surgery has been practised without question or challenge. It is indeed sad (or tragic?) to know, for both patients and the medical profession, that the Halsted radical surgery has been based on wrong assumptions from the very beginning.
William Halsted, then 22 years old, studied medicine in Columbia University in 1874. On completion of his medical education, he went to Germany and Austria to further refine his medical knowledge, for Europe then was the centre of medicine. One outstanding doctor of that era was Rudolf Virchow, recognised by many as the pope of German medicine. Accordingly, Halsted imbibed his theory of cell pathology. Virchow attested that cancer cells in the tumour spread to other sites of the body by direct extension, i.e., they send out tentacles like the octopus and infect other organs. This was later known as the Theory of Centrifugal Spread. This theory has since become the foundation of surgical oncology. This flawed perception of tumour spread has led to the logical conclusion that the more aggressive the surgery, the better it is to remove all traces of cancer cells. When Halsted returned to the US, he devised this surgical procedure
Challenges to Radical Surgery
For over a hundred years surgeons had held on to radical surgery like a dogma and insisted that every last cancer cell must be removed in order to cure the disease. Today, we know that such a presumption is wrong and was based on bad science (or no science at all).
In the first decades of the 20th century, a few doctors were brave enough to stick their necks out and challenge the doctrine of radical surgery. One of the first among them was Rudolf Matas of Tulane, a close friend of Halsted; then came Geoffrey Keynes and Duncan Fitzwilliams of England and George Crile Jr. of the US. Today, one hospital in the US that stands up and advocates limited surgery is the Texas Cancer Center (see website: www.texascancercenter.com).
Dr. Richard Evans of the Texas Cancer Center wrote:
• Cancer treatment should not be worse than the cancer itself. People are tired of having their bodies mangled by radical surgical techniques … there is too much of surgery, too much radiation and too much chemotherapy.
The tragic affair about the medical profession is that despite the devastating consequences and research results showing that the success rates of patients undergoing radical treatments were no better or equal to those of conservative medical treatments, many doctors still continue to advocate aggressive treatments.
Dr. Evans wrote:
• Surgeons in major medical centers are the leading proponents of radical surgery, as they and major pharmaceutical companies wield their political,
financial and decision-making influence on the medical community.
The National Surgical Adjuvant Breast Project (NSABP)
In 1957, the NSABP was initiated under the leadership of Bernard Fisher of the University of Pittsburgh to study various aspects of breast cancer treatment. The following are some of NSABP’s findings:
• Cancer cells of the tumour spread through the blood stream and these cells begin circulating in the blood fairly early.
• Cancer is a systemic, not a localised disease.
• Positive lymph nodes indicate a poor prognosis. In other words, if cancer cells are found in the lymph nodes, it simply means that the patient’s immune resistance is probably weak.
• The NSABP verified the fact that patients initially treated by only lumpectomy (i.e., removal of the lump only) survived just as long as those treated with aggressive treatment. Surgeons can leave behind some cancer cells in the lymph nodes without compromising the patient’s survival.
• NSABP studies also showed that patients treated with lumpectomy had a higher tumour recurrence. However, this recurrence can be treated with a second operation without risk to the patients’ survival. This is because the surviving patients have a level of immune protection that exceeds the tumour challenge.
The issue of a mastectomy versus lumpectomy is actually one issue of how much a surgeon should cut off a patient’s tissue with the hope of curing the disease and saving life. Excessive surgery not only adds more suffering to the patient but can also be a wasted heroic act which at the same time, compromises the patient’s chances of healing. So, what is the happy balance? If one’s action is based on faulty assumptions, then surely the consequences are equally faulty and damaging.
Two Main Objections to Breast Surgery
Two aspects of breast surgery which are being challenged are:
a) The need for mastectomy for all breast cancer cases, as opposed to lumpectomy (or removal of the tumour only) where possible, to conserve the breast.
b) The need for axillary clearance or removal of the lymph nodes under the armpit.

Axillary Clearance: A Diagnostic Not a Curative Procedure!
Chris K. H. Teo in “Breast Cancer: Perspectives of Medical Science and Holistic Healing” wrote:
• Axillary clearance or removal of the lymph nodes in the armpit area, remains the standard procedure in breast surgery. The reasons doctors do this are: they wish to determine and assess the extent of the cancer spread, and the logic of lymph node removal is that if any node is infected, it is of no use anymore. So, it should be resected and discarded.
• Do you think that removing all the infected nodes really makes much difference when there are still millions of cancer cells floating around in the blood stream and lymphatic fluid?
• Axillary clearance is simply a diagnostic NOTa curative
procedure, which may not be necessary at all. On the other hand, it may bring about lymphoedema (swelling of the arm), numbness due to damaged nerves and a reduction of shoulder movements.
Compton Burnett (in Curability of Tumours by Medicine) wrote:
• Surgeons may think (of) the cutting-out and cutting-off process as “curing” I think of them as a last refuge of helplessness.
• A lady came to me fora tumour of the breast. The lady’s husband declined my treatment … she was successfully operated on, and thoroughly cured thereby of her mammary tumour. Nine months later, she was again thoroughly cured of another tumour, by a perfectly successful operation. A few months thereafter, she was again successfully operated on for another tumour, and just as she was getting well, she died.
Although Dr. Burnett wrote these words more than a hundred years ago (in 1893), do you not think the message is still valid today – patients having to endure one treatment after another only to get a recurrence or die later?
Let us look at the issue of breast surgery in the light of the NSABP’s findings. When a tumour is detected in the breast as a lump, it is at least 1 cm in diameter, consisting of about a billion cells. Virchow and Halsted assumed that such a lump is a localised disease, meaning the cancer cells stay put and do not move. The tumour eventually spreads by putting out its tentacles. Subsequent studies show such a perception is wrong. Cancer is a systemic disease. The cancer cells spread through the blood stream. The point to ask is: When do the cells start spreading? Unfortunately, the answer is not encouraging at all. Cancer cells start to spread at an early stage of to spread many years ahead of the time when we first detect the presence of the lump. What this means is that it may already be too late to stop the spread by the time we know of it. If the cancer cells have already colonised distant sites, no amount of surgery can cure the patient. The metastasis or the cancer will show up in due course somewhere. In such a situation, radical surgery serves no advantage, for the surgeon’s knife cannot prevent the spreading of what has already spread out.

If you understand this concept well, then ask yourself: If a patient has breast cancer that has already spread to the lungs, liver or bone, can surgery ever cure the patient? Does the removal of the breasts do any good?

Of course we have patients saying: Exactly, we want to have the tumour removed as much as possible and as soon as possible to prevent it from spreading. The fact of the matter is: If the cancer has already spread, no amount of “cutting” can prevent further spreading. What makes the problem worse is that we do not know and we cannot see or even verify if the cancer has already spread. Studies of cancer behaviour, however, tell us that in most cases, cancer cells start to spread in the early stages of tumour development, even before the tumour can be detected. Some patients would say that according to the doctor, the cancer has not spread yet. Everything seems to be clear on the films. Perhaps it is worth knowing that X-rays, CAT scans and MRS are not able to detect a tumour smaller than 1 cm in diameter. A billion cells in the body cannot be detected or seen by today’s modern technology as yet. So, you could have a billion cancer cells in the body and the picture may still be just clear and clean.

Because of this understanding and the limitation of knowing, many daring doctors now advocate limited surgery for this is the only logical and correct thing to do. Dr. George Crile Jr. (in Cancer and Common Sense) wrote: Those responsible for
telling the public about cancer have chosen to use the weapon of fear. They have created a new disease, cancer phobia. With this phobia the idea of the more aggressive the treatment the better sells very well indeed.

“Extracted From – Cancer, What You Need To Know About… Dr. Chris KH Teo”

Now read what Dr. Kenneth Pelletier (in The Best Alternative Medicine) of Stanford University School of Medicine wrote:
• It is important to point out that as much as twenty to fifty percent of conventional care and virtually ALL surgery have not been evaluated by RCTs.
• The US Office of Technology Assessment reported in 1978 and again in 1990 that only an estimated ten to twenty percent of all conventional interventions have been empirically proven.

Dr. Robert Youngson and Ian Schott (in Medical Blunders) wrote an account of how oophorectomy, a medical term for the removal of ovaries came about. There was a Robert Battey who became one of the pioneers of American surgery in the 19th century. Like all surgeons, Battey obtained much of his early practice with the knife in the battlefields during the American Civil War. After the war, Battey turned his attention to women. His specialty was removing their ovaries.

It all started one day in August 1872, when a 23 year old girl came to him for help. She developed convulsions and became almost comatose. She had painful periods with haemorrhages in various parts of her body. She also developed a pelvic abscess. The girl was on morphine to relieve her pains and as a result became addicted to it.

Battey operated on her and removed both her ovaries. The ovaries were healthy! What surprised him was that after the operation, the girl became well. All her symptoms disappeared. She had no more fits, no more internal bleeding and the abscess in the pelvis disappeared.

Battey published the account of this case and became a hero in the medical community. His surgical procedure for the removal of ovaries became widely known as Battey’s operation. Battey then proceeded to use this surgical treatment for many problems, ranging from epilepsy, menstrual pains, nervous upsets, nymphomania and even insanity. It did not bother Battey if the ovaries he removed were found to be healthy. Nothing would escape his knife. Ovariomania had resulted in many unfortunate young women becoming sterile, mutilated and attaining menopausal symptoms at an early age. Today, surgery to remove the ovaries is still being carried out, hopefully for more justifiable reasons.

A Point to Ponder?
Where is the RCT or science in this kind of surgery? Where is the experiment or RCT that the scientific community so often talks about?

One area of abuse in surgery is hysterectomy — the removal of the uterus. During this operation, in about forty percent of cases, the ovaries are also removed. By defination this procedure is actually castration.
Dr. Stanley West (in Hysterectomy Hoax) wrote:
• No man would agree to have his sexual and reproductive organs removed for anything short of life-saving illness. I wonder why women willingly and gladly consent to this procedure without hesitation? More than 600,000 hysterectomies are performed each year in the US, only ten percent of them are necessary. In other words, ninety percent of hysterectomies are unnecessary.
• You don’t need a hysterectomy. It can do more harm than good … many women develop serious health problems after hysterectomy.

If you like the idea of going under the surgeon’s knife, do not forget that surgery always carries risks. Dr. Robert Mendelsohn (in MalePractice) advised:
• Don’t assume that the operation is necessary.
• Don’t be deceived by a well-polished air of confidence.
• Don’t assume that the surgeon cannot make mistakes.

Jonathan Chamberlain (in Fighting Cancer: A Survival Guide) wrote:
Surgery is an empirical science. It is therefore not a proven form of cancer treatment in any real sense. It is subject to its own fads and fashion.

“Extracted From – Cancer, What You Need To Know About… Dr. Chris KH Teo”

Dr. Richard Evans, one of the founders of the Texas Cancer Center www.texascancercenter.com stated that around ninety per cent of the patients cured of cancer made because of surgery and surgery alone. Radiotherapy, chemotherapy and technological marvels such as CT scanners contributed little to the overall survival of patients with cancers.

Chris K. H. Teo in “Breast Cancer: Perspectives of Medical Science and Holistic Healing” wrote:
• The aim of surgery is to remove as much as possible of the primary tumour while at the same time save as much as possible the healthy tissues.
• Surgery is sometimes a necessary life-saving procedure in cancer treatment.
• It is effective as a cure for early, small tumours that have not spread to other parts of the body.
• Once the cancer has spread outwards, the benefit of surgery is much less and sometimes questionable.
• Doctors would like us to believe that they have got it all removed but studies show that some cancer cells are still left behind in sixty to seventy-five percent of patients.
• In fact, some critics have pointed out that surgery itself may often be responsible for the spread of cancer. Due to human error or carelessness, the cancer tumour can spill millions of cancer cells into the blood stream.

Ralph Moss in “The Cancer Industry” wrote that here is no doubt that in certain circumstances surgery is a highly effective and indispensable method of dealing with cancer. Overall, most of the cancer patients who are cured today are cured because of surgery.

Most authors agree that surgery is often a vital life-saving procedure. However, not all surgeries done are said to be necessary. The US Senate Committee set up to investigate unnecessary operations reported that 2.4 million unnecessary operations were performed in America each year. It is said that only about twenty percent of surgery is really warranted. The dilemma that many of us face is when our surgery belongs to the other eighty percent unneccessary surgery.

Dr. Andrew Weil, a Harvard-trained medical doctor and the director of Integrative Medicine programme at the University of Arizona, (in Health and Healing), however, pointed out that surgery :
• is often performed unnecessarily and carried out to drastic extremes, sometimes in the honest belief that the operations were indicated, sometimes as a crass way of upping their incomes.
• Which organs are targeted for mass removal is a matter of fashion.
• Never let a surgeon takeout a (so-called) ‘functionless” organ unless it is really diseased.

Dr. Stephen Fulder in “How to Survive Medical Treatment” wrote:
• If the hospital is the temple of medicine the operating theatre is its altar Yet by the same token it is the worst of medicine.
• The highly skilled professionals have little understanding of the real causes of illness.

The most common unnecessary operations are the following:
1. appendix removal
2. back operations
3. biopsies
4. breast removal, as opposed to removing the lump only
5. heart by-pass
6. gall bladder removal
7. hysterectomy, i.e., removal of the womb
8. tonsils
9. tympanostomy, i.e., puncture of the ear drum.

Statistics Do Not Lie: More Doctors More Operations!
According to Joseph Pizzorno (in Total Wellness), one research study found that an area with 2.5 surgeons experienced 590 surgeries per 10,000 population while an area with 4.5 surgeons experienced 940 surgeries per 10,000 population. What this means is the more surgeons there are in the population, the more the number of surgeries performed.
Dr. Pizzorno wrote:
• Every doctor needs to perform about 200 operations a year to cover overheads and maintain his/her desired income.
• The more specialised the doctors, the more expensive the procedures they utilise. Unfortunately, this has not led to improved health.

In 1976, doctors in Los Angeles, California, USA, went on strike. As a result, the number of operations done in hospitals dropped by sixty percent. Amazingly enough, the decline in operations was reflected in a eighteen percent reduction of the death rate. When doctors resumed work after the strike, the death rate soared above and beyond the rates prevailing before the strike.

“Extracted From – Cancer, What You Need To Know About… Dr. Chris KH Teo”

The answer to cancer lies simply in practicing healthy living, mainly eating a balanced diet, adopting a healthy body weight and keeping active.
Unbelievable as it may sound, these old-fashioned measures are life-saving. Did you know: Just being fat and obese puts you at risk of get¬ting 6 different types of cancer. Consuming alcohol also predisposes you to this killer disease. So does eating red meat and processed meats.
These are some of the key findings in long-term studies done worldwide that top cancer experts today say people should seriously heed.
The findings reviewed by a panel of the world’s leading scientists and supported by observers from the United Nations and other international organizations were published on 1st November 2007 by the World Cancer Re¬search Fund (WCRF) and the American Institute for Cancer Research (AICR) in a detailed 517-page report, entitled Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity, and the Prevention of Cancer: A Global Perspective.
The report is the most comprehensive ever published on the evidence linking cancer risk to diet, physical activity and weight.
Its main conclusion can be described in one sentence: Our diet and lifestyle greatly influence cancer risk. You and your family need not hear the dreaded “C” word if you simply adopt an anti-cancer lifestyle, by eating right and incorporating physical activity in your daily life.
Read on for more on the lethal link between lifestyle choices and lifespan, and the connection between poor diets and premature deaths from cancer and cancer-inducing diseases.

More Cancer in Urbanized and Industrialized Societies
Cancer, which has evolved unchecked into a worldwide health scourge today, will continue to strike many in the future.
According to the recently released WCRF-AICR report, “… (P)atterns of production and consumption of food and drink, of physical activity, and of body composition have changed greatly throughout human history.
“Remarkable changes have taken place as a result of urbanization and industrialization, at first in Europe, North America, and other economically advanced countries, and increasingly in most countries in the world.
“Notable variations have been identified in patterns of cancer throughout the world. Significantly, studies consistently show that patterns of cancer change as populations migrate from one part of the world to another and as countries become increasingly urbanized and industrialized.

“Projections indicate that rates of cancer in general are liable to increase.”

This is not the first time that such concerns have been raised. In 2003, the World Cancer Report, issued by the Inter-national Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), which is part of the World Health Organization (WHO), warned that global cancer rates could increase by 50% to 15 million by 2020.
Once considered a “Western” disease, more than 50% of the world’s cancer burden, in terms of both numbers of cases and deaths, already occurred in developing countries, according to the 2003 WHO data.
“Cancer has emerged as a major public health problem in developing countries for the first time, matching its effect in industrialized nations. This is a global problem, and it’s growing. But, we can take steps to slow this growth,” Paul Kleihues, MD, Director of IARC and co-editor of the World Cancer Report, was quoted as saying at that time.
Today, the latest cancer alert says that we can actually prevent cancer. The recently released WCRF-AICR report specifies recommendations “based on solid evidence will which, when followed, be expected to reduce the incidence of cancer”.

Most Cancers are Invited, Not Inherited
Although cancer is considered to be a disease of genes that are vulnerable to mutation, evidence indicates that small
only a number of cancers are inherited, the experts say.
While it’s true that DNA (genetic material) damage promotes cancer, only 5-10% of cancers are directly inherited, and someone with an inherited cancer-promoting gene will not necessarily develop cancer (but is at in¬creased risk compared to the general population). (Source: EUFIC)
Instead, exposure to environmental factors that promote gene damage is by far the most important determinant of whether we develop cancer or not.

What are these environmental factors?

What Initiates Cancer
Some of the major environmental factors that trigger cancer include tobacco use, infectious agents, radiation, industrial chemicals, pollution and medications. But that’s not the whole list.
Food and nutrition, physical activity and body composition are also important, but often overlooked, environmental factors that contribute to the development of cancer.
We may not be able to avoid all environmental carcinogens (cancer-producing substances) such as tobacco smoke, radiation and infection, but there are many aspects of our daily life that can be modified to prevent damage to our DNA, such as a healthy diet and lifestyle choices. (Source: EUFIC)
According to the worlds top cancer experts involved in the WCRF-AICR report; there is a wealth of evidence that documents the ability of food and nutrition, physical activity, and body composition to influence several stages of the cancer development process.

How do these 3 factors influence cancer risk?

FAULTY DIET.

An unhealthy diet, which results in poor nutrition, raises cancer risk in 2 main ways:

1. Causes cellular mayhem.
Cancer begins in your cells, which are the building blocks of your body. Normally, your body forms new cells as you need them, replacing old cells that die. Sometimes this process goes wrong. New cells grow even when you don’t t need them, and old cells don’t die when they should. These extra cells can form a mass called a tumor, which can I be malignant (i.e. cancer) or benign (i.e. harmless). (Source: Medline Plus)
According to the 2007 WCRF-AICR report, “Our dietary patterns can indirectly influence cell growth by way of changes in general metabolic, regulatory and endocrine effects.
“The normal functioning of all biological processes, including those of the human body, depends on the availability of substrate (i.e. the base on which an organism lives) and nutrients. Good nutrition defined as appropriate provision of food and nutrients from the level of the whole organism to the cellular and intracellular level is needed for normal structure and function.
When a person is not suitably nourished, either through under or over nutrition, this has an effect on the tissue micro environment, and can compromise both its structure and function.

2. Changes and damages DNA.
It is now well established that an important process underlying cancer involves changes or defects in our genes. (Genes are composed of DNA, the genetic material and hence, I “blueprint” of life.)
Damage to DNA (i.e. mutations) can “initiate” a cancer a by turning off normal cell regulation. Most cancers that develop this way are clinically identifiable only years or decades after the initial DNA damage.
Here, too, diet and nutrition play a role.
“Nutrients and food constituents have effects that can either stop several processes that lead to cancer; or contribute to cancer development by altering DNA itself, or by altering how the genetic message in DNA is translated.” (WCRF-AICR report, 2007)

The good news: There is increased evidence that specific dietary patterns, foods and drinks, and dietary constituents can and do protect against cancer, not only before but also after the start of the process.

• EXCESS BODY FAT.
One of the biggest changes in the current WCRF-AICR report, also referred to as the Second Expert Report (this cancer report is actually the second one to be published in the past 10 years), is that medical evidence that excess body fat increases the risk of developing cancer, is much stronger now than 10 years ago.
“The most striking finding in the report is that excess body fat increases risk for numerous cancers. That is why body weight is the focus of our first recommendation,” expert panel member W. Phillip T. James, M.D., D.Sc., said at a press conference previewing the report.
How does being fat increase cancer risk?
Research indicates that body fat produces an excess of substances such as sex hormones and insulin. Under normal circumstances these are perfectly normal substances that contribute to natural body chemistry. But in an obese person, higher levels of these chemicals can urge cells to grow and divide at an accelerated rate. (Source: WebMD Health News)
The good news: Physical activity a simple, inexpensive measure can protect you against many forms of cancer.

• PHYSICAL INACTIVITY.
Although humans are designed to be regularly physically active, in recent years, especially in high-income countries, physical activity levels have continued to decline. Occupations have become more sedentary, most journeys are made in motorized vehicles, machines do most of the household chores and active recreation has been replaced by TV and computer games.
This lack of activity is likely to be an important factor in overweight and obesity, which themselves increase the risk of some cancers.
The latest WCRF-AICR report supports the general theory that humans are evolved and adapted to be physically active throughout life and that sedentary ways of life can be unhealthy. (Source: EUFIC)
Because the evidence on weight gain as a factor in cancer is now so much stronger, the report stresses that people should keep their weight under control by abstaining from unhealthy fat inducing diets and being physically active on a regular basis if they want to prevent cancer.

The study showed increased risk of dying from cancers of the colon, rectum and pros­tate, as well as from lymphatic leukaemia.

These diseases result in 930,000 deaths worldwide each year, in addition to more than 5 million smoking-related deaths esti­mated by the World Health Organisation as being caused by diseases such as lung cancer, which have long been associated with smok­ing.

The new study, which was based on data from 17,363 male civil servants based in Lon­don, showed a 43% increase ⁱⁿ the chances of dvino from cancer of the colon if the person smokes, a 40% higher likelihood of dying from rectal cancer, ^an increase of 23% in the chance^s, of losing one’s life to prostate cancer and a 33% rise in mortality from lymphatic leukaemia among smokers.

“Cigarette smoking appears to be a risk factor for several malignancies of previously unclear association with tobacco use,” the Scotsman quoted the researchers as saying.

Dr David Batty, of the Medical Research Council Social and Public Health Sciences Unit, based at the University of Glasgow, said: “What this study shows is that smoking is linked to more kinds of cancer than previ­ously thought. It’s important to remember that cancer is not a single disease and that the various kinds of cancers are different illnesses so you couldn’t necessarily assume that smoking was linked to them in the same way. What’s unclear is how exactly smoking causes these cancers.”

Health Minister of Scotland Shona Robi­son said: “This study appears to demonstrate that smoking is even more carcinogenic than was realised.”

Scotland’s health minister and anti-smok­ing campaigners have welcomed the study as further proof of the need to clamp down on the habit.

The study has been published in the journal Annals Of Oncology.

At this point, some of you are groaning and saying, “Good grief, what is left to eat?”
The following is a suggested food plan that we all should be eating for good health, cancer prevention and maximum energy:
• Fowls with skin removed.
• Eat plenty of cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, bok choy, turnips, cabbage and Brussels sprouts. Steam or eat them raw to preserve their cancer fighting nutrients.
• Eat at least three servings of cold-water fish such as salmon, tuna, mackerel, halibut and cod. They contain omega-3 fatty acid.
• Get plenty of fiber from vegetables, fruits, beans and whole grains.
• Include in your diet soy products like tofu, miso, and tempeh regularly.
• Shop for organic food whenever possible.
• Regularly include in your diet mushrooms of the Japanese variety like maitake and shiitake.
• Eat a large variety of fresh vegetables and fruits, grains, seeds, nuts and legumes instead of processed and refined carbohydrates. Eat foods as close to their natural state as possible. They contain phytochemicals that act as antioxidants like carotenoids and flavonoids that protect against cellular damage and inhibit cancer growth.
• Consume plenty of allium vegetables like garlic, onions, leeks and shallots.
• Lots of good clean water. “Tap water these days is more like a soup, a chemical soup,” says Harvey and Marilyn Diamond in their book, Living Health. I suggest a good quality reverse osmosis unit for drinking water.

Eat small frequent meals. Nibbling helps to stabilize blood sugar levels and minimize insulin rushes.
Don’t eat a food that will not rot or sprout. Foods with long shelf life are not going to nourish the body.
Take spirulina, a whole food. Some scientists have called it “a food of the future.” It contains 65% vegetable protein and a whole spectrum of vitamins (except C), minerals, phytonutrients, antioxidants and chlorophyll which help boost the immune function against cancer. Scientists at the Osaka Center for Cancer and Cardiovascular Disease have confirmed in humans that taking an extract of spirulina can have a positive effect on the production of cancer fighting immune cells in the body (The Journal of International Immunopharmaco/ogy vol. 2, number 4).
Ease up on sugary beverages. A lot of beverages at kopitiam and stalls contain excessive amounts of sugar.
Snack wisely. Snacks like chips, kuih, cakes and other tid-bits are laden with fat, sugar and sodium.
When eating out, choose your food wisely. Preferably choose food cooked in clear soup, steamed, braised or roasted.