My comment went something like: "It's nice to finally see some official recognition that sugar is involved in cancer. Governments should redirect the funds they allocate to anti-smoking campaigns towards a campaign to inform people about the dangers of a high-carb diet and to promote a Paleo diet, as a way to prevent the spread of cancer".
The strange thing is, right now there are no comments at all under that article, and there is no longer any option to comment, so I was wondering what actually happens to them and what the point of asking for comments is.
A while ago I found out. A nice program researcher from the BBC called me and referred to my comment and asked me if I would like to take part in a BBC radio show that is to discuss the 'tidal wave' of cancer that is bearing down on us all. The researcher asked me what the Paleo diet was and how I found out about it and, after I explained the basics to her, she said would email me back and let me know if they wanted to talk to me. Well, the radio show is airing as I write this, and I haven't heard back from the nice researcher lady, so I guess they didn't like what I had to say. So I'll just say it here.
Today being World Cancer Day™ the mainstream media broadsheets of late have been devoting an unusual amount of space to warning the public about the dire threat from cancer. We're told that fourteen million people a year are diagnosed with cancer and that number is predicted to increase to 24 million by 2035.
Chris Wild, the director of the WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer, told the BBC:
"The global cancer burden is increasing and quite markedly, due predominately to the ageing of the populations and population growth. If we look at the cost of treatment of cancers, it is spiralling out of control, even for the high-income countries. Prevention is absolutely critical and it's been somewhat neglected."I'm pretty sure that most people reading this know someone who has died of cancer in the past 10 years. Personally, I know several people who have died of cancer in the past 5 years. One was a member of my extended family, another was a guy I went to school with, and he hadn't even reached 40 years old. So I have no problem accepting that cancer is a serious problem in our advanced technological society, I do, however, have a beef with the conclusions that scientists reach about the causes of the cancer pandemic that is knocking at humanity's door.
The problem seems to be that the advancement in technology over the course of the 20th century was not matched by an advancement in human intelligence. Modern science has developed all sorts of fancy instruments that enable us to explore and understand the human body in increasing detail. Very often, these instruments produce data that, in and of itself, strongly suggests that long-held scientific theories and beliefs need to be reassessed, sometimes radically. But there is one final piece of processing that this information must go through before it can be presented to the public; it must pass through the average modern scientist's brain, complete with his or her prejudices, beliefs and awareness that a scientists future career prospects are greatly influenced by the nature of the research he or she does and the nature of the conclusions he or she reaches.
Take smoking for example. Despite the fact the decades-long government anti-smoking campaigns have greatly reduced the number of smokers, particularly in Western nations, recent reports state that, not only is cancer on the increase, (with lung cancer the overall second most common after breast cancer but the most common in men) but it is going to increase dramatically, by over 70%, over the next 20 years. On the basis of this data alone, shouldn't any scientist, or anyone gifted with a scientific mind, at least question the pervasive propagandistic claim that smoking causes lung cancer? Why, when there is evidence that genetics may play a major role in lung cancer, is smoking still held up as the number one cause? Why, when doctors happily use smokers' lungs for 50% of lung transplants, and even say that patients that received lungs from smokers had an increased survival rate over those that received lungs from non-smokers, is smoking still held up as the quintessential evil that rots your lungs and gives you cancer?
While still placing smoking at the top of their list of major sources of preventable cancer, the WHO does give a notable mention to another cause of cancer: sugar.
The BBC reports:
The globe is facing a "tidal wave" of cancer, and restrictions on alcohol and sugar need to be considered, say World Health Organization scientists.But then we read:
One of the report's editors, Dr Bernard Stewart from the University of New South Wales in Australia, said: "In relation to alcohol, for example, we're all aware of the acute effects, whether it's car accidents or assaults, but there's a burden of disease that's not talked about because it's simply not recognised, specifically involving cancer. He said there was a similar argument to be had with sugar fuelling obesity, which in turn affected cancer risk.
How can the WHO or anyone else ever hope to 'win the battle with cancer' if they resolutely refuse to consider that the replacement of natural foods with synthetic foods 40-50 years ago is largely responsible for the cancer pandemic?
If you deprive the normal cells of your body of glucose, they switch to the alternate fuel, ketone bodies. Cancer cells can only survive on glucose, they cannot use ketone bodies as fuel, and in the absence of glucose, they die. Ketone bodies are three different water-soluble, biochemicals that are produced by the liver from fatty acids. The best source of fatty acids is animal fat. The best way to get animal fat into your diet and deny any potential cancer cells the chance to grow, is to follow the Paleo Diet. (If you need to, you'll lose weight too!)
But sugar isn't only implicated in the direct fuelling of cancer cells. There is another pandemic of recent decades that is afflicting millions of people around the world, and especially in the West: diabetes. The diabetes pandemic is directly linked to over-consumption of carbohydrates and sugar (they're the same thing from your body's point of view). The average Western diet today is made up of about 70% carbohydrates (glucose/sugar).
Diabetes is the result of eating a diet high in carbohydrates/sugar. People with diabetes have high levels of insulin circulating in their bloodstream. But people who do not have diabetes also have high levels of insulin circulating in their bodies because insulin is designed to remove excess levels of glucose, or carbs, from the bloodstream. Recent research points to a link between high levels of blood insulin and cancer where insulin may be a causative factor in the generation of cancerous cells.
The bottom line appears to be this: there is enough evidence out there already to point to the high-carb western diet being implicated in cancer of all types, not to mention the pandemic of diabetes, heart disease and a host of other modern illnesses. Therefore, the amount of carbs that people are eating today is seriously bad for their health and there IS an alternative. It's the diet that human beings ate for 99% of their evolution: animal meat and fat.
It's long past time that people looked at the data themselves and came to their own conclusions. Alternatively, we can all wait while scientists quibble, debate and bow down to the dictates of big Agri-business and big government, both of which make millions from keeping people addicted to carbs (being riddled with cancer is just 'collateral damage), and finally announce that, yet again, the smokers are to blame for everything. While you're waiting, and munching on your 70% carbs, don't be surprised if you find yourself among those 20% of men and 17% of women who will contract cancer over the next 20 years.
Best of luck.
Excellent article Joe. Some of this scientific information is slowly getting through to the general public.
When it does that it still has to overcome people's individual programing, desire to conform, and their fears as well as their perceived 'lack of knowledge'. It's quite a barrier to overcome too.
Especially their fears/realisation that the 'powers that be' may actually NOT have their best interests at heart, and that most of their 'beliefs' about reality are simply programing and not based on real science or evidence at all.
Mainstream media seems to have learned their lesson when they inadvertently let the cat out of the bag in Australia regarding anti-cholesterol medications.
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Perhaps the BBC is aware of this and the 'storm' it created?