Breast Cancer: A Preventable Disease Through Good Nutrition
February 11, 2008 by: Peggy Gannon
Key concepts: cancer, food, health
(FishOilReport) Cancer. It feels like a modern version of the plague. The word strikes fear in us. We all know someone who has it, or had it, or is in remission from it. The recent Breast Cancer Awareness month was dedicated to the importance of early detection. We read articles about breast cancer statistics, symptoms and treatment. Strangely missing from the mix was information on prevention. Did you see anything on prevention? Me neither.
All the hoopla around Breast Cancer Month only made me angry. More than angry: outraged. The propaganda from the medical community constitutes an elaborate scam by reiterating, over and over, the need for funding to research - what? Treatment. Not prevention, not cure. Cancer is discussed as if it were a chronic but manageable disease, something like diabetes. But wait. Isn't that how the medical and pharmaceutical industries stay in business? If we could prevent it, or cure it, a lot of people would be unemployed.
Forgive me if I sound a little cynical. I have pursued a lifelong interest in health and nutrition. When I retired last fall, I had loads more time to continue my research and reading. One of the things I learned is that the chemicals used in chemotherapy are so toxic that they require a MSDS (Materials Safety Data Sheet). That's, like, industrial strength. Bluntly, what is being put in your body are hazmats (hazardous materials). Conventional cancer treatment is still in the Stone Age.
Something else I learned: the American Cancer Society takes donations for "cancer research." Whatever is left over after paying salaries and overhead is funneled to organizations like Planned Parenthood. Their financial statements for the past 3 years are available on their website (they are required to make that information public because of their nonprofit status). For example, in 2005, out of millions and millions of dollars they received, only 3 percent went to actual cancer research - and that was a research grant for a medication for only one type of cancer (http://tinyurl.com/yr278x) .
Even more important, I learned something I had suspected all along: cancer can be prevented. Notice that no fund-raising agencies ever talk about this approach, nor will they. They depend upon cancer to stay in business.
Think about this: every society, throughout history, around the world, has always known one thing to be true - we are what we eat. Yet in the last three generations the quality of the SAD (Standard American Diet, an apt acronym) has plummeted.
Our vegetables are grown on depleted soils whose micronutrients have long been exhausted. Chemical fertilizers replace only N (Nitrogen), P (Phosphorous) and K (Potassium). During the growing season and post-harvest, they are sprayed with an assortment of toxic chemicals before appearing in your local market. Processed foods are loaded with health-destroying substances like HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup), MSG (Monosodium Glutamate, a dangerous excitotoxin) and Nutrasweet (Aspartame, another excitotoxin). Your milk and dairy products may come from cows treated with rBGH (Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone). At the very least, they have been pasteurized, destroying all beneficial bacteria and enzymes necessary for optimal health. Products made with corn, soy and rice very likely contain genetically modified (GM) versions of these crops, whose impact on human health and the environment has never been evaluated; and you will never know, because food processors are under no obligation to label GM ingredients.
Your meat contains traces of antibiotics and growth-accelerating hormones, and your chicken was so awash in avian feces that we take it for granted that it is contaminated with salmonella, as are commercial eggs. (Consumer Reports compared 525 chickens from 27 brands and found only 17% of the samples to be free from salmonella and campylobacter). We have been consuming artery-clogging trans fats (in the guise of margarine, vegetable oils, deep-fried foods and baked goods), and our ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids is skewed. Your grandmother would not recognize most of the ingredients in a simple product like a modern donut. We have been lied to by the food growers, processors, manufacturers and distributors, all in the name of the almighty dollar, and the first casualty has been our health. Food allergies, asthma, autism, obesity, diabetes, and ADD/ADHD are becoming epidemic and endemic in our society; and I submit that every one of them can be traced to the "jiggery-pokery" going on in our food supply. Even artificial colors and flavors act in unpredictable ways on immature brains. When will we start to question what we are putting in our bodies?
By choosing whole, unprocessed (local and organic when possible) foods, we can reassert control over our diet. We can make better choices about slow and wholesome foods as opposed to "crap-in-a-box" or drive-through foods. I learned how. So can you.
But most important, I learned that cures for cancer exist. I repeat: cures for cancer exist. I know those four words are hard to read because they contradict what we "know" and what we have always "known," i.e. what the medical community has taught us to know. Anything different strikes us as heresy, denial, quackery, even conspiracy. In fact, "conspiracy" may be a good word. A conspiracy of silence exists around those four words because they embody methods from which the pharmaceutical industry cannot profit. Consequently, any attempt to promulgate information of this nature results, first, in warnings of fraud from the FDA and ultimately, confiscation of personal property and imprisonment.
At least three names reappear at the center of the claims for cancer cures. Jerry Brunetti's two-part documentary, Food As Medicine, recounts his personal experience in curing his lymphoma. Max Gerson's career as cancer healer, carried on by his daughter, is detailed in the documentary Dying to Have Known. Both are available on line. Interestingly, both emphasize diet. And the concepts of Dr. Ryke Geerd Hamer are embodied in what is called German New Medicine,
(http://www.germannewmedicine.com/do...) . These are only three of a variety of cancer therapies that promise affordable and commonsensical healing.
Let's take a final look at prevention. How can you best take care of yourself so as not to become sick in the first place?
* If you smoke, quit.
* Keep alcohol consumption at no more than 1 ounce of spirits, 1 glass of wine or 1 beer per day.
* Eliminate sugar from your diet. Cancer cells thrive on sugar.
* Eliminate processed foods (including HFCS, MSG, aspartame and other artificial sweeteners). Yes, that means soda pop, fast food, chips and other junk.
* Eliminate or cut back on starchy carbs like white bread, white rice, white potatoes.
* Increase fresh fruits and vegetables. The more brightly colored (blueberries, cantaloupe, broccoli), the more anti-cancer qualities.
* If you choose to eat meat, try to limit yourself to organic or at least local, grass-fed meat and free-range poultry.
* Limit fish intake to less than 12 ounces per week (4 ounces for pregnant and nursing mothers). Good choices are herring, sardines and wild Pacific salmon. Fish oil or cod liver oil is an appropriate substitute since it is mercury-free.
* Drink at least 8 glasses of water a day.
* Get adequate sleep.
* Avoid stress; find ways to combat unavoidable stress (a hot bath, massage, yoga, music, EFT, whatever works for you).
* Strengthen your immune system: take one gram of Vitamin C and 2000 mg. of Vitamin D3 a day (or better still, get at least 15 minutes of exposure to direct sunlight every day, without sunscreen).
* Limit your exposure to environmental toxins (molds, mildews, harsh cleaners and other chemicals).
* Make a point of including at least 30 minutes of brisk exercise in your day, at least 5 times a week.
Little of this is new; you probably heard most of it before. It's all well documented. Are you going to dismiss it again? Or will today be the day you finally make the decision to take responsibility for your own health?
About the author
Peggy Gannon lives on a 50-acre farm, where she is owned by three parrots and a few cats. She taught at Unity College in Maine for 18 years, and has in the same lifetime been a small farmer, public relations director, commercial horticulturist, and mental health professional. Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared in a variety of literary and other small magazines. She has pursued a lifelong interest in health and nutrition and is a vocal advocate of local and organic foods. When not writing, she keeps busy gardening, traveling to exotic and arcane locales, and periodically emptying the bag on the vacuum in deep space.About the author: Peggy Gannon lives on a 50-acre farm, where she is owned by three parrots and a few cats. She taught at Unity College in Maine for 18 years, and has in the same lifetime been a small farmer, public relations director, commercial horticulturist, and mental health professional. Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared in a variety of literary and other small magazines. She has pursued a lifelong interest in health and nutrition and is a vocal advocate of local and organic foods. When not writing, she keeps busy gardening, traveling to exotic and arcane locales, and periodically emptying the bag on the vacuum in deep space.
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