DOT-3 Some Thoughts on Cancer...

This post is not intended to bring you down, or bum you out.
 I hope it serves as a wake up call for some of you who may be ignoring that odd pain, fatigue, or that spot of dry skin on your back or neck,  and motivate you to get a check-up and some blood work.  I will not raise the issues of cost of prevention vs cost of treatment, that is for a later rant.  

When you are a kid, they tell you it is growing pains. I figured that what was happening to me was the corollary aging pains, as my systems started to wear out.  Pumps fail, filters get clogged up, it is part of our life journey, until this corruptible gets exchanged for the incorruptible, or whatever your theology is on the afterlife be it Corporeal/non corporeal/pure spirit/get to come back/got to come back/ go to 

Jack Webb, from Dragnet 

Soundtrack is by George Harrison ... hear it below the jump

Have a listen to this this George Harrison song


Cancer has always been Within You and Without You


I have had several Medicos explain cancer to me in these terms- big picture - and I paraphrase.

We were created, evolved, whatever your belief is, to run hard for about 30 years,
and if the sabre-toothed tiger or the plague didn't get us, and we made it
to 50 or beyond we became the elder/sages/survivors.  
The ones who knew which purple berries were safe to eat.

We have driven most of the wild beasts to extinction, and are pretty much on top of plagues and pandemics, at least in the "developed" or first world. It will take a while longer for the "developing " or "third world " countries to get the message and the medicine, often for political and religious reasons, but that is coming, accelerated by the interwebs, twitter, etc. 

Increased Life Expectancy

Just in my lifetime the life expectancy has gone up dramatically. see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_expectancy  It is fascinating.


Every day we live beyond say 30 yrs, statistically the odds one of
the bazillion cell divisions that occurs in our bodies daily going awry increases
exponentially.  This is a fact of life. Cells divide. Sometimes they keep dividing.
This is not factoring in dietary and environmental influences we have wittingly or unwittingly exposed
ourselves to in this Age of Plastic, genetically altered agriculture, wells poisoned  with antibiotics, etc.
Researchers in Cairo found that a mummy had prostate cancer caused by genetics, not pollution.
Researchers find Cancer in Mummy


As we read in the The_Emperor_of_All_Maladies:_A_Biography_of_Cancer, (REQUIRED READING FOR ALL CANCER PATIENTS AND CAREGIVERS)
one has to respect cancer a bit, for it is but cell division, albeit out of control. The genes
that are meant to turn off cell division mutate, and if our built in
immune system does not destroy these rogue cells, or can not switch them off, 
then we wind up with what the ancients called imbalanced humors, and what we call cancer.


Some cancers are "de novo",  in the medicos' lingo, and refer to  genetic mutations not possessed or transmitted by our parents.  New,  Sprung up in one of very own cells, Our own Flesh and Blood turned on us. Seemingly spontaneous. Traitorous. 

Some cancers are "extra nos" , or from outside of us, that is, the cause came from an external influence. 

This is my take, I have no business making this distinction, I am not a Doctor, and I don't play one on TV.

 I only do so to set up a dialectic, a tension to discuss the causes of cancer. Did we bring it on ourselves, or did it randomly spring up within us. Off we go into the world of the subject-object dualism, summoning up the ghosts of Heidigger and Heisenberg and his uncertainty principle,  Gods will or God's  wrath. Kismet or Karma, Naked String Theorists and who knows what-all. Whatever the causal circumstances and factors, I believe there are ways we can work with our bodies to recognize when we are hosting an out of control cell division event, and ways we can eat and drink to minimize the odds of our becoming a statistic.


A second bonus  Soundtrack to lift our spirits.

Have a listen to this 1966 chart buster from the Young Rascals while you go back and skim over the  case I made for chemical causes of cancer in my recent post What Causes MDS if you have not read it. 

Working at cross purposes

Researchers are working as hard as they can to find "The Cure" for cancer.  Mapping the Genome, clinical trials like the one I have enrolled in at Duke, new technology. smart, dedicated, concerned medicos and scientists from all over the world collaborating.  Philanthropists taking up the slack when the government cuts funding.  It gives one hope. The answer is just around the corner, right?

"Quick Watson, the game is afoot!" 

                                                          ~ Sherlock Holmes

" Come Hastings, there is not a moment to waste"
                                                               ~Hercule Poirot

The underlying assumption is that there is going to be some breakthrough discovery that will yield the "silver bullet " and we will have triumphed over this scourge to mankind. Could it be that simple? Probably not.

Research is progressing,
But....

Meanwhile, we are peeing in the well.

Peeing in the well,  and toasting the efforts of the researchers with goblets brimming over with 

the.... well, you get the picture, and it is not a pretty one. 

The battle is on two fronts

Got it? 

On the one hand, we are finding ways to "cure" cancer, and on the other we are poisoning ourselves.

It is almost a Catch 22.  There is a lot of Bullshit to cut through.

So what is there to do?

Prevention: 

Stop Peeing in the well, dammit!  And that means YOU!   Monsanto, Big Ag, and Big Pharma.

The run-off from the stockyards is a Love Canal of Anti-biotics. Too little or too much gummint regulation?
Too much Greed and not enough Common Sense?

Who will be the Upton Sinclair of this Generation, the one to expose the practices of the meat packers even as "The Jungle" did ?"

Research

Starry Eyed Idealist Med School Grads get Grants to prove the Grantors' premise.

The approval process for new drugs to come to market is held up and tainted by money and regulations.
My blood pressure is going up- enough for now. I have a post in draft for the interplay between the drug companies and research.

Alternatives are out there but are not understood, much less accepted, and claims of  homeopathic cures are not always well documented. The link is to a good movie entitled, "What if Cannabis Cured Cancer" Watch for a post on that to. There is something to it.

After a year at our local chemo cafe, I have seen many, no most -
of the lymphoma folks go into remission. For some others it has been maybe too little too late.

Unfortunately there are life threatening side effects from exposure to
chemo and radiation, and one of these is MDS. You are in "remission"  but 
your marrow can be compromised.
So the incidence of MDS  is increasing dramatically as more people get
treated for other cancers and wind up with damaged marrow.  



YOUR RISK

Sobering Statistic:

"Each year globally, 12.7 million people learn they have cancer, and 7.6 million people die from the disease. "(from CDC site) 


Mayo Clinic: Understanding Risk

So check those "spots " on your back or face, have a blood test, and a check up.  Be proactive and responsible. 

Or  use the Carolina Cure   "git you some dry ice and a q-tip and have at them spots. "
Omaha Steaks will  be tickled to send y'all some free dry ice.

Am I right Cousin Stan?

Do it now before the weather breaks.


 If you are over 50, 
UK research on incidence

Here. UK study on cancer incidence by age group.


Cap'n Chris