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New Treatment From Australia For All Cancers

Posted by Soulskill on from the that's-not-a-scalpel,-this-is-a-scalpel dept.

New submitter FirephoxRising writes "A new, protein-based treatment from the University of NSW breaks down cancers by destroying their internal protein structures. The approach has been tried before but always resulted in too much damage to muscles and the heart. The new approach allows the new class of drug to attack tumors without damaging normal cells. Professor Peter Gunning said, 'Our drug causes the structure of the cancer cell to collapse — and it happens relatively quickly.'"

139 of 217 comments (clear)

  1. Yay! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Another daily cure for cancer.

    1. Re:Yay! by i+kan+reed · · Score: 5, Informative

      Yeah, and the headline even contradicts the poorly written news article(which is already far too removed from the research to be safe). It specifically was engineered to treat one kind of cancer, they think it will effects on a similar cancer, and have a little hope for "many others". That's a far-cry from "curing all cancers".

    2. Re:Yay! by thaylin · · Score: 1

      good thing it did not say cure, but treat...

      --
      When you cant win, ad hominem.
    3. Re:Yay! by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yes, it only goes to prove my axiom "The only thing worse than science journalism are /. summaries."

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
    4. Re:Yay! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Quick! Patent it so only the rich can use it!

    5. Re:Yay! by ColdWetDog · · Score: 5, Informative

      Surprisingly, the full text is available without registering or going through a paywall. Must be a leak into a different universe or something.

      Just scanned it quickly - all cells have a cytoskelaton, a framework that allows a cell to maintain a three dimensional shape. Cytoskeletons are controlled, in part, because of a class of proteins called tropomyosins. These proteins are turned over quite rapidly in cancer cells yielding the hypothesis that targeting those molecules could selectively kill cancerous cells. Unfortunately, the chemicals that have been used previously also targeted non cancer cells and caused a lot of systemic toxicity (they cured the cancer, but unfortunately, the patient died).

      The new compound, TR100 (sounds like a toy truck), specifically targets a type of tropomyosin presumably found only in cancer cells. Leaves normal cells alone.

      IF this remains true in testing and IF the compound doesn't have other, unintended and typically deleterious effects it MIGHT be a good drug. Grandstanding by the PR idiots notwithstanding.

      The road to Big Pharma Hell is paved with effective in vitro cures for cancer.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    6. Re:Yay! by reverseengineer · · Score: 4, Informative

      There is reason to think that a drug like this would be broadly effective against different kinds of cancer. TR100 disrupts the actin cytoskeleton vital to all cells, and specifically disrupts its formation by targeting an isoform of the protein tropomyosin. Isoforms are different structures for the the same protein- every cell needs tropomyosin to regulate their actin filaments, but cancer cells preferentially use a certain structure of tropomyosin. Compounds with anti-actin activity have been looked at for a long time as anticancer compounds, but the known ones have been nonspecific. TR100 also has the advantage of being a relatively simple small molecule instead of a complicated biomolecule, which could make its development as a commercial drug much easier.

      It is however, still (potentially) just a new chemotherapy agent, one of many out there. From what has been observed from other chemo agents, just because a compound targets a basic cellular function doesn't mean a cancer can't develop resistance. The taxanes and the Vinca alkaloids arrest mitosis (by targeting microtubules), and are excellent, widely used drugs, but are not the The Cure for Cancer. I'd imagine this compound to be along those lines- another weapon in the oncology arsenal, but not a magic bullet.

      --
      "FDA staff reviewers expressed concern about the number of patients who were left out of the study because they died."
    7. Re:Yay! by interkin3tic · · Score: 4, Insightful
      The article points out that some combinations of tropomyosins are needed in the embryo, but are dispensable afterward. You needed this particular combination of tropomyosins targeted before birth, but your heart doesn't need it now. Cancer cells often revert back to a more primordial state mimicking development. So the strategy seems to be targeting that since only the cancer should be using it.

      The specific combination will not be important to all cancers, but it's possible that the STRATEGY of targeting individual tropomyosin combinations might be broadly applicable. They used the structure of the tropomyosins in question to identify drugs that would block it specifically. That could be used in other combinations. You get a sample of the tumor, find it's using combination X and Y. Y is used by the heart and is no good for targeting, but X is, so you attack that. Another cancer, combo AB and Y might be upregulated, so you look into A or B. One would likely also use it in combination with other chemotherapy. If Y combo, is the only one the cancer is using, and again that one is needed for the heart, you might give a low dose of that with a lowered dose of taxol, which targets all dividing cells. That one-two punch will have two sets of side effects to worry about, but if you give low doses of both, you might target the cancer more effectively with reduced side effects.

      I'm not a clinical doctor, so maybe that's not the idea, just that more tools are better, and the strategy is what seems to be a bigger story.

      The road to Big Pharma Hell is paved with effective in vitro cures for cancer

      It's also the road to better basic research tools. You can't jump from the stone age to the space age obviously. If this were the stone age, I might want to develop a better chisel. If people funding (?) research back in the stone age were the same people that are funding biomedical research today, I probably would suggest that a better chisel would be better able to cut metal for the rocket engine. I'd know in reality, it would just make it easier to carve stones to make a house, but if I don't promise big, the research money will go to some guy rubbing sticks together suggesting it was a novel source of combustion energy for reaching that big bright thing in the night sky.

      I won't say it in my grant applications, but I doubt we have the technology to cure cancer at this point. That doesn't mean my research won't be essential to the eventual cure for cancer, nor does it mean that cancer research is wasted.

    8. Re:Yay! by oreiasecaman · · Score: 1

      Modded funny but in fact this is (sadly) insighful...

      --
      This is a UDP joke, I don't care if you get it or not...
    9. Re:Yay! by tsotha · · Score: 1

      The road to Big Pharma Hell is paved with effective in vitro cures for cancer.

      So true. If that were all there is too it my bleach cure for cancer would have made me rich already. It kills cancer cells, after all.

    10. Re:Yay! by ppanon · · Score: 1

      So if they did develop a treatment based on this set of proteins, it probably wouldn't be safe for pregnant mothers. And it might even be usable off label as an abortifacient, so that would probably have the US religious right wing trying to ban it or at least make it heavily restricted?

      --
      Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
    11. Re:Yay! by Occams · · Score: 1

      How grossly un /. you actually found and RTFA instead of trashing it. Everyone knows that an effective treatment for cancer must come from the USA, and be bound up in patents and IP rights.

      --
      Heavy is the head that wears the tinfoil hat.
  2. Even if this does pan out... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    rather than simply allow everyone to be cured, the powers that be will milk this for every penny they can, and medical bankruptcies will continue on, unabated.

    1. Re:Even if this does pan out... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yeah, you're right, curing cancer sucks. This is the worst day ever. :(((

  3. Exciting Times by Somebody+Is+Using+My · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Whether this new cure is a true breakthrough or not, it is really exciting to live in a time where things such as CURING CANCER are possible (even living on the verge of such a time is breathtaking). The places science and technology are taking us are out of a science-fiction novel. We might not have flying cars or jetpacks (except we /do/!), but we truly are living "in the future". A thousand years ago what we take for granted would have seemed magic or even godlike. And who knows what tomorrow will hold for us - a cure for death, perhaps?

    Even knowing that no such advance comes without its unforeseen darkside, it is still enough to give me a childlike glee and hope again.

    1. Re:Exciting Times by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Citation needed.

    2. Re:Exciting Times by h4rr4r · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Such a claim requires some serious proof.

      Unless you mean our current means of food production enable people to live long enough to get these diseases.

    3. Re:Exciting Times by i+kan+reed · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Well, one of the dark sides is that our agrochemical food causes many of these cancers in the first place.

      He said lacking any justification at all for his statement.

      People die of cancer everywhere, and everywhen, it's not unique to "our" food. It's not magically caused by "chemicals". There are carcinogens present in modern society, but the primary causes of cancer aren't your damn food.

    4. Re:Exciting Times by omnichad · · Score: 4, Informative

      A cure for death would wreak unbelievable chaos on the world.

    5. Re:Exciting Times by quantumghost · · Score: 5, Informative

      Whether this new cure is a true breakthrough or not, it is really exciting to live in a time where things such as CURING CANCER are possible (even living on the verge of such a time is breathtaking).

      Actually, most cancers are curable. I can cut out most tumors....the problem is getting to them early enough. Solid tumors are mostly responsive to surgery first, chemotherapy and, for some cancers, radiotherapy are best left to "mop up" residual cells be it tumor-in-situ or micrometastases or out metastatic disease, now there are a few exceptions - especially the "liquid tumors" or hematologic malignancies.

      What I'd really like to see is better screening for cancers - the only universal truth about cancers is that the earlier they are caught, the better the response to treatment. Catch a cancerous growth early before is has spread locally and we can cut it out and you'll likely be cured. When it has a chance to invade locally and especially distally, I can't perform a simple operation to remove it - I have to take out more tissue and sometimes in different places or other organs...sometimes the tumor burden is so great that an operation won't make a difference. This is where chemo can also be used. But responses to chemo are almost universally poorer than surgery. And please bear in mind, most people use "cancer" like its a single entity. It is not. There are a multitude of cancerous transformations for each cell line in the body, each with its own peculiarities.

      Don't get me wrong, any improvement in chemotherapy will increase survivor hood of cancer, but I doubt that this will do much to change the initial treatment of most cancers.

    6. Re:Exciting Times by ImdatS · · Score: 2

      [...] A thousand years ago what we take for granted would have seemed magic or even godlike. And who knows what tomorrow will hold for us - a cure for death, perhaps?

      "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke

    7. Re:Exciting Times by JanneM · · Score: 5, Informative

      Mostly I agree wholeheartedly. A close relative has survived colon cancer (one of the most survivable cancers today), in no small part because it was diagnosed and removed in time.

      But, it seems that screening has some pretty tough limits. You have some cancers such as glioblastoma that seem to still be pretty much uniformly fatal no matter how early you find them. And breast cancer seems to be less promising for screening than it seemed at first; the aggressive type seems to be liable to have metastised almost no matter how early it is detected, while the other types are fairly unlikely to do so, even with late detection.

      This seems to partly explain why breast cancer survival hasn't budged nearly as much as expected with the advent of wide-spread screening.

      Screeining _is_ important. Surgery is the main means of cancer cure. And both have improved hugely over time. But for all that, cancers still collectively comprise the second most common cause of death, behind cardiovascular issues. And arguably a much more difficult and prolongued death for most sufferers. I'd say any improvement in treatment is both urgent and welcome.

      --
      Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
    8. Re:Exciting Times by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      And who knows what tomorrow will hold for us - a cure for death, perhaps?

      I'm afraid that information theory and entropy prevents that.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    9. Re:Exciting Times by skids · · Score: 1

      The degree of chaos really depends on a lot of the characteristics of the cure, chiefly cost and effect on various aspects of senescense especially intelligence and reproductive capability. Much of the craziness in the world happens in spite of the futility of mortal existence, not because of it.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    10. Re:Exciting Times by tgd · · Score: 1

      Well, one of the dark sides is that our agrochemical food causes many of these cancers in the first place.

      Science: a process intended to prevent stupidity like this statement.

      Try it. It works.

    11. Re:Exciting Times by skids · · Score: 1

      Answer me this: why not routinely remove moles? Its always mystified me. If they are benign, then they should be safe to remove for cosmetic purposes, and if they are potentially dangerous, why not get rid of them ASAP?

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    12. Re:Exciting Times by Wookact · · Score: 2

      My prediction is many of the people who could afford it, would not be deserving of it.

    13. Re:Exciting Times by kevkingofthesea · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Assuming there's been an increase in cancer incidence in recent history (not saying there's been one, I just don't feel like looking it up), I'd conjecture that it's primarily due to our greatly increased average lifespan, not any ill effects of whatever foods or chemicals we might have added to our daily diets.

    14. Re:Exciting Times by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Which explains a lot of problems we have today... Too many people grew up believing in magic, and are starting to see it everywhere. They can't explain it so either god did it, or the devil did it. And since god is doing such wonderful things we should push the scientists out of the way and let god do his thing... Certainly wouldn't want to teach more children to stand in gods way either....

    15. Re:Exciting Times by omnichad · · Score: 1

      I was linking to a TV Mini-series that explored the possibility where death simply wasn't possible for some mysterious reason. Overpopulation, overcrowded hospitals, lack of food - all within a matter of only days. Sure, it's just TV. But it seemed realistic.

    16. Re:Exciting Times by quantumghost · · Score: 1

      Answer me this: why not routinely remove moles? Its always mystified me. If they are benign, then they should be safe to remove for cosmetic purposes, and if they are potentially dangerous, why not get rid of them ASAP?

      Most "moles" are benign. The suspicious ones (ABCDEs) are removed and sent for pathology to detect if they are cancerous. It would not be possible to remove and pathologically screen all moles on every person.

    17. Re:Exciting Times by RobinH · · Score: 3, Informative

      There is the tiny problem that chemotherapy damages your brain. There is, at the very least, a measurable and significant decline in IQ when tested before and after chemotherapy. Google for effect on iq from chemo to see some information.

      --
      "I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
    18. Re:Exciting Times by pr0fessor · · Score: 2

      My mother had surgery for liver cancer more than 20 years ago and has been cancer free since. It was however terrifying and took a close to two years for her to really fully recover not to mention the couple of years of slowly declining health before the tumor was found. Today she is retired and involved in all kinds of cancer related charities.

    19. Re:Exciting Times by lisaparratt · · Score: 3, Insightful

      THEY'RE FLUORIDATING OUR AVGAS!
      dsjghsdbfgbfgngvbnbvnyjghmjghdmjhmhj

    20. Re:Exciting Times by metrix007 · · Score: 1

      I just read up on that...that's actually really disturbing! Many peer reviewed studies supporting that finding...eek!

      --
      If you ignore ACs because they are anonymous - you're an idiot.
    21. Re:Exciting Times by ColdWetDog · · Score: 1

      the only universal truth about cancers is that the earlier they are caught, the better the response to treatment.

      Except that this isn't even remotely true. That was a nice hypothesis a couple of decades ago, but it's turned out to be much more complicated than that. Some cancers can be treated very late in the game, some early, some it doesn't seem to make a difference when you do it. It's a very reasonable supposition, just happens not to be a correct one.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    22. Re: Exciting Times by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Your post just gave me cancer.

    23. Re:Exciting Times by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      One of the hardest things for lay people to understand about screening is that false positives are a HUGE problem. If you offer somebody a painless $10 test for brain cancer which has a 1% false positive rate, they think that seems really useful and take it. Maybe a million people take your screening test. At least 10 000 get told they were positive. Virtually NONE of those people have brain cancer, but now they're scared shitless and will probably get a load more tests done, some of which are invasive or even dangerous.

      Getting the false positive rate down is thus of huge importance, because if you can't do that then your screening test is worse than useless and in most countries it'll be prohibited (because it has a bad overall health outcome) and in places like the US it'll be used and drive up costs and make people's health worse because they're scared and nobody is being the grown-up and taking away the test because "We can make our own decisions" yeah right.

    24. Re:Exciting Times by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1

      To say that every part of society has gone though a dramatic shift over the last 2 centuries is an extraordinary understatement.

    25. Re:Exciting Times by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      I'd settle for a young mind and body alive until the heat death of the universe

      Well, that's what I had in mind. If you lived for such an extended period of time, what would happen to the "old you"? You can't put that much information into a human brain, even if you extended the physical longevity of all cells in your organism. There would be a completely different person inside after a much shorter period of time than that.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    26. Re:Exciting Times by JanneM · · Score: 1

      False positives is as you say a huge issue. It ties in to the ridiculous airport screening programs, to the daft idea of facial recognition for street-side cameras, as well as recent developments in common screening programs such as for breast cancer.

      --
      Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
    27. Re:Exciting Times by quantumghost · · Score: 1

      Sorry, I am not. I have the usual general surgery training (which includes time on a surgical-oncology service), but I specialize in trauma, emergency general surgery, and surgical critical care. I do not routinely do cancer operations, any cancers that I operate on are incidental or have resulted in a surgical emergency like a perforated colon cancer.

    28. Re:Exciting Times by skids · · Score: 1

      So wouldn't the same be said for a lot of internal growths? Early detection would waste resources?

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    29. Re: Exciting Times by dlingman · · Score: 2

      You should either sit further back, or turn your monitor brightness down a bit then.

    30. Re:Exciting Times by Immerman · · Score: 2

      A fair point - the death rate has been pegged at 100% since our distant ancestors gave up asexual reproduction billions of years ago. As we stomp out other causes of death the general body failure "diseases" will inevitably become the dominant cause of death.

      However IIRC cancer rates within a given age group are also increasing, and that does suggest that something drastic is changing - and among the the obvious candidates are something in the chemicals we're saturating our farming and living environments with - or something we're *removing* from those - like the trace nutrients that are no longer present in food grown in intensively farmed soil, or perhaps symbiotic microbes that our cleanliness obsession is depriving us of. Or, or, or...

      Or perhaps it's something that has little to do with our actions at all, like more aggressive strains of cancer-enabling viruses evolving. Yes, that's a thing, really. Warts are the common example of a virally-induced benign tumor, and 100% of cervical cancer victims have had a vaginal HPV infection which suggests that it's at least a necessary precursor. (but most genital HPV victims never develop cancer)

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    31. Re:Exciting Times by Jason+Levine · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't that be a vaccine against death? A cure for death would make dead people come back to life.... Oh, great. You just started the Zombie Apocalypse.

      --
      My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
    32. Re:Exciting Times by Immerman · · Score: 1

      I don't know. If the cure rendered people permanently sterile and had to be applied before puberty, then perhaps it wouldn't be a huge issue, zero population growth would be assured from the immortals, and everybody else could enjoy replacement-level reproduction. Or if it were inherently expensive enough that only the richest would ever had access then the chaos would likely be due to uprisings against the folks that permanently locked themselves into the halls of power, but if they were smart and generous enough that might be avoided.

      Just for reference lets look at the numbers:
      Current estimated global death rate: 8.4 per 1000 per year = 59 million people per year
      Current estimated global birth rate: 19 per 1000 per year = 134 million people per year
      Net growth rate = 10.6/k/yr = 74 million/yr
      So if a widely available "death cure" were unveiled today it could be expected to raise the population growth rate from 10.6 /k/yr to the full 19, or an 80% increase. And while birth rates seem to naturally fall to replacement levels with minimal effort when cheap/free access to effective birth control and family planning education, getting people to give up having kids at all would probably be a very tough nut to swallow, not to mention likely meaning the death of our species as a long-term viable organism if we succeeded.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    33. Re:Exciting Times by n2hightech · · Score: 1

      I agree things are getting better all over the world. For a great visual presentation check out the TED talk by Hans Rosling: The best stats you've ever seen http://www.ted.com/playlists/56/making_sense_of_too_much_data.html . After watching this there is not much the doom and gloomers can say that will cause me to believe things are getting worse. Yes we have problems and things are not always fair, sometimes there are setbacks however the world is becoming a better place all around.

    34. Re:Exciting Times by omnichad · · Score: 1

      In the miniseries I linked, people just stopped dying. Nobody came back from the dead. No apparent side effects. And it was still an ugly mess. Real interersting to watch.

    35. Re:Exciting Times by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Chemotherapy damages the patient in many ways. When I complain to my oncologist that I seem to have cognitive/memory difficulties since he started beating me up three and a half years ago, he rolls his eyes. But, the nurses in the infusion room know all about "chemo brain". Are my memory and attention deficits the normal result of aging? Early Alzheimers? A consequence of exposure to 5FU, Oxaliplatin, Irinotecan, Avastin, C/T contrast? I dunno. I'd be dead without the drugs. My colon cancer is advancing slowly despite treatment. Unless it breaks out in some surprising place, I may have a couple years to wait for a miracle cure. Press releases come and go. I've got my will and advance medical directives in order. My wife will be financially OK. Meanwhile, the sun just came out. Gotta go...

    36. Re:Exciting Times by camperdave · · Score: 1

      What happens is that your head swells, and your body disappears.

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
    37. Re:Exciting Times by quantumghost · · Score: 1

      the only universal truth about cancers is that the earlier they are caught, the better the response to treatment.

      Except that this isn't even remotely true. That was a nice hypothesis a couple of decades ago, but it's turned out to be much more complicated than that. Some cancers can be treated very late in the game, some early, some it doesn't seem to make a difference when you do it. It's a very reasonable supposition, just happens not to be a correct one.

      [citation needed]

      I will respectfully disagree. Yes, I agree some cancers can be treated in later stages, but I did not say that they can't. As you will see in almost every cancer, there is a precipitous decline in survival based on major staging (denoted by the roman numeral). There are a few *subtypes* in colorectal cancer that have variable survival (likely multifactorial due to changing definitions, evolving treatment protocols, and lower numbers of patients due to the subdivisions of the group), but I think you can see the trend. In fact, let's conduct a little experiment. Look me up when you get a diagnosis of cancer, we'll wait until you're stage IV until treatment is started. And we'll see what your outcome is. Granted the n will be 1, but methinks you will not be happy with _your_ outcome. Now, here are my examples, please cite yours. I will warn you I do not accept data that can not be reproduced or is not peer-reviewed

      Breast:

      Stage 5-year Survival Rate

      0 xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 93%

      I xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 88%

      IIA xxxxxxxxxxxxx 81%

      IIB xxxxxxxxxxxxx 74%

      IIIA xxxxxxxxxxxxx 67%

      IIIB xxxxxxxxxxxxx 41%

      IIIC xxxxxxxxxxxxx 49%

      IV xxxxxxxxxxxxxx 15%

      Colon:

      Stage 5-year Observed Survival Rate

      I xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 74%

      IIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 67%

      IIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 59%

      IIC xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 37%

      IIIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 73%

      IIIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 46%

      IIIC xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 28%

      IV xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 6%

      Rectal:

      Stage 5-year Observed Survival Rate

      I xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 74%

      IIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 65%

      IIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 52%

      IIC xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 32%

      IIIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 74%

      IIIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 45%

      IIIC xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 33%

      IV xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 6%

      Non-small cell lung cancer:

      Stage 5-year Survival Rate

      IA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 49%

      IB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 45%

      IIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 30%

      IIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 31%

      IIIA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 14%

      IIIB xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 5%

      IV xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 1%

      Small cell lung cancer:

      Stage 5-year Relative Survival Rate

      I xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 31%

      II xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 19%

      III xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 8%

      IV xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 2%

      Similar statistics exist for: bladder cancer, cervial cancer, endomertrial cance

    38. Re:Exciting Times by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      It's really depressing living in a time when cancer has not been cured, nor the common cold, allergies, warts, and on and on. The depressing thing is that future historians will look back at us and know that at this stage our medicine has not progressed much past the age of bloodletting.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    39. Re:Exciting Times by rs79 · · Score: 1

      "but the primary causes of cancer aren't your damn food."

      No, just the phytoalexins required to reverse tumors. You are wrong and should read more.

      Cancer is caused by a number of things. Cosmic rays can do it. It's quite natural and nearly all the time the body takes care of it' cancerous cells can be fond at all times in all living things, they're just cells that didn't divide properly for whatever reason. You cam never stop that not do you need to. What needs to be addressed is the inability of some people under some conditions to have their immune system destroy these defective copies. This turns out to be because of a nutritional deficiency caused by industrial tampering in our food supply. See my comments near the top to see the actual molecular biodynamics involved.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    40. Re:Exciting Times by rs79 · · Score: 1

      This argument was addressed in this paper - from 1928.

      http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/jcanres/12/1/9.full.pdf

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    41. Re:Exciting Times by HuguesT · · Score: 1

      It is easy to design a $0 test with 0% false negative rate.

    42. Re:Exciting Times by HuguesT · · Score: 1

      Because no surgery is benign. If a mole is indeed say a melanoma, you need to remove a *large* and *thick* area of the skin around it. Think inches in diameter, otherwise is does more harm than good.

      To avoid skin cancer, simple monitoring (checking that nothing changes) every 3 months for a suspicious mole is cheaper and less dangerous than surgery.

    43. Re:Exciting Times by i+kan+reed · · Score: 1

      Your comments near the top have no actual science in them FYI.

  4. Oblig by war4peace · · Score: 4, Insightful

    TV Personality: And how many people have you treated so far?
    Dr. Alice Krippin: Well, we've had ten thousand and nine clinical trials in humans so far.
    TV Personality: And how many are cancer-free?
    Dr. Alice Krippin: Ten thousand and nine.
    TV Personality: So you have actually cured cancer.
    Dr. Alice Krippin: Yes, yes... yes, we have.
    [cuts to post-apocalyptic New York three years later]

    --
    ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
    1. Re:Oblig by Anubis+IV · · Score: 2

      He's making an I Am Legend reference, not a Resident Evil reference.

    2. Re:Oblig by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      No, no, you don't understand. See, this is an article about curing some disease that pop culture has consigned to the "scary unstoppable boogeyman" category. So, because some work of fiction was created that shows swift and terrible punishment for blatantly flaunting the omniscient medical wisdom of pop culture (in popular, easy-to-swallow zombie apocalypse form, no less!), this clearly proves it is a bad idea in the real world, so stop thinking about it, you horrible, murdering MONSTER.

  5. So it only works on people born June 21 - July 22? by barlevg · · Score: 1

    That's too bad. I'm a Pisces.

  6. Re:SCIENCE! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    You mean, it is better than praying? Sacrilege!

  7. Not all cancers work the same way... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Bone marrow cancer is usually just normal bone marrow with one or two genes that have bits flipped...

    Granted, cancer is just mutated cells, but unlike brain/lung/kidney cancers, bone marrow cancers grow like normal bone marrow, only the marrow density rises and the *clonal* marrow produces too many of a certain kind of white cell which is what kills the person with it.

    Thankfully there's Gleevec (Imatinib) that puts several forms of it into remission, but doesn't cure it. Even if it does cost over USD 6000.00 for a 30 day supply.

  8. Re:SCIENCE! by iggymanz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    if we have a global nuclear war, does that mean science won?

  9. for certain animals by iggymanz · · Score: 3, Informative

    this has never been tried on a human being and won't be until at least 2015

    many cures for cancer have worked very well in animals over the past three decades

    1. Re:for certain animals by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      you must be new here. hang around and see how deep the poop hole goes.

  10. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 5, Informative

    that actually was a quote of Vishnu in the Hindu scriptures Bhagavad-Gita.

  11. Call me cynical by grasshoppa · · Score: 4, Funny

    But all I think they've cured is the need for research funding for a year or two.

    --
    Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
  12. a cure for a self inflicted plague by nimbius · · Score: 4, Insightful

    the CDC routinely releases statistics and studies that conclude people who eat healthy and exercise regularly experience dramatically lower cancer rates. of course cancer is a terrible disease for anyone it afflicts but rarifying its manifestation should be of greater realistic priority than a panacea. if you're pining for a silver bullet you might want to give running shoes, fresh fruit and vegetables a shot. Drink a little less, and for christ sake if you're still smoking, quit.

    --
    Good people go to bed earlier.
    1. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by ceoyoyo · · Score: 2

      What you've said isn't technically wrong, but your title is horrible. Cancer is usually not "self-inflicted". EVERYONE who lives long enough will get cancer. You can reduce your chances, a bit, not really dramatically, of getting one while you're young by being basically healthy.

    2. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by ceoyoyo · · Score: 1

      Yes. He was one of the lucky people on the high tail of the bell curve and didn't live long enough, given his particular genetic and environmental makeup, to develop cancer, despite living to an old age.

      In his 103 year he was much more likely to have or have had cancer than he was in his 33 year, and a bit more likely than in his 102 year. If he'd lived longer, his chances in his 150th year would be higher than at any previous time. Cumulative density functions are like that, but the probability density is also higher for most cancers at greater ages. Once exception is the nastier kinds of brain cancers, which have spikes in probability density in babies, then a drop, then increasing pd with age.

    3. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by ceoyoyo · · Score: 2

      Not really. We know a fair amount about the mechanisms behind cancer and we also have a lot of epidemiological data. Cancer can be caused by natural errors in copying DNA, or by corruptions caused by radiation or carcinogenic chemicals. All of those mechanisms tend to occur throughout life at constant (in the case of radiation) or increasing (in the case of copying errors) rates. Some of them can accumulate too, but that doesn't actually matter.

      Your immune system normally kills cancerous cells (or they kill themselves) before they become a problem, but there's some probability of failure, resulting in the disease we call cancer. Also, both those mechanisms become less effective with age so that probability slowly grows.

      ANY of those factors, never mind all of them together, mean you have a nonzero probability of developing cancer in any given year, and in fact this probability increases for most cancers the older you get. Either way, the result is a cumulative density function that increases monotonically with age. Which means the older you get the more likely you are to have had cancer, and if you live long enough you WILL get cancer.

      It's not really a hypothesis. The hypotheses are contained in the first two paragraphs and they're well tested both experimentally and epidemiologically. The third paragraph is more of a logical consequence.

      It really doesn't matter what you "think." Reality doesn't care much about your prejudices. Exercise helps your immune system stay healthier, which helps reduce your risk of cancer. Eating well does that and, depending on what you're eating, may also help reduce the rate of chemical mutation. Either or both do reduce your risk of cancer, but the rates are usually in the low single digits for particular cancers. Heavy alcohol use, for example, appears to raise your risk of prostate cancer by a few percent. Not half, and certainly not half across the board.

      Both a healthy diet and exercise will also tend to keep you from dying from things like heart attack and stroke, which means you're more likely to live longer. Those extra years on the end of your life are also when you're most likely to develop cancer, so it's quite possible -- even probable, although I haven't seen any epidemiological studies looking at this -- that exercise and good diet increase your lifetime probability of getting cancer. Not that you shouldn't exercise and eat well - that small extra cancer probability comes as a direct result of not dying earlier from other things.

      Most cancers are not lifestyle diseases. If sneering at fat lazy people makes you feel good, talk about cardiovascular disease.

    4. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by istartedi · · Score: 1

      There is a good chance he had prostate cancer and didn't know it. Most men will get slow growing prostate cancer. The saying has become, "you are more likely to die with it than from it".

      Also, his immune system probably killed some cancer cells. As the other poster said, he was at the far end of the curve where everything that prevents cancer worked right.

      --
      For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
    5. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by demonrob · · Score: 1

      bullshit - I played competitive sport till a week before my bowel cancer surgery, and had a healthy diet. Many cancers are just random, or some people are just more vulnerable. 10 years earlier I had a cancerous kidney removed - also random, not lifestyle caused. Guess I must just be vulnerable, but no there is no link they can find. In the chemo rooms, where I'm treated every 2 weeks for the last 3 years, you'll find it full of normal people, ones who exercised and ones who didn't. Some who smoked many who didn't. So no, don't make crap generalisations. Stupidity in your case, well maybe yes that is self inflicted.

    6. Re:a cure for a self inflicted plague by ranmagirl · · Score: 1

      Though your point is obvious, my person gave +1 Insightful to this post, because, I, my sub-conciouss boy/girl, who also wanted to make a point, saw that your post has a point:

      While obvious, it is ignored by masses in most rich countries and especially in couple ones (to name two, GB & USA, not in any order, and not the only ones) - even to a point they stuff their mouths full of XXL-size McDonalds (btw, what do, e.g. Americans, see in their food? Maybe they sell crappier stuff here in Finland) crap or mega-pizza while driking diet-cola to not get fat (err..., to not get fatter? err... to fool oneself?) while blaming their greaceball form for genetics... Ach!

      --
      ranma - girl?
  13. Re:SCIENCE! by FreeUser · · Score: 4, Insightful

    if we have a global nuclear war, does that mean science won?

    No. In all liklihood, it will mean religious fanatics in either America, some other region, or both, got their hands on nukes and decided to usher in whatever their version of post-apacalyptic "our religion now rules on Earth as it does in Heaven" millennium. By the time they realize what fools they were, we as a species have joined the other 99% of species in extinction.

    Regardless, it will mean the baser side of human nature won, and happened to use a scientificly derived tool as it defeated our better natures, and our species.

    --
    The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
  14. Re:SCIENCE! by h4rr4r · · Score: 2, Informative

    You mean living longer and better diagnoses?

    Because that is what caused increase in cancer diagnoses. There is no evidence of anything else.

  15. Does this mark the day when by maroberts · · Score: 1

    Slashdot turned into the Daily Mail?

    --

    Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
    Karma: Chameleon

  16. It could be worse by maroberts · · Score: 1

    You could be working with Cowboys

    --

    Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
    Karma: Chameleon

  17. Re:SCIENCE! by flyingfsck · · Score: 1

    Uhh, so cigarettes (a.k.a. cancer sticks) are the result of 'science'?

    --
    Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
  18. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    wrong, there is evidence of what you say in recent decades, but the whole time period of which I spoke tells a different story. Let's use one example, the mass production of cigarettes, before which people hand rolled a few smokes a day....

  19. Re:SCIENCE! by tgd · · Score: 2

    if we have a global nuclear war, does that mean science won?

    No, it means the neutrons won.

  20. You do realize that you're talking in fallacies? by denzacar · · Score: 1

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onus_probandi

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  21. Re:SCIENCE! by tgd · · Score: 1

    that actually was a quote of Vishnu in the Hindu scriptures Bhagavad-Gita.

    But only one of the two was talking about nuclear weapons.

  22. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    yes, the processes and machinery used are very much the products of science. do you imagine modern agriculture, machinery and chemical reactors are not?

  23. But by maroberts · · Score: 1

    I blame God - after all He made animals so tasty. Bless his Noodly Appendages!

    --

    Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
    Karma: Chameleon

  24. ok, but... by trum4n · · Score: 1

    I have two friends dieing of prostate cancer. When can this happen? Are they doing human testing? Cause i know some guys....

  25. Re:SCIENCE! by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

    Tobacco smoking has been available lots longer than that. Nor does is require rolling. Smoking near constantly has been something people have done, the few who could afford it, for much longer than that.

    Try again?

  26. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by jeffclay · · Score: 1

    Prove what? Prove that they genetically modify seeds? Look at their website. Prove that they also produce pesticides and poisons? Look at their website. Prove that there are side effects? I haven't seen nor heard of any proof that there aren't. You do realize that using big words doesn't actually make you smart right?

  27. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Prove that there are side effects? I haven't seen nor heard of any proof that there aren't.

    In case you haven't quite grasped this yet, that right there is the point you fell off the edge into a logical fallacy.

  28. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by metrix007 · · Score: 2

    I haven't seen nor heard of any proof that reptile aliens don't secretly live among us, disused as humans.

    --
    If you ignore ACs because they are anonymous - you're an idiot.
  29. Re:SCIENCE! by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

    Because when we used wood fires no one breathed any particulate?

  30. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    no, a Prince Arjuna is worried about whether to attack an enemy or not. Vishnu appears incarnated as Krishna and converses with him.

    (Arjuna): Tell me who are You in such a fierce form? My salutations to You, O best of gods, be merciful! I wish to understand You, the primal Being, because I do not know Your mission.

    The Supreme Lord Vishnu said, I am death, the mighty destroyer of the world, out to destroy. Even without your participation all the warriors standing arrayed in the opposing armies shall cease to exist.

    Therefore, get up and attain glory. Conquer your enemies and enjoy a prosperous kingdom. All these (warriors) have already been destroyed by Me. You are only an instrument, O Arjuna.

  31. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by denzacar · · Score: 1

    Prove that there are side effects? I haven't seen nor heard of any proof that there aren't.

    You do realize that you're STILL talking in fallacies, and adding further fallacies to your "argument"?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignoratio_elenchi

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  32. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by denzacar · · Score: 1

    And I almost forgot this one.

    You do realize that using big words doesn't actually make you smart right?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  33. Re:SCIENCE! by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

    it will mean religious fanatics in either America, some other region, or both, got their hands on nukes

    Haven't they already?

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  34. Better information by tom_gram · · Score: 2

    The cited article is extremely thin on information, but the publication that it is based on is available as a pdf:
    http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/73/16/5169.full.pdf+html
    It was published yesterday...

    1. Re:Better information by tom_gram · · Score: 1

      Here is the abstract:
      Abstract
      The actin cytoskeleton is a potentially vulnerable property of cancer cells, yet chemotherapeutic targeting attempts have been hampered by unacceptable toxicity. In this study, we have shown that it is possible to disrupt specific actin filament populations by targeting isoforms of tropomyosin, a core component of actin filaments, that are selectively upregulated in cancers. A novel class of anti-tropomyosin compounds has been developed that preferentially disrupts the actin cytoskeleton of tumor cells, impairing both tumor cell motility and viability. Our lead compound, TR100, is effective in vitro and in vivo in reducing tumor cell growth in neuroblastoma and melanoma models. Importantly, TR100 shows no adverse impact on cardiac structure and function, which is the major side effect of current anti-actin drugs. This proof-of-principle study shows that it is possible to target specific actin filament populations fundamental to tumor cell viability based on their tropomyosin isoform composition. This improvement in specificity provides a pathway to the development of a novel class of anti-actin compounds for the potential treatment of a wide variety of cancers. Cancer Res; 73(16); 5169–82. 2013 AACR.

  35. Re:You do realize that you're talking in fallacies by Nidi62 · · Score: 1

    Prove that there are side effects? I haven't seen nor heard of any proof that there aren't.

    A lack of proof for the negative is not de facto proof for the positive.

    --
    The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
  36. What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I wonder if it's real or some really horrid chemical they can't quite get safe enough to use without dissolving your veins. That's the problem with that "discovery" in Sask. that cured cancer in rats. That's because rats can't scream as their veins dissolve.

    Put on your thinking caps, why has cance shot up since 1900? What changed?

    In 2007 or so, a Cytochrome B enzyme was found - CYP1B1 that only occurs in cancer cells. Fresh off the end of a successful prostate cancer drug, the first one with a new paradigm - something other than "kill ALL of the cells and pray" (See: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2012%2F06%2F02%2FMNI11ORI84.DTL) that exploited CYP17, Potter then set out to make a more generalized one based on the nearly universal CYP1B1. He designed the molecule then set about to make it and while looking for precursors noticed the exact same molecule occurs in fruit, made in response to mold.

    So they tried it, and it worked. Every time. It gets converted in cells with CYP1B1 to picotaneol which is fatal to cancer cells but not regular cells. If you google "Salvestrol case studies" you'll find three clinical trials where cancer was reversed in every case. It's not patentable...

    So, the current hypothesis is, since we began spraying anti-fungals, there's no mold so the plant doesn't make this chemical in response to mold, so non-organic fruit contains only 10% of what unsprayed fruit has. And it's a very bitter chemical and we breed bitterness out...

    Cancerous cells can be found in any animal at any time, the body takes care of them. The problem arises when it can't, and we find Gene P53 is deactivated in those people. This reactivates it; once the body has the correct raw materials it gets down to work.

    It's always better to help the body do what it does naturally and has for millions of years compared to some synthetic noxious substance. If nothing else understand that with a chemical that's already in the body all the time, the body knows what to do with it. With man-made drugs there are always side effects in every case as the body has no idea what to do with the molecules it doesn't recognize and they latch on to places they shouldn't and hellooo side effects.

    There are 30,000 deaths a year from these side effects.

    This chemical is found in tangerines and prune plums, strawberries, asparagus and so on. Tangerines have the most. Which raises an interesting question. Do areas that grow a lot of tangerines have a lower cancer rate. That would be Morocco.

    It's not on the list of per capita cancer rates WHO keeps, that's quoted in Wiki. That list ranges from South Africa as the lowest (about 250) to Denmark with the highest at 387 or something. Note also that poor countries have less, developed countries have more... poor people grow their own food and can't afford chemicals.

    But, if you poke around on the Moroccan government website long enough, you find their per-capita cancer rate: 100. Less than half the lowest stat WHO has for any country. And besides having all the tangerines, they pretty much invented chain smoking there. But still: 100.

    So, if these guys are using this mechanism and trying to make a patent end run, bad. If it's something else, some noxious chemical, it's equally worthless. If however they have a new agent that also uses the pro-drug paradigm Potter found, then that would be good.

    But there's a reason they don't give any details on this compound and I'd really like to know what it is.

    --
    Need Mercedes parts ?
    1. Re:What is this stuff? by rubycodez · · Score: 2

      the rats in my country hold public office

    2. Re:What is this stuff? by semi-extrinsic · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm not arguing with the articles you posted, but the argument "India/Morocco/Nepal has less cancer, so we must be doing something to cause cancer" has a significant weakness: many people in those countries die before they have the time to get cancer.

      --
      for i in `facebook friends "=bday" 2>/dev/null | cut -d " " -f 3-`; do facebook wallpost $i "Happy birthday!"; done
    3. Re:What is this stuff? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Put on your thinking caps, why has cance shot up since 1900?

      In large part, it hasn't. What has shot up is our ability to detect it.

      Apart from that, a lot of it has to do with increased overall life expectancy. You die of cancer at 80 because you didn't die of heart failure at 60.

    4. Re:What is this stuff? by Charliemopps · · Score: 2

      Actually there have been studies regarding why aspirin seems to significantly reduce cancer rates. Some doctors are starting to think, similar to what you're saying, that many of the chemicals contained in Aspirin are also found on plant molds and that our current access to fresh vegetables combined very little contact with food molds and chemicals plants produce when damaged may be related to recent increases in cancer rates. Wouldn't it be ironic if the cure for cancer was bruised moldy tomatoes?

    5. Re:What is this stuff? by Samrobb · · Score: 4, Funny

      Wouldn't it be ironic if the cure for cancer was bruised moldy tomatoes?

      Ridiculous. Next you'll be claiming that moldy bread is a cure for bacterial infections.

      --
      "Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgement." Job 32:9
    6. Re:What is this stuff? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      I am a cancer biologist.

      There's a huge problem with the statement that Salvestrol can "reactivate" P53: P53 is irreversibly inactivated in most cancers by direct deleterious mutations.

      Source data from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center:
      http://www.cbioportal.org/public-portal/cross_cancer.do

    7. Re:What is this stuff? by sonamchauhan · · Score: 1

      In the off chance, someone misses the sarcasm...

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penicillin

    8. Re:What is this stuff? by whatteaux · · Score: 1

      many of the chemicals contained in Aspirin

      Say what? Aspirin contains only one chemical: acetylsalicylic acid. Nothing else.

    9. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      If Morocco was the only poor country where people died early that would be a good point.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    10. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      You need to read medical history. Cancer was virtually unseen prior to 1900. But it has been known for 7000 years at least.

      The first notice of work/toxin related cancers were chimney sweeps in the late 1800s. Enough of them got testicular cancer that a causative link was established. This was the first of the industrial cancers. Come 1900 and radical modernization of industry and the rate just starts shooting up culminating with the post-WWII idea that without antifungals (which turn out to be the thing that's doing the bees in) chemical fertilizers and pesticides we can't grow enough food to feed the boomers.

      No go back 50 years prior to and read a gardening book from that era, say "Garden magic". The number of times they advise to spray "lead arsenate" in that book is phenomenal. Try doing that today. Point is that seemed quite reasonable in the day.

      It's not our ability to detect it that's changed, it's how soon we can detect it that's changed. That's why people are living longer with cancer. They're not really, we can just identify it sooner. The cure rate has not changed since 1900; thats why Potter's stuff is so exciting, we've actually figured out what part of the body failed and why.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    11. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      If you're trying to suggest it doesn't work (without actually knowing what it does) you have the problem of explaining what it is than that reversed the cancer in the 11 people in those three clinical trials.

      And you also need to explain this:
      http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=%2Fc%2Fa%2F2012%2F06%2F02%2FMNI11ORI84.DTL

      "I don't have time to debunk your misunderstanding about science"
      Translation: "I haven't read anything you're talking about but I know it's wrong" - the logical fallacy of the argument from ignorance. It's a shame you didn't even notice the refernces and pointers given, let alone actually read them.

      There's a chance P53 doesn't work the way you think it does.

      Here's an easier to digest synopsis for those short of time:

      The Cytochrome P450 enzyme CYP1B1 [1] only occurs in cancer cells [2]. When certain phytoallexins such as reservetol and salvestrol are ingested these phytoallexins are converted by the P450 enzyme into picetannol [3], which is fatal to cancer cells but not human cells [4].

      [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CYP1B1
      [2] http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/57/14/3026.short
      [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piceatannol
      [4] http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v86/n5/abs/6600197a.html

      This is old and there are newer references now but this should at least explain how the idea works and gives you some explicit papes to go chase down.

      At this point chemo and radiation are total dead ends and should be stopped immediately.

      Also curious is Potter had convinced the British government to give this stuff to everyone, big pharma talked them out of it.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    12. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      I'd point out it works, and your team has no clue. At this point the number of cancer cures from intravenous C exceeds those cured by radiation and chemo combined[1] - which often cause more cancer than they cure.

      Enjoy your high salary while you can.

      [1] Brian Sparkes, pers. comms. 2009
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Sparkes

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    13. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      ASA controls inflammation which is often the source of mutagenesis.

      Like all NASIDS they impede the formation of E2 series prostaglandins which control inflammation, so there's a short-term/long-term component to think about.

      ASA hasn't been shown to do much here afaik, cite 'em if ya got 'em.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    14. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      Bingo. There's a huge lag in the discovery and acceptance of new ideas.

      In the 1600s Jaques Cartier sailed from France to Canada and a planned return to France in the fall was delayed and they were forced to stay on the ship in a Montreal winter (notorious for being extra cold; you always want to buy a winter coat made in Montreal, not Toronto). They of course began getting ill from scurvy and when close to death the natives were finally asked for help. One them went to look at the men, shook his head, scraped some bark off a pine tree, boiled it in tea an the next day they were all better.

      They get back to France and tell of this wonderful cure for the scourge of the seas (thought to come from "foul vapors" from the bottom of the ship) and what was the reaction of the "medical establishement" in Europe? "We have nothing to learn from savages" and the discovery of vitamin C was put back a while.

      Modern medicine is utterly brilliant at surgery - we can fix nearly anything now. But chronic disease? Check for yourself, there's been no appreciable progress in what... 50? 100 years?

      What it always comes down to in the end is a fundamental choice of therapeutic modalities, do you:
      1) create synthetic drugs to manage the symptom
      or
      2) identify the biochemical fault and correct it.

      that is, it's always better to work with the body and fix the broken bits (it's been said all non-infectious chronic disease is a nutrient deficiency of some sort) then to introduce synthetics to manage a particular symptom the additional complication being when the body sees a molecule it recognizes it knows what to do with it, but synthetics - since they're foreign to human biochemistry there are without exception side effects. In the US alone there are > 100,000 deaths every year from prescription "medicine", currently the third leading cause of death after heart and cancer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iatrogenesis

      "In the United States, figures suggest estimated deaths per year of: [1][18] [19][20]
      12,000 due to unnecessary surgery
      7,000 due to medication errors in hospitals
      20,000 due to other errors in hospitals
      80,000 due to nosocomial infections in hospitals
      106,000 due to non-error, negative effects of drugs
      Based on these figures, iatrogenesis may cause 225,000 deaths per year in the United States (excluding recognizable error). An earlier Institute of Medicine report estimated 230,000 to 284,000 iatrogenic deaths annually.[1]
      The large gap separating these estimates from annual deaths from cerebrovascular disease suggests that iatrogenic illness constitutes the third-leading cause of death in the United States; after heart disease and cancer.[1]"

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    15. Re:What is this stuff? by rs79 · · Score: 1

      The poor grow their own food. That's why. I don't have much sympathy for whites complaining in areas notorious for systematic oppression of blacks. Move if you can't take the karmic payback.

      --
      Need Mercedes parts ?
    16. Re: What is this stuff? by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      Well, technically, aspirin also contains varying levels of salicin and acetic acid from hydrolysis. Plus of course the inert ingredients to make a pill and whatever trace compounds are left after purification.

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    17. Re: What is this stuff? by gzuckier · · Score: 1

      Few years back I was chatting with a senior in a top ivy league school premed and I pointed to they gray green fuzzy mold on his orange and said "hey, penicillin" and he didn't have the faintest idea what I was talking about.

      --
      Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
    18. Re:What is this stuff? by HuguesT · · Score: 1

      Are you quite sure of what you write? Cancer was quite well known before 1900 and people were dying of it all the time. Of the top of my head, it seems queen Hatcheptsut of ancient Egypt died of cancer. Marie de Medicis died of breast cancer.

      The cure rate has changed dramatically since the 1900s. Before then there was only surgery, with mixed results. Then radiation and chemoterapy have made huge progress since the discovery of radium. The cure rate over all cancers is about 50% right now, I doubt it was that high even 50 years ago.

  37. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    not in the mass quantities of today's two and three pack a day smokers, and not with the chemicals used for processing

  38. Re:SCIENCE! by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    wood is not leaves from the "nightshade" family of plants

  39. Re:I've been wondering about something by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    you might lose 99% of all patients.

    plenty of people don't seek modern cancer treatment, ask Steve Jobs how that went for him

  40. Then go next door by ThatsNotPudding · · Score: 1

    this has never been tried on a human being and won't be until at least 2015. many cures for cancer have worked very well in animals over the past three decades

    I would think Tasmanian Devils would be a worthy candidate.

    1. Re:Then go next door by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      unfortunately, did not mean to imply works in all animals, mostly only lab rats and mice

  41. As an American with an interest in biotech... by BitwizeGHC · · Score: 1

    ... to the UNSW researchers I say, good on you, mates.

    --
    N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
  42. Re:SCIENCE! by oldhack · · Score: 1

    A Vishnu incarnation in the form of Krishna revealing Shiva's aspect as the destroyer of the world...

    Something like that.

    --
    Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
  43. Re:SCIENCE! by ppanon · · Score: 1

    Yeah! Put that in your pipe and smoke it! Oh wait...

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  44. Re:SCIENCE! by ppanon · · Score: 1

    Maybe he remembers that before cigarettes became popular there used to be these two things called pipes and snuff. Neither of them were exempt from abuse, although snuff admittedly didn't cause lung cancer, just other nasty conditions.

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  45. Re:SCIENCE! by ppanon · · Score: 1

    He doesn't have to. All he has to do is to ask you to prove its reproducible. What are you praying for now?

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  46. Re:Bacon cure. by ppanon · · Score: 1

    Except bacon, like many processed meats, contains inorganic phosphates to enhance taste and texture, and those phosphates are probably causingbowel cancer. So excuse me if I take your advice with a grain of salt, not that sodium is that good for you either.

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  47. Re:SCIENCE! by matria · · Score: 1

    Way back in 1967 I wrote a term paper for my 11th grade English class on the tobacco industry. I was able to find many references to a "lung cancer epidemic" in the mid-1900s that alarmed the medical community. For example http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,807357,00.html

    Turned out to be caused by tobacco use as pushed by the tobacco companies. Servicemen during WWII got a pack of cigarettes in their daily ration packs, generously donated by the tobacco companies. They knew even then that it was highly addictive. I grew up sucking on candy cigarettes. All the movie stars and "cool" people smoked. Only the chronic asthma and bronchitis caused by my parent's smoking, that still plagues me to this day, kept me from ever smoking myself, until I wrote that report and realized just what was going on. It started out to be a paper on the advertising industry, until I found out how much the tobacco industry was spending on advertising - as I recall for just one year, something over a million dollars in 1952, which was a lot in those days. My English teacher gave me an A+ and quit smoking...for a month.

    Anybody else remember television in the early 1950s, the big wooden box, the tiny screen, the guy in the white coat with a stethoscope around his neck showing you the graphs proving how good smoking BrandX cigarettes were for your heart?

  48. Re:SCIENCE! by iggymanz · · Score: 1

    then we need a War on Neutrons, with a neutron czar. those neutrons need to back into the closet and keep their strong-forcy interactions confined and out of public sight

  49. Re:I've been wondering about something by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    before Steve went to real doctor, he wasted time with health-quack nonsense, that's why he had to have his guts removed.

  50. Re:I've been wondering about something by rubycodez · · Score: 1

    no, slightly more than half survive having cancer (of all types)

  51. Re:SCIENCE! by ppanon · · Score: 1

    So you're not currently praying its reproducible (only proposing it as an experiment) but actually are frequently praying for Jesus to take over the situation? Good, since He presumably is more likely to listen to your more frequent and fervent prayer, I'll be happy to ignore you going forward until you can reproduce your results with the latter prayer. Cheers!

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  52. Re:SCIENCE! by ranmagirl · · Score: 1

    Not to mention that freebase nicotine being added instead of regular into cigarettes by some companies (I'm not sure which, but I recall Marlboro & L&M might have been some of them). That's possible due to science.

    This coming from science advocate - but also truth advocate.

    --
    ranma - girl?
  53. Re:SCIENCE! by ppanon · · Score: 1

    Well, I think that if Jesus actually took over the situation, which I interpret to be a second coming, presumably performing miracles left and right while bringing the kingdom of heaven to Earth, it would be pretty difficult to claim it was the result of science. But perhaps I misunderstood what you meant by the statement praying for "Jesus to take over the situation".

    --
    Laissez lire, et laissez danser; ces deux amusements ne feront jamais de mal au monde. - Voltaire
  54. What a load of BS! by TheRealLifeboy · · Score: 1

    Since 1984, Dr Bresinzky has had breakthrough treatment, yet the FDA (actually their Pharma sponsors) have been fighting him tooth and nail. Not that they have disputed that his treatment works, nor that his patients are having a much greater chance at recovery than with chemo, but rather on frivolous grounds.

    Chemo kills people.

    If they really have something going down under, they should not call it chemo. Maybe people will take note.

  55. Re:Cancer is a bazillion different things by TheRealLifeboy · · Score: 1

    Do you actually know anything about cancer???