My Malignant Melanoma

I was recently showered with increasingly offensive emails by someone who thought that turmeric can cure cancer, and that I was highly irresponsible to say on this site that it doesn't.

So I had a look to see if any new evidence had come to light since I last looked into it. No new favourable evidence, but as ever, even more hucksters plugging alternative medicine. No wonder people get taken in, if they don't understand that being on the front page of Google isn't anything to do with accuracy of content.

CRUK have a page on turmeric, which I referenced in my previous post on the subject. It says that there is some anti-cancer activity in the test-tube, but that trials showed that it is so poorly absorbed from the gut that it is useless for anything other than gut cancers. It also cautioned against internet turmeric supplements, which have been shown to contain dangerous drugs.

Pretty much everything, including paracetamol has anti-cancer effects in cell culture or lab mice. It doesn't mean a damn thing.

The ranter also insisted that if he spoke to his doctor as I suggested, that his doctor would be struck off or even jailed if he were to agree that turmeric cured cancer. There is no conspiracy to suppress the truth about cancer treatment, other than the one perpetrated by the commercially motivated snake-oil merchants. You've been had, friend.

Labels: conspiracy, curcurmin, quack, snake-oil, turmeric

Yesterday's attempt to promote turmeric as a cure for cancer on the What Now board using a mass of inconclusive, weak, and badly designed studies has been deleted by the admins, but the woman responsible is all over the internet with it today.

There were a lot of studies in the pile, but science doesn't weigh the evidence for each side in a scale, but ranks it in terms of its strength.

So what does the evidence really tell us about turmeric?

1. That the strongest of the weak evidence available for anti-cancer effects is not for turmeric itself, but for a purified component, curcurmin.

2. That the strongest of the weak evidence for anti-cancer effects is in cell culture, rather than in complete living organisms.

3.That curcurmin is hardly absorbed from food at all in humans.

4. That is is not possible to attain the levels of curcurmin in the human body which show possible anti-cancer effects in cell culture without taking at least 110g of curcurmin daily.

5. That is is presently just as as likely that curcurmin promotes some cancers as suppresses others.

Here's how Cancer Research UK weigh the evidence to date.

They DO NOT recommend using turmeric supplements. Note the warning at the end that internet turmeric supplements are contaminated with nimusulide, an unlicensed medicine which can cause liver damage. Despite this, the What Now poster promoted a document which contains links to places to buy these supplements on the internet.

The ultimate source of the misleading "evidence" was apparently Christian Wilde, (a songwriter with no scientific or medical qualifications whatever) who has made himself a long-time promoter of alternative medicine, especially turmeric.

She is now hard at work promoting him, his books and his half-baked ideas on every cancer forum she takes part in because he "validated" (read flattered) her and her "proactive" approach in which she labours under the delusion that she and her husband are making medical history.

Of course in the American medical system, you can have any treatment you want if you have the money, then convince yourself that the quack treatments did the job rather than the proven ones, as this unfortunate woman has done. The medics involved will also avoid contradicting you on these issues as they are your employees, and are commercially interested in you having as much medical treatment as possible.

She consequently really thinks that an unqualified member of the general public armed only with a directory of quack sites knows more about cancer than people who have spent their entire lives studying it.

Suggesting differently is bad because that would be "invalidating her", or "making her wrong" which means that you aren't very nice, and can safely be ignored. Thus at a stroke she is utterly inured against any form of reasoned argument.

If she could just keep her nonsense to herself it would be no-one's problem but her unfortunate husband's, but she consistently chooses to try and persuade others that these various quack cures for cancer are a good idea. More generally she tries to persuade them that a patient or carer's reading partial and misleading summaries of the research and the falsehoods on internet quack sites might allow them to make a helpful input to the treatment of cancer.

In fact such activity just leads to confusion, and in some cases to promoting to other cancer patients supplements which could cause liver damage, whilst having no proven benefit, as in this case.

Doctors may not know everything, but you'd have to be unbelievably arrogant or stupid to think they don't know more than the general public, however many quack sites they have read.

Labels: christian wilde, curcurmin, habubrat, turmeric

I have recently had a book called "Anticancer-a new way of life" by a French psychiatrist (David Servan-Schreiber) brought to my attention.

Whilst the author makes many helpful (if obvious) suggestions in line with scientific knowledge, he mixes in with them liberal quantities of reasonable-sounding nonsense.

Of course as a head-shrinker he is no more qualified than a member of the public to write a book on cancer prevention or cure. He makes this obvious in being taken in by alternative medicine propaganda which a "real" doctor would presumably have spotted.

Particularly insidious is the idea that things which might be associated with reducing the risk of occurrence of cancer might also affect the course of disease once you have it. This does not follow.

So let's have a look at a few of the claims he makes:

1. Sugar feeds cancer preferentially

Whilst this may sound plausible, it is unsupported by any scrap of scientific evidence. Source

2. Stress feeds cancer

Whilst plausible for many years, recent detailed research shows this to be false. Source

3. "Environmental toxins" feed cancer

In the sense used in the book, this is without scientific basis, and is actually informed by alternative medicine propaganda- here is a helpful article about this area of misinformation.

4. Genetics do not have an effect on cancer

This is possibly the most ridiculous assertion in the book. Some cancers are solely genetic in origin, most occur as an interplay of genetic and environmental factors. Source

5. Psychological wounds/Hopelessness/Mental attitude feeds cancer

There is no scientific evidence to support this belief, though it is sometimes held by medical professionals on the basis of their own partial recollection of cases.

The latest study showed no association between mental attitude and progression of cancer.

6. There are anticancer foods:

There are associations between eating certain foods and increased/decreased risk of getting certain cancers (not all cancers, note). Source

There are however no known associations between eating certain foods and survival once you already have cancer.

He recommends a number of specific foods:

a. Turmeric

Turmeric does indeed show some interesting effects. Unfortunately the dose required to obtain them in a human being is 110g per day of turmeric powder! Source

b. GreenTea

A recent study of 26,000 Japanese has shown there to be no beneficial effect on stomach cancer from green tea. Another recent Japanese study of 41,400 people showed no protection against lung cancer.

Note that this means that the previous lab scale work which showed promise for green tea is meaningless.

c. Berries

Bilberries have shown some promise in the lab against cancer cells. Source

However, any suggestion that they have an effect on existing cancer in the human body is highly premature.

d. Cabbage family vegetables

There is limited evidence for this, but strangely, the research only provides evidence for a possible protective effect in men. Source

e. Onion family vegetables

It has not been demonstrated to usual scientific standards that these vegetables reduce the risk of cancer.

There is no evidence to support the idea that they affect the progress of existing cancer.

There is however some evidence to support the assertion that consumption of these vegetables is associated with lower levels of cancer, at least in Europe. Source

The evidence for any role for garlic in cancer prevention is weak. Source

8. You can deliberately and helpfully stimulate your own immune system to prevent and eliminate cancer

There is no evidence for this whatever, and it is a cornerstone of a number of brands of quackery. Source

9. Organic food is better for you

There is no evidence for this whatever. Source

10. Meat causes cancer

There is sufficient evidence to associate red meat with bowel cancer. There is no evidence to suggest that any other link exists between meat and cancer. Source

Of course, it is not for me or anyone else anyone else to prove the author wrong. In science, it is his job to prove his ideas right. He has failed to do so.

He has not really even tried, but has just cherry-picked some attractive ideas with little supporting evidence, and lashed them together into a crock of poor quality pop medicine. A crock of something, certainly.

Labels: Alternative, Anti, Cancer, Clinical, curcurmin, Diet, genetic, Green Tea, immune system, Malignant, meat, Medicine, Melanoma, organic, psychological, stress, sugar, Trial, turmeric, vegetarian