Is Cancer Manmade? New Study Shows Cancer Was a Rarity in Ancient Civilizations

[Donnachaidh]

http://planetgreen.discovery.com/food-health/is-cancer-manmade-a-new-study-shows-a-rarity-of-cancer-in-ancient-civilizations.html

A study of ancient remains shows rare cases of cancer in mummies.

Cancer has become all too common in our modern day lives. As we bring the focus to breast cancer in this month of breast cancer awareness, we're left with a startling statistic, that one in eight women will be diagnosed with the disease. But a fascinating study just released from scientists at Manchester’s KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology and published in Nature Reviews, shows that in the age of antiquity and in ancient Egypt specifically, cancer was a rarity. The study concludes that cancer is a manmade disease, caused mostly by pollution and diet.
No Cancer in Ancient Egypt


Scientists started by studying mummies preserved from Ancient Egypt. The state of the mummified bodies would have made it easier to find tumors, scientists contended. But even still, only one case was found out of hundreds of mummies studied. That case was identified as rectal cancer in an unnamed mummy who had lived in the Dakhleh Oasis during the Ptolemaic period 1,600 to 1,800 years ago. It was identified by dehydrating the dried tissues under a microscope, according to MSNBC.

A researcher from the study Michael Zimmerman from Villanova University in Pennsylvania said this in a statement: “In an ancient society lacking surgical intervention, evidence of cancer should remain in all cases. The virtual absence of malignancies in mummies must be interpreted as indicating their rarity in antiquity, indicating that cancer causing factors are limited to societies affected by modern industrialization”.

According to the Daily Mail, the first reference made to cancer was made by the Greeks, who were also the first to discern the difference between benign and malignant tumors. This is quite astonishing considering that today cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide, accounting for roughly one in eight deaths in 2004, according to the World Health Organization. The scientists also studied literature through the ages and found few references to the disease.

MORE at the link ---

[stray cat]

1. so was survival into your 70s

[Arugula Latte]

2. I think about all the neighbors on the street on grew up on

So many, many are dead from cancer. I wonder if it was some sort of "cancer cluster" or if it's just the norm for today.

Also, yesterday a friend told me that HPV is present in almost every cancer. The Gardasil (sp?) shots are supposed to reduce your chances for many types of cancer, according to my friend's doctor. I'll have to look into that more.

[hayu_lol]

3. I would suggest that the results do not reflect...

the very short lifespans of most people that long ago. Only important individuals were preserved. The rest have long been dust.

[stopbush]

13. Exactly. The study is worthless unless it comparies mummies

from that time to today's 20-something population, and the well-off population at that.

[HopeHoops]

4. We've got a lot more cancer-catalyst factors now.

Like McFood for example. Man-made materials like fiberglass and chemicals beyond comprehension as little as 100 years ago clearly come into play. So sure, you could call it man-made. It has always existed, but it is easier to identify and more likely to be experienced now. Still, I seriously doubt that they can tell from mummies if flesh-based cancers (including breast, brain, and liver) were present. That just smells wrong.

[Another Bill C.]

5. Benzene

It's everywhere:
"How you could be exposed to benzene
"Outdoor air contains low levels of benzene from tobacco smoke, gas stations, motor vehicle exhaust, and industrial emissions.
"Indoor air generally contains levels of benzene higher than those in outdoor air. The benzene in indoor air comes from products that contain benzene such as glues, paints, furniture wax, and detergents.
"The air around hazardous waste sites or gas stations can contain higher levels of benzene than in other areas.
"Benzene leaks from underground storage tanks or from hazardous waste sites containing benzene can contaminate well water.
"People working in industries that make or use benzene may be exposed to the highest levels of it.
"A major source of benzene exposure is tobacco smoke."

http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/benzene/basics/facts.asp

[NeoGreen]

9. Don't forget the limitations of our Science...

in regards to understanding the cause(s) of cancer.

Almost all of our toxicity response data is based on single compound studies.

We cannot account for the multiple and very likely synergistic effects (negative) that all these man made compounds have on our biological systems (our bodies).

[Chulanowa]

6. As Stray Cat points out, longevity is a factor

Also?

They removed the organs from mummies-to-be. You're not going to find much by way of cancer in the jerky-and-bones left behind.

[wildbilln864]

7. well of course! nt

[librechik]

8. radioactive isotopes in fertilizer

since the 30s

[Mimosa]

10. I believe the samples -mummies- were too restricted

I'm a couple of decades past the era when I intensively studied history from ancient Rome through the Renaissance and, later, through the nineteenth century, especially from 1812 through the 1860s, the Civil War period.

I also happened to be able to draw upon medical sources, since my best friend is a medical professor. There are in Roman historian sources quite a few accounts of various cancers. More than once we'd read accounts of a prominent Roman's wife being thought to be pregnant but instead she died a death from a well-described cancerous tumor. Julius Caesar's grandfather died of possible throat cancer and was unable to speak before his death. The Romans were not averse to simple explorative autopsies.

During the Renaissance period cancers of the breast or 'matrix' (uterus) were not unknown. For instance, famed Renaissance poet Gaspara Stampa died of cancer of the matrix during her early thirties.

During accounts of the 'Reconstruction' period in the Southern United States, many people were very poor. They could not afford medical care, but many left behind diaries . Cancers of various sorts -especially breast cancer- were common, and mainly left untreated except for pain killing drugs, when available.

People in general live a bit longer today. We have better access to medical diagnoses and treatments. However, it is probable that we may have an increase in rates of cancer related to polluted water, chemicals and obesity.

[Lance_Boyle]

11. Wasn't mummifaction a rarity, reserved for the upper-upper echelons of society?

And, for that matter, wouldn't most deadly tumors be removed in the mummification process, along with the organs? Mummification is, after all, a post-mortem "surgical intervention." Remove the brain, remove the brain tumor. Same with the lungs, pancreas, etc.

Seems to me that "biomedical Egyptology" does science about as well as L. Ron Hubbard.

[Lucian]

12. Hmmm...high amounts of fluoride, benzene, fats, sugars...

in our daily lives, it's no wonder why we're dying of cancer.

The ancient people didn't have to deal with the industrial revolution.

[progressoid]

14. flouride?

:wtf:

[Name removed]

15. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[progressoid]

16. P u r i t y O f E s s e n c e Mandrake

P.O.E.

[Lucian]

17. Yeah, cuz fluoride is totally safe.

:eyes:

If you buy that, well I have a plot of land on the moon for sale...

[progressoid]

18. I'll buy that plot

as soon as you show me a direct link between flouride use and cancer.

[Pavulon]

20. News Flash. The SUN is a nuclear reactor

bombarding us with radiation.

[Lucian]

21. Tanning beds do the same.

That's why younger people get skin cancer now.

[Pavulon]

22. So do X ray machines and international flights

people get skin cancer because they stay in the sun for leisure rather than working for subsistence and croaking at 45. Link..

http://www.demog.berkeley.edu/~andrew/1918/figure2.html

[KurtNYC]

19. "man-made" ? mummies ? who did this study, Indiana Jones?

Of course the disease is not man-made -- the conditions that increase likelihood probably are, many carcinogenic agents are man-made but to ask if the disease is man-made betrays a lack of understanding of biology (or semantics).

So they studied mummies and found nothing yet the Greeks next door were already naming it and classifying malignant versus benign. And on the other end of Asia the Chinese were using treatments they developed for cancer. Tutankhamen was 19 when he died of malaria (nothing stops cancer quite like malaria). And just to contradict their own sub-head they admit that researchers FOUND CANCER IN A MUMMY.

ugh...

[Bullet1987]

23. Human diet has changed dramatically over the past century

That's why you see the increase in diseases. And no, I don't trust what they put in food.

[Lucian]

25. I don't trust what they put in food either.

That's why I buy organic.

I know my meat and milk don't have any hormones or other shit in it.

[Odin2005]

24. This is complete BULLSHIT.

[subsuelo]

26. How so? Did you read the article?

What specifically about it did you find so incredibly objectionable?

[etherealtruth]

27. "Cancer is very rare in modern societies in humans under age 30," ...

... "oncologist Dr. John Glaspy at UCLA's Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center told LiveScience. "In ancient times, people rarely lived to be much older than that. So cancer was rare. The 'sin' of modern societies is having people live to be much older."

From the article