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Correspondence: Letter to the Editor Re: Cancer Research
Letter to the Editor, and draft, publication unknown, circa 1957.
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Editor: Re. cancer research.
Since statistics (Cancer Research and Hospital Foundation, New York; Cancer Commission, California Medical Association, San Francisco) show that one out of every four American have or will have cancer in 1957, and the five-year survival rate for all cancers, combined, is only 30.8 per cent, isn’t it about time some consideration is given to prevention of the dread disease, as well as cure?
It is of vital concern to the forty-odd millions of us who already have been or will be stricken with cancer within the year to know the truth about diet and cancer. The study of food additives and contaminants as possible cancer starters, as recommended by the students of the disease attending the world symposium held on food and cancer, held in Rome, Italy, in August, 1956, is not enough. To-day’s methods of growing, refining and processing our foods have deprived us of many essential nutrients as vitamins, bioflavonoids, chlorophyll, minerals, trace elements, catalysts, etc.–the LACK of any one or more of which could give rise to many seemingly unrelated ills. We KNOW that the LACK of vitamin B causes beriberi; vitamin C–scurvy; vitamin D–rickets; iron–anemia; iodine–goiter, to mention a few. While known food deficiencies are restored, in part, by additives, pills and other concoctions, we know little about the “LITTLE THINGS” Nature put in our foodstuffs, for a purpose, no doubt, and less, perhaps, of how they should be “juggled” in present-day diets.
The LACK of some essential food nutrient as a possible cancer starter has never been considered in cancer research, to my knowledge, though a study of the chemistry of malignant growths some seven or eight years ago revealed a lower than normal concentration of copper and zinc, it was reported. Neither have I seen mention of the extensive studies of Sir Robert McCarrison, director of nutrition research in Coonoor, India, 1927-? In large groups of Indians he observed physical states ranging from near-perfection–superb physique, vigor, longevity, freedom from disease in general and cancer in particular–to lethargy and every disease known to man. Feeding the same diets the various groups of people ate to thousands of white rats in his Coonoor laboratory, he obtained identical results corresponding to the state of health or disease, including cancer, observed in the people. The diet of the vigorous, healthy cancer-free group (25,000) consisted of unrefined, unadulterated (no additives, contaminants, growth accelerators, etc.) home-grown foods; and so are the diet and people to this day. Likewise, it is said, the incidence of cancer varies in our own country from practically none in certain areas in our southern states where nature-made, home-grown foods are still in vogue, to very high incidences in other sections where the people subsist almost entirely on synthetically fertilized, sprayed, quick-grown, refined and processed foods. Is this a fact or fiction? The public has a right to know.
Very truly yours,
Martha R. Jones, Ph.D.
Formerly,
Fellow and assistant, Department of Physiological Chemistry, Yale University; Research Associate, Dept. Pediatrics, University of California Medical School; Research Associate, The Queen’s Hospital, Honolulu, Hawaii; Originator and director, Ewa Plantation Health Project, Oahu, Hawaii.
Cancer Research
Since alleged statistics (Cancer Research and Hospital Foundation, New York, Cancer Commission, California Medical Association, San Francisco) show that one in every four Americans have or will have cancer in 1957, and the five-year survival rate for all cancer cases is 30.8 per cent, isn’t it time serious consideration be given to the prevention of the dread disease, as well as cure?
It is a vital concern to the forty-odd millions of us who already have been, or will be stricken with the disease within the year, to know the truth about food and cancer. The study of food additives and contaminants as possible carcinogens as recommended by the cancer specialists attending the world symposium on food and cancer held in Rome in August, 1956 (Saturday Review, October 6, 1956), is not enough. A “clean bill of health” was given to all foods commonly used today, as far as initiating malignant growth is concerned, but no mention was made of the possible deleterious effects of the loss of many “LITTLE THINGS”–vitamins, bioflavonoids, amino acids, minerals, trace elements, catalysts, etc.–occasioned by modern methods of growing, refining and processing our foods–notwithstanding the attempted replacement of known deficiencies with man-made additives, pills and other concoctions. Is it not possible that the LACK, or disturbance in the relationship or interdependence of one or more essential nutrients could create a nutritional imbalance–a “HIDDEN HUNGER” of sorts, that initiates or provokes the development and growth of cancer? A lower than normal concentration of copper and zinc in malignant growths as reported (Pathogenesis of Cancer, J. E. Gregory, M.D.) lends credence to such a concept.
Highly significant, I believe, are the extensive studies reported by Sir Robert McCarrison, M.D., surgeon in the British Medical Service in India, 1904-1911, and later (1927-?) director of nutrition research at Coonoor (British Medical Journal, June 6, 1931). Dr. McCarrison observed strikingly different physical states among the Indian groups under his supervision. These varied from near-perfect physique, great vigor and strength, longevity and freedom from disease in general, and CANCER, in particular, to lethargy and practically every disease known to man. Agricultural methods and diets of the various groups differed, also. The healthy, cancer-free people ate all that was edible of both animals and chickens that grew normally without growth stimulants and nature-made foods grown in soil so complete that they, too, needed no synthetic fertilizers or disease-insect sprays.
On becoming director of nutrition research at Coonoor, Dr. McCarrison fed the diets of certain of the groups of people he had served and studied to some thousands of white rats maintained under identical living conditions. Duplicated in the rats were the same physical states and diseases he had observed in the people. The diet of the stock rats was based on that of the healthy, cancer-free people, and the rats, like the people, maintained their immunity to disease, though living in proximity to it. Reported Dr. McCarrison: “There has been no case of illness in this universe (rats); no death in adult stock and no infant mortality.” In 2,243 autopsies performed on imperfectly-fed rats he found diseases of the eye, ear, nose, sinuses, upper respiratory passages, lungs, heart, gastro-intestinal tract, skin, bones and teeth; reproductive, circulatory, nervous, endocrine systems; ulcers and CANCER. Said he: “Food deficiencies, as I pointed out many years ago, derange both the normal production of hormones and the functional perfection of sympathetic nervous control. Especially, do I direct attention to the effect of food deficiencies on the digestive organs and those endocrine organs concerned in the regulation of metabolic processes. These effects provide the pathological basis for attaching to food a prominent ideological significance in regard to that great mass of ill-defined gastro-intestinal disorders and vague ill health which throngs clinics at the present day, and concerning which we have hitherto known little or nothing.” Still resisting modernization, the long- lived, vigorous, happy, healthy, cancer-free people described by Dr. McCarrison remain so to this day, according to a communication from the San Francisco Consul General of Pakistan.
Likewise, it is said, the incidence of cancer (tooth decay, also) very greatly in our own country from practically none in the “deep” South where nature-made, home-grown foods are still in vogue, to high incidences in other areas where people subsist largely on synthetically fertilized, sprayed, quick-grown (both plant and animal), refined and processed foods. The loss of vitality, health, teeth and life of our own American Indians and Polynesians on the abandonment of their native foods in favor of the American-style diet, is well known. That the restoration of native foods to the diet could greatly improve the health and teeth of plantation children in Hawaii was dramatically demonstrated by the writer and associates on several hundred babies and pre-school children, 1929-1936 (H. S. P. A. Research Health Project, Bulletin No. 1, 1933). Pneumonia, previously the principal cause of death, became non-existent. Sickly babies became healthy huskies. A towering infant death rate tobogganed to zero.
Regional studies of the incidence of cancer in relation to diet could, perhaps, provide the “key” to the solution of many, if not all, of today’s baffling disease problems of nutritional origin, including CANCER. Wouldn’t such studies be worth a try?
Martha R. Jones, Ph.D.
Formerly,
Fellow and assistant, Department of Physiological Chemistry, Yale University; Research Associate, Department of Pediatrics, University of California Medical School; Research Associate, The Queen’s Hospital, Honolulu, Hawaii; Originator and director, H. S. P. A. Research Health Project, Ewa Plantation, Hawaii.