All Entries Tagged With: "cancer"

Anti-nuclear scientist expects ‘about 400,000 people’ will get cancer from Fukushima crisis

Christopher Busby, a scientist and anti-nuclear activist, made a startling prediction this week: he claimed “about 400,000 people” within 200 kilometers of Japan’s Fukushima nuclear reactors will develop cancerous growths due to the radioactive fallout.

Challenged by the host as to the data he’s based these claims on, Busby said that he’d been in Berlin compiling research about the Chernobyl disaster and the human toll going out years later. He claims to have based his prediction upon historical data from that last major meltdown.

Japanese officials recently raised the severity level of the Fukushima crisis to 7, the same level of Russia’s Chernobyl disaster.

Full Story Here: Anti-nuclear scientist expects ‘about 400,000 people’ will get cancer from Fukushima crisis | Raw Replay.

Breakthrough in cancer vaccine research

Researchers at the University of Cambridge hope to revolutionise cancer therapy after discovering one of the reasons why many previous attempts to harness the immune system to treat cancerous tumours have failed.

New research, published November 4 in the journal Science, reveals that a type of stromal cell found in many cancers which expresses fibroblast activation protein alpha (FAP), plays a major role in suppressing the immune response in cancerous tumours — thereby restricting the use of vaccines and other therapies which rely on the body’s immune system to work. They have also found that if they destroy these cells in a tumour immune suppression is relieved, allowing the immune system to control the previously uncontrolled tumour.

Douglas Fearon, Sheila Joan Smith Professor of Immunology of the Department of Medicine at the University of Cambridge, said: “Finding the specific cells within the complex mixture of the cancer stroma that prevents immune killing is an important step. Further studying how these cells exert their effects may contribute to improved immunological therapies by allowing us to remove a barrier that the cancer has constructed.”

Full Story: Breakthrough in cancer vaccine research.

Americans are Dying to Eat

Despite evidence that they may cause cancer, food manufacturers continue to pour about 15 million pounds of eight synthetic dyes into the American food supply every year.

Try pronouncing disodium 6-hydroxy-5-((2-methoxy-5-methyl-4-sulfophenyl) azo)-2-naphthalene-sulfonate.

It’s not easy, right? That explains why this mouthful goes by its friendlier name, Red 40. It might sound innocent, but this ingredient and others like it are far from harmless. And they’re in our food.

For years, we at the Center for Science in the Public Interest and food-safety officials in Europe have highlighted studies linking food dyes to hyperactivity and other behavioral problems in children. The British government and the European Parliament even decided to phase out artificial dyes based on these concerns alone, but the same can’t be said for the United States. So why do food manufacturers continue to pour about 15 million pounds of eight synthetic dyes into the American food supply every year?

Full Story: OtherWords: Americans are Dying to Eat.

Cancer cells slurp up fructose, US study finds

* Study shows fructose used differently from glucose

* Findings challenge common wisdom about sugars

WASHINGTON Aug 2 (Reuters) – Pancreatic tumor cells use fructose to divide and proliferate, U.S. researchers said on Monday in a study that challenges the common wisdom that all sugars are the same.

Tumor cells fed both glucose and fructose used the two sugars in two different ways, the team at the University of California Los Angeles found.

They said their finding, published in the journal Cancer Research, may help explain other studies that have linked fructose intake with pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest cancer types.

“These findings show that cancer cells can readily metabolize fructose to increase proliferation,” Dr. Anthony Heaney of UCLA’s Jonsson Cancer Center and colleagues wrote.

Full Story: Cancer cells slurp up fructose, US study finds | Reuters.

Cold cuts could cause cancer: study

Red meat is being raked over the coals again.

Already linked with an increased risk of cardiovascular disease and certain cancers, including cancer of the pancreas, red meat was found by a team of US researchers to be a possible cause of bladder cancer, a study published in the journal Cancer said.

For those who can’t do without their bacon-cheeseburger, some good news: scientists found no associations between beef, bacon, hamburger, sausage or steak and bladder cancer.

But they did observe a “positive nonlinear association for red meat cold cuts” and bladder cancer, they said.

The culprits in the cold cuts are nitrates and nitrites which are added to meat when it is processed to preserve and enhance color and flavor.

Full Story: Cold cuts could cause cancer: study – Yahoo! News.

Top 5 Suspected Everyday Carcinogens in American Cancer Society’s Scary New Report

Some carcinogens you already know and fear: cigarettes, asbestos, smoked meat.

But what about the ones you’ve never even heard of? That’s the crux of a new report from the American Cancer Society (ACS), which rounds up 20 “suspected carcinogens” the organization would like to see studied more extensively.

Of course, that research, if it happens, will come after the chemicals, ingredients — and even lifestyle choices — are already embedded into the bedrock of our 24/7 economy.

“The objectives of this report are to identify research gaps and needs for 20 agents prioritized for review based on evidence of widespread human exposures and potential carcinogenicity in animals or humans,” Elizabeth Ward, the co-author of the report, said.

So just what are these potential cancer causers lurking in our everyday environs? Surge Desk runs down five (not so awesome) favorites.

Full Story: Top 5 Suspected Everyday Carcinogens in American Cancer Society’s Scary New Report.

New saliva test ‘can detect various cancers’

Japanese and US universities have jointly developed a medical technique that can quickly detect various cancers using a simple saliva test, researchers said on Tuesday.

Japan’s Keio University and University of California, Los Angeles, have developed the technology with which they detected high probabilities of pancreatic cancer, breast cancer and oral cancer.

The researchers analysed saliva samples of 215 people, including cancer patients, and identified 54 substances whose presence can be used to detect the disease, Keio University said in a statement released Monday.

By further analysing the substances, the test detected 99 percent of pancreatic cancer cases, 95 percent of breast cancer and 80 percent of oral cancer cases among those taking part, it said.

Full Story: New saliva test ‘can detect various cancers’ – Yahoo! News.

Scientists claim to have identified stem cells that spread cancer

Hong Kong scientists say they have identified the cancer stem cells responsible for the spread of colorectal cancer to other organs and believe the find will revolutionize treatment.

Current treatments regard all cancer cells as alike, but the Hong Kong University researchers discovered that cancers contain a small number of stem cells responsible for starting and maintaining tumors.

“It will revolutionise the approach to cancer treatment in future,” one researcher, Ronnie Poon, told the South China Morning Post.

Full Story: Scientists claim to have identified stem cells that spread cancer | Raw Story.

Crizotinib, Lung Cancer Drug, Shows Big Promise In Early Tests

It’s way too soon to declare success, but an experimental drug for lung cancer patients with a certain gene showed extraordinary promise in early testing, doctors reported at a cancer conference on Saturday.

More than 90 percent of the 82 patients in a study saw their tumors shrink after two months on the drug, Pfizer Inc.’s crizotinib, (crih-ZAH-tin-ib), researchers reported.

Doctors had expected only about 10 percent of these very sick patients to respond to the drug, according to one of the study’s leaders, Dr. Yung-Jue Bang of the Seoul National University College of Medicine in South Korea.

Full Story: Crizotinib, Lung Cancer Drug, Shows Big Promise In Early Tests.

New cancer guidelines: Exercise during and after treatment is now encouraged

Cancer patients who’ve been told to rest and avoid exercise can — and should — find ways to be physically active both during and after treatment, according to new national guidelines.

Kathryn Schmitz, PhD, MPH, an associate professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and a member of the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, will present these guidelines at an educational session at the 2010 meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, aimed at making cancer exercise rehabilitation programs as common as those offered to people who have had heart attacks or undergone cardiac surgery. (“Exercise Testing and Prescription for Cancer Survivors: Guidelines from the American College of Sports Medicine.”)

Schmitz, whose previous research reversed decades of cautionary exercise advice given to breast cancer patients with the painful arm-swelling condition lymphedema, led a 13-member American College of Sports Medicine expert panel that developed the new recommendations after reviewing and evaluating literature on the safety and efficacy of exercise training during and after cancer therapy.

“We have to get doctors past the ideas that exercise is harmful to their cancer patients. There is a still a prevailing attitude out there that patients shouldn’t push themselves during treatment, but our message — avoid inactivity — is essential,” Schmitz says. “We now have a compelling body of high quality evidence that exercise during and after treatment is safe and beneficial for these patients, even those undergoing complex procedures such as stem cell transplants. If physicians want to avoid doing harm, they need to incorporate these guidelines into their clinical practice in a systematic way.”

Full Story: New cancer guidelines: Exercise during and after treatment is now encouraged.

Man got cancer from transplanted kidney

Man died after getting a kidney transplanted from a donor with disease

A prominent organ-transplant hospital wasn’t to blame for the death of a man who became riddled with cancer after getting a kidney from a donor who unknowingly had uterine cancer, jurors found Friday.

The Queens jury found for NYU Langone Medical Center on Friday in the medical malpractice case surrounding Vincent Liew’s 2002 death, said the hospital’s lawyer, Robert Elliott. Experts have said it may be the only case of uterine cancer being transmitted by transplant, though the hospital has suggested Liew died of another form of cancer derived from the transplant.

Attorneys for Liew’s widow, Kimberly, who had sued seeking more than $3 million in damages, didn’t immediately return a call.

Full Story: Hospital wins suit after man got uterine cancer – Cancer- msnbc.com.

Study: Many Sunscreens May Be Accelerating Cancer

Almost half of the 500 most popular sunscreen products may actually increase the speed at which malignant cells develop and spread skin cancer because they contain vitamin A or its derivatives, according to an evaluation of those products released today.

AOL News also has learned through documents and interviews that the Food and Drug Administration has known of the potential danger for as long as a decade without alerting the public, which the FDA denies.

The study was released with Memorial Day weekend approaching. Store shelves throughout the country are already crammed with tubes, jars, bottles and spray cans of sunscreen.

The white goop, creams and ointments might prevent sunburn. But don’t count on them to keep the ultraviolet light from destroying your skin cells and causing tumors and lesions, according to researchers at Environmental Working Group.

Full Story: Study: Many Sunscreens May Be Accelerating Cancer – AOL News.

New drug reverses even ‘untreatable’ cancers

Cancer patients may be offered new hope in the form of a harmless virus which can reverse even apparently untreatable forms of the disease when injected into tumours.

Full Story: New drug reverses even ‘untreatable’ cancers – Telegraph.

President’s Cancer Panel: Environmentally caused cancers are ‘grossly underestimated’ and ‘needlessly devastate American lives.’

“The true burden of environmentally induced cancers has been grossly underestimated,” says the President’s Cancer Panel in a strongly reported report that urges action to reduce people’s widespread exposure to carcinogens. The panel today advised President Obama “to use the power of your office to remove the carcinogens and other toxins from our food, water, and air that needlessly increase health care costs, cripple our nation’s productivity, and devastate American lives.”

The President’s Cancer Panel on Thursday reported that “the true burden of environmentally induced cancers has been grossly underestimated” and strongly urged action to reduce people’s widespread exposure to carcinogens.

The panel advised President Obama ”to use the power of your office to remove the carcinogens and other toxins from our food, water, and air that needlessly increase health care costs, cripple our nation’s productivity, and devastate American lives.”

The 240-page report by the President’s Cancer Panel is the first to focus on environmental causes of cancer. The panel, created by an act of Congress in 1971, is charged with monitoring the multi-billion-dollar National Cancer Program and reports directly to the President every year.

Environmental exposures “do not represent a new front in the ongoing war on cancer. However, the grievous harm from this group of carcinogens has not been addressed adequately by the National Cancer Program,” the panel said in its letter to Obama that precedes the report. “The American people – even before they are born – are bombarded continually with myriad combinations of these dangerous exposures.”

Full Story: President’s Cancer Panel: Environmentally caused cancers are ‘grossly underestimated’ and ‘needlessly devastate American lives.’ — Environmental Health News.

Experts: One-Third Of Breast Cancer Is Avoidable

Up to a third of breast cancer cases in Western countries could be avoided if women ate less and exercised more, researchers at a breast cancer conference said Thursday – comments that could ignite heated discussions among victims and advocates.

While better treatments, early diagnosis and mammogram screenings have dramatically slowed the disease, experts said the focus should now shift to changing behaviors like diet and physical activity.

“What can be achieved with screening has been achieved. We can’t do much more,” Carlo La Vecchia, head of epidemiology at the University of Milan, told The Associated Press. “It’s time to move onto other things.”

La Vecchia spoke Thursday on the influence of lifestyle factors at a European breast cancer conference in Barcelona.

Full Story: Experts: One-Third Of Breast Cancer Is Avoidable.

Even The Cows Have Cancer: EPA Weighs Tougher Regulation of Toxic Coal Ash

Elisa Young says she has lost at least six neighbors to cancer in the last ten years.

“I’ve lost neighbors to lung cancer who have never smoked,” she said. “I’ve lost them to brain cancer, breast, throat, colon, multiple myeloma, pre-leukemia, arsenic poisoning. When my son, who’s in his 20s, came home to visit, he said, ‘Mom, is it normal for your mouth to taste like metal?’ We pulled over and he coughed until he got sick.”

Young has no doubt about what she believes is causing all the cancer: coal. For the past 10 years she’s lived in Meigs County, Ohio, home to four coal-fired power plants within an 11-mile radius, and has become an environmental activist.

“There isn’t a house on this road that hasn’t been touched by cancer… I had melanoma and I currently have two more precancerous conditions for breast and thyroid cancer, none of which are in my family,” said Young, 47. “My dog died of cancer, my best friend died of cancer and her dog died of lymphoma. I just gave up a dog because I couldn’t afford to take him into the vet.

Full Story: Even The Cows Have Cancer: EPA Weighs Tougher Regulation of Toxic Coal Ash.

Nanotech robots deliver gene therapy through blood

U.S. researchers have developed tiny nanoparticle robots that can travel through a patient’s blood and into tumors where they deliver a therapy that turns off an important cancer gene.

The finding, reported in the journal Nature on Sunday, offers early proof that a new treatment approach called RNA interference or RNAi might work in people.

RNA stands for ribonucleic acid — a chemical messenger that is emerging as a key player in the disease process.

Full Story: Nanotech robots deliver gene therapy through blood – Yahoo! News.

Study Reinforces Links Between Formaldehyde and Cancer

OPS:  Wonder if they’re still putting it in ice cream

Study Reinforces Links Between Formaldehyde and Cancer

A study released last week by the National Cancer Institute strengthens the link [1] between exposure to formaldehyde and several forms of cancer, including leukemia. The 30-year study, which tracked the health of nearly 25,000 men exposed to the chemical in industrial plants, is likely to impact a long-awaited Environmental Protection Agency risk assessment of formaldehyde.

Last year we reported on how FEMA trailers used by Hurricane Katrina victims [2] were contaminated by formaldehyde, causing severe respiratory ailments. At the time, FEMA defended its use of the trailers [3] by pointing to a lack of formal rules governing the chemical’s use in wood and particle board.

Now the EPA is developing those rules [4], and it will probably use its formaldehyde risk assessment to determine an appropriate safety standard.

But the risk assessment has long been sidetracked by the cancer study and the politics around it. The assessment was scheduled to come out in 2004, until Sen. James Inhofe, then chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, wrote a letter [5] (PDF) to Michael Leavitt, the EPA administrator at the time, persuading him to delay the assessment until the NCI released its study.

via Study Reinforces Links Between Formaldehyde and Cancer – ProPublica.

Israeli invention may revolutionize skin cancer diagnosis

Israeli invention may revolutionize skin cancer diagnosis

An Israeli company has developed what it believes is a breakthrough device to aid in the early detection of skin cancer.

The device, developed by Skin Cancer Scanning, is currently undergoing clinical trials at Beilinson Hospital in Petah Tikva. It offers far more precise data than the doctor’s naked eye, by using fiber-optic cables to scan for potentially malignant moles.

It was found to be 92 percent effective in identifying certain types of skin cancer – far more so than any apparatus currently available.

Skin cancer is one of the most common forms of cancer, and its incidence rate grows annually.

The disease is currently identified through a two-stage diagnosis – first, suspicious moles are examined by a physician. If the physician believes the patient is at risk, the patient undergoes a biopsy.

However, the doctor’s examination is not precise, and many patients are sent for biopsies unnecessarily.

via Israeli invention may revolutionize skin cancer diagnosis – Haaretz – Israel News.

Scientists discover genetic ‘off switch’ for series of cancers – Scotsman.com News

Scientists discover genetic ‘off switch’ for series of cancers

Scotsman.com News.

Activating a specific gene common to fruit flies, mice and humans may allow cancer to be “switched off”, researchers say.

The work has major implications for treating and curing cancers by snuffing out the root of tumour formation.

Cancers caused by obesity ‘as big a threat as climate change’ – Telegraph

Cancers caused by obesity ‘as big a threat as climate change’

Telegraph.

Cancers caused by obesity now pose a threat to mankind akin to that of climate change and must be tackled immediately, a scientist has warned.