{"id":486,"date":"2015-01-11T15:17:00","date_gmt":"2015-01-11T15:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drmirkin.com\/2015\/01\/11\/cancer-is-not-just-a-random-disease\/"},"modified":"2023-02-24T13:56:58","modified_gmt":"2023-02-24T13:56:58","slug":"cancer-is-not-just-a-random-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/?p=486","title":{"rendered":"Cancer Is Not Just a Random Disease"},"content":{"rendered":"

A study from respected researchers at Johns Hopkins claims that two-thirds of adult cancers are caused by random DNA mutations in your cells, and far fewer cancers are caused by genetics, lifestyle or exposure to cancer-causing agents (Science<\/em>, January 2, 2015). If this is so, changing your lifestyle or limiting exposure to carcinogens would do little to prevent cancer, yet the scientific literature overwhelmingly shows that cancer susceptibility is associated with
\n\u2022 lifestyle,
\n\u2022 environmental carcinogens and
\n\u2022 genetic factors.<\/p>\n

How the Study was Done<\/strong>
\nThe Johns Hopkins researchers set out to explain why some tissues are more likely to develop cancer than others. They reviewed the scientific literature for the number of stem cell divisions of 31 different tissue types. Stem cells are basic cells that turn into specific tissues such as lung, skin, or heart muscle. Dividing cells must make copies of their DNA, and mutations in the DNA can cause uncontrolled growth that is cancer. The authors claim that the more often tissue cells divide to form new cells, the more likely they are to form mutations that increase cancer risk.<\/p>\n

Why I Disagree with Their Message<\/strong>
\nScientists have known for more than 50 years that humans produce millions of cancer cells every day. Virtually all cancer cells are searched out by a person\u2019s immunity and destroyed before they can cause cancer. Why wouldn\u2019t it be reasonable to conclude that factors in the environment impair immunity to allow the cancer cells to live, or make cancer cells more resistant to a person\u2019s immunity?<\/p>\n

The authors support their theory of random genetic mutations causing cancer by giving the example that the colon has a lifetime cancer risk of 4.8 percent that is 24 times higher than in the small intestine, where it is 0.2 percent. The scientists found that the large intestine has many more stem cells than the small intestine, and that they divide more often: 73 times a year, compared with 24 times.<\/p>\n

Yet a recent study gives a far more plausible explanation that is linked to diet, an environmental factor. This study shows that bacteria associated with colon cancer live in your colon and manufacture biofilms that they use to prevent your immunity from killing them. These biofilms are associated with increased risk for colon cancer and are not regularly found in the small intestine. We do not yet know all of the reasons why some cancer cells are destroyed by your own body and others go on to become cancers, but I think it is more reasonable to state that bacterial biofilms in the colon cause colon cancer than it is to state that the high number of random mutations in the colon cause colon cancer. The random mutation theory also does not explain why mice, which have the highest rate of cell reproduction, do not have the highest rate of cancers or why blue whales, which have the largest number of cells of any organism, have a low cancer rate.<\/p>\n

Why Cancer is More Likely to be Caused by Environmental or Genetic Factors<\/strong>
\nThe researchers only set up a mathematical model that associated rates of cancer with rates of cell division. They did not study people and they did not study environmental or genetic causes of cancers. To show that cancer is caused by random chances of gene mutation, they would have had to study how environmental and genetic factors affect gene mutations. Since they did not do this, they have to state only that their conclusions are their opinions and are not supported by adequate data on lifestyle and genetic factors. They have shown what we already know, that SOME cases of cancer are caused by random gene mutations. I believe that we will find that the majority of cases of cancer are associated with
\n\u2022 genetic cancers that run in families,
\n\u2022 unhealthful lifestyles, and
\n\u2022 exposure to factors that cause cancer,
\nand that the more of these factors a person accumulates over a lifetime, the greater the cancer risk.<\/p>\n

Many studies show that people with the same genes are subject to higher rates of cancer (and other diseases) when they leave a healthy native lifestyle behind and adopt a more hazardous one. Many studies show that some societies have fewer cancers apparently because they avoid certain carcinogens. For example, Seventh Day Adventists, who are vegetarians with no exposure to meat or other animal products over their lifetimes, have much lower rates of colon cancer than other North Americans.<\/p>\n

Some cancers, such as those in the lung and skin, are too common to be caused just by random cell mutations from their rates of stem-cell division. Smoking causes the increased rate of lung cancer and excess sunlight exposure accounts for the increased rate of skin cancers. The rate of lung cancer in smokers is very high and exposure to toxic chemicals is a potent cause of cancers.<\/p>\n

The authors did not include data on thyroid, breast or prostate cancers because they did not fit into their model. If they had, they would probably have found that these cancers are predominantly caused by genetic and environmental factors. Breast cancer is associated with genetic factors because it runs in families and many of these genetic risk factors for breast cancer are well known. Some forms of thyroid cancer run commonly in certain families. Breast cancer is also associated with taking the female hormones, estrogen and progesterone, drinking alcohol, being overweight, and so forth. Prostate cancer appears to be primarily an environmental disease since virtually 100 percent of North American men develop it by age 90, compared to two percent of rural Chinese men (Cancer Biol Med<\/em>, Jun 2012; 9(2): 128\u2013132).<\/p>\n

My Recommendations<\/strong>
\nYou can play an active role in preventing cancer by avoiding the lifestyle habits and environmental toxins that have been linked to cancers, such as:
\n\u2022 Lack of exercise
\n\u2022 Overweight
\n\u2022 Poor diet (too much red meat, sugared drinks, sugar-added foods, fried foods ; too little fruits and vegetables)
\n\u2022 Lack of vitamin D
\n\u2022 Alcohol
\n\u2022 Tobacco
\n\u2022 Excessive sun exposure
\n\u2022 Sexually transmitted diseases (infectious agents associated with cancers that can be spread through sexual contact include HPV, Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, Epstein-Barr Virus (mono), Human herpes virus 8 (HHV-8), Human T-lymphotrophic virus-1 (HTLV-1), Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCV), Simian virus 40 (SV40), Helicobacter, chlamydia and many more)
\n\u2022 Radon
\n\u2022 Asbestos
\n\u2022 Agent Orange
\n\u2022 Tetrachlorethylene cleansing fluid
\n\u2022 Arsenic
\n\u2022 Formaldehyde
\n\u2022 Air pollution
\n\u2022 Radiation including X-rays
\n\u2022 Hormone replacement therapy
\n\u2022 Drugs to suppress immunity
\nThis is just a partial list of lifestyle and environmental factors that have been linked to various types of cancers. It appears that the more of these exposures you have over a lifetime, the greater your risk for cancers.<\/p>\n

Checked 2\/24\/23<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A recent study from respected researchers at Johns Hopkins claims that two-thirds of adult cancers are caused by random DNA mutations in your cells, and far fewer cancers are caused by genetics, lifestyle or exposure to cancer-causing agents.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-morehealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=486"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/486\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drmirkin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}