Is Cancer Contagious?

[Guest guest]

http://www.mercola.com/2003/may/24/cancer_contagious.htm

Is Cancer Contagious?

By Holland, MD

I recently spoke with a nurse who was diagnosed, as an adult, with

leukemia. She endured the chemotherapy regimen her doctors

prescribed, only to suffer from a secondary fungal infection during

that time. The intensity and duration of the antifungal treatment

rivaled that of the chemotherapy. At any rate, she recovered from

both afflictions and went back to work.

Later, as a result of another workup -- which included a liver

biopsy -- for some returning symptoms she had, bad news was again

brought up. " Your leukemia has returned, " her oncologist told her,

and he proceeded to lay out the next line of chemotherapy drugs she

would have to take.

Given that her chances of dying were much higher now that her cancer

had returned, she opted to get a second opinion on her biopsy before

proceeding with her next round of chemotherapy. She took her tissue

sample to another hospital, and what she was told there was

absolutely stunning: " You don't have leukemia, " remarked the

pathologist, " what you have is a fungal infection! "

The scenario that her doctors figured was that her previous fungal

infection had returned -- a total possibility. But for this nurse,

more questions were raised. She thought, for example, " If they

diagnosed my fungal infection as leukemia this time, is it possible

that they were wrong the FIRST time? Was my leukemia really a fungal

infection to begin with, and was my so-called 'secondary' fungal

infection I had earlier really a full-blown manifestation of what

originally might have looked like leukemia? "

Of course, she would never get answers to these questions, for to

fully investigate thoughts like these might imply that a diagnostic

error was made on the part of either her initial oncologist or

pathologist.

Nevertheless, an intense six months later -- some of it spent in the

hospital -- of high-dose, powerful antifungals finally achieved a

cure for her fungal infection. Today, she is again back at work,

exuding more than ever with compassion for her patients. It really

struck me when she told me where she works, because in her case, her

occupation may very well relate to what she had suffered over the

past two years. It turns out that she works at a bone-marrow

transplant center, and is in daily contact with children with

leukemia.

Now, the thought of her " acquiring " something as grave as leukemia

would almost be preposterous to some. But the temptation to scratch

our heads and wonder about this is unbearable. What if she really

did have a fungal infection -- and NOT leukemia -- her first time

around? And if so, did she " catch " this from her precious little

patients?

Fungal infections not only can be extremely contagious, but they

also go hand in hand with leukemia -- every oncologist knows this.

And these infections are devastating: once a child who has become a

bone marrow transplant recipient gets a " secondary " fungal

infection, his chances of living, despite all the antifungals in the

world, are only 20%, at best.

And then the unthinkable thought arises: what if all of these

children didn't even have leukemia, but rather a fungal infection,

just as this nurse did? If doctors, in the 21st century, could

mistake a fungal infection for leukemia in this nurse, could the

same fate have fallen upon these children?

Doctors in general are not very good at diagnosing fungal infections

because their medical school training is based so heavily on the

role of bacteria and viruses in the area of infectious diseases.

Fungi have been a forgotten foe ever since the advent of

antibiotics. Once we had a drug that could kill bacteria, the

interest in and the study of fungi fell to the wayside.

Laboratories display the same difficulty in diagnosing fungal

infections: current tests for detecting the presence of fungi are

both terribly scant and sorely antiquated.

Despite these training and technical inadequacies, there have been

at least a few good reports that implicate the role of fungi in

causing leukemia.

For example, in 1999 Meinolf Karthaus, MD, watched three different

children with leukemia suddenly go into remission upon receiving a

triple antifungal drug cocktail for their " secondary " fungal

infections.(1)

Pre-dating that, Mark Bielski stated back in 1997 that leukemia,

whether acute or chronic, is intimately associated with the yeast,

Candida albicans. (2)

Finally, almost 50 years ago, Dr. J. Walter , in his textbook

of clinical mycology, said that " it has been established that

histoplasmosis and such reticuloendothelioses as leukemia, Hodgkin's

disease, lymphosarcoma, and sarcoidosis are found to be coexistent

much more frequently than is statistically justifiable on the basis

of coincidence. " (3)

Histoplasmosis is what we call an " endemic " fungal infection. It is

most commonly acquired in regions surrounding the Ohio and

Mississippi river valleys in the United States. One becomes ill by

merely inhaling the tiny fungal spores of this fungus. (For more

information on histoplasmosis and other endemic fungi, you can

visit: http://www.doctorfungus.org/). Three similar reports like

this over the span of 40 years should convince us to at least study

the role of fungi in cancers like leukemia a little more thoroughly.

The late Milton White, MD., did exactly this. He fully believed that

cancer is a " chronic, intracellular, infectious, biologically

induced spore (fungus) transformation disease. " (4) Using the proper

isolation techniques (involving saline instead of formaldehyde as a

tissue transportation medium between the operating room and the

pathology lab), he was able to find fungal spores in every sample of

cancer tissue he studied. His lifetime work has been routinely

dismissed as nothing more than an unproven postulate.

Regardless, wouldn't you expect all of this information to make

front-page headlines in every newspaper across the country, if not

the world? Instead, every one of these findings was merely a brief

mention -- only curious thoughts that one might entertain but never

take seriously.

The fact is, if leukemia and fungal infections " co-exist " so

frequently, and if an antifungal drug cocktail effectively cured at

least these three children of their leukemia, then I say we put the

brakes on right there. Is there a need to go any farther, except to

more deeply investigate the need for antifungals in treating

leukemia and not just the secondary infections that arise in the

course of chemotherapy?

In his book, The Germ that Causes Cancer (http://iknowthecause.com),

author and television host Doug Kaufmann asserts that not only

fungi, but also foods play a role in the etiology of cancer. He has

seen children become free of their documented leukemia once the

child's parents simply changed the child's diet. Kaufmann's diet is

base on the widely-published problem of mycotoxin contamination of

our grain foods.

Grains such as corn, wheat, barley, sorghum, and other foods such as

peanuts, are commonly contaminated with cancer-causing fungal

poisons, or " mycotoxins. " (5,6) One of them, called aflatoxin, just

happens to be the most carcinogenic substance on earth. If this is

indeed a problem, Kaufmann asserts, then cereal for breakfast and

soda pop for dinner may not be conducive to a cancer-free lifestyle.

A case in point: in a grain-based diet, we consume, on average, from

0.15mg to 0.5mg of aflatoxin per day. (7) Further, he states, it is

not the sugar alone that is the problem in our western diet, but the

fungal toxins that are found in the sugary grains. More than once

has Kaufmann interviewed a caller (on his health talk show) who

absolutely craved peanut butter and popcorn just prior to their

diagnosis of cancer.

Fungi are such a nuisance in carbohydrate foods in particular

because fungi need carbohydrates to thrive. Therefore, it is rarer

to see fungal contamination problems in foods like vegetables and

high-protein foods.

Kaufmann goes on further to explain how even antibiotics may play a

role in the disease process. Antibiotics destroy the normal,

protective gut bacteria, allowing intestinal yeast and fungi to grow

unchecked. These internal, gut yeast make toxins, too. This can lead

to immune suppression, symptoms of any autoimmune disease, or even

cancer. " If the onset of any symptom or disease- cancer included-

was preceded by a course of antibiotics, " he maintains, " then look

for a fungus to be at the root of your problem. "

Holland, MD

Co-author, The Fungus Link, Infectious Diabetes.

20 May 2003

MediaTrition, Inc.

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References:

1. Karthaus, M. Treatment of fungal infections led to leukemia

remissions. Sept. 28, 1999

2. Bielski: Boyd, W. Introduction to medical science. 1937. Lea &

Febiger. Philadelphia, PA.

3. , J.W. Clinical and immunological aspects of fungus

diseases. 1957. C. . Springfield, IL.

4. White, M.W. Medical Hypotheses. 1996;47,35-38

5. Mycotoxins: Risks in Plant, Animal, and Human Systems. The

Council for Agricultural Science and Technology. Task Force Report

No. 139. Jan 2003. Ames, IA.

6. Etzel, R.A. Mycotoxins. Jan 23, 2002. 387(4). Journal of the

American Medical Association

7. Cheeke, P.R. Natural toxicant in feeds, forages, and poisonous

plansts. 1998. Interstate Publishers, Inc. Danville, IL.

[Guest guest]

That is interesting Duncan. I wonder if the same thing would have

been the case if he had put the kidney cancer into the salamanders

kidney instead of its leg? Did the study also try that? I don't know

a lot about cancer, but from what I have read, I got the impression

that cancers in different organs where not the same,and did not

function nor spread etc the same way.

blessings

Shan

>

> > Posted by: " surpriseshan2@... " surpriseshan2@...

> > bestsurprise2002 Date: Thu Jun 29, 2006 5:21 pm (PDT)

> >

> > There are some interesting questions here.

>

> Perhaps the wrong question was asked in the subject line. Cancer

> is known to be not contagious; when implanted into healthy

> animals it often simply vanishes.

>

> Dr. O Becker details one such experiment in his book The

> Body Electric. He implanted frog kidney cancer into a

> salamander's leg to find out what exactly happens to the cells

> when they disappear. They redifferentiated, not into kidney cells

> but into functional muscle cells, albeit they were still frog

> cells doing a normal job in the salamander's leg. Becker could

> tell the difference between the frog and salamander cells because

> they have different size nuclei.

>

> Duncan

>

[Guest guest]

On 6/30/06, Duncan Crow <duncancrow@...> wrote:

> Perhaps the wrong question was asked in the subject line. Cancer

> is known to be not contagious; when implanted into healthy

> animals it often simply vanishes.

It must depend where or how it is implanted, or on the definition of " healthy. "

I don't think cancer is rightly called " contagious, " and after reading

the article posted, I don't see what it has to do with the subject

line or title, but in any case, in the studies I've seen testing a

certain substance's ability to protect against cancer, they inject

cancer cells into, say, mice, and watch how they metastasize. It may

be that all lab animals are below a certain threshold of health, but

it doesn't seem to be true that under all conditions the cancer will

just vanish.

For example, see:

Hubbard, et al., " Beef Tallow Increases the Potency of Conjugated

Linoleic Acid in the Reduction of Mouse Mammary Tumor Metastasis, "

Journal of Nutrition, 136 (2006) 88-93.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve & db=pubmed & dopt=Abstra\

ct & list_uids=16365064 & query_hl=17 & itool=pubmed_docsum

In this study, tumor cells were implanted in mouse mammary glands,

where they continued to grow. If they injected them into the tail

vein, they wound up in the lungs.

The study concluded that the long-chain saturated fatty acids in beef

tallow both had an independent effect suppressing tumor growth and

metastasis and enhanced the ability of the trans/cis-unsaturated fat

CLA (found in butter and beef fat) to suppress the tumor, while

linoleic acid (from vegetable oils) eliminated the ability of CLA to

suppress tumor growth and oleic acid (from olive oil) had no effect.

> Dr. O Becker details one such experiment in his book The

> Body Electric. He implanted frog kidney cancer into a

> salamander's leg to find out what exactly happens to the cells

> when they disappear. They redifferentiated, not into kidney cells

> but into functional muscle cells, albeit they were still frog

> cells doing a normal job in the salamander's leg. Becker could

> tell the difference between the frog and salamander cells because

> they have different size nuclei.

That's very interesting. As another poster wondered, I wonder what

would have happened had he injected the cancer into the blood or the

kidney. Likewise, I wonder what would have happened had he injected

it into the muscle of a frog.

If the result would have been the same, then I wonder how Becker's

animals' health differed from that of the mice in the study I cited

above.

Chris

--

The Truth About Cholesterol

Find Out What Your Doctor Isn't Telling You:

http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com

[Guest guest]

>

> Posted by: " Masterjohn " chrismasterjohn@...

> Date: Sun Jul 2, 2006 2:32 pm (PDT)

>

> It must depend where or how it is implanted, or on the definition of

> " healthy. "

Where is more important than how the cancer is implanted. In the

glands there is less oxygenation, thus cancer tends to grab and

spread although it doesn't in muscle tissue that is better served

by circulation and oxygen.

The definition, better, actual health, is sure to apply too,

inasmuch as in an unhealthy body there's less oxygen delivery to

some cells, and some areas that might normally deter cancer might

then allow it.

> I don't think cancer is rightly called " contagious, " and after reading

> the article posted, I don't see what it has to do with the subject

> line or title, but in any case, in the studies I've seen testing a

> certain substance's ability to protect against cancer, they inject

> cancer cells into, say, mice, and watch how they metastasize.

The metastasize in areas that are oxygen-deprived; I've read that

cancer occurs in poorly-oxygenated areas such as glands, duct

walls, lymph and connective tissue, and in certain parts of

organs that are under chronic assault (more than normal). Becker

in his studies implanted cancer where cancer wouldn't normally

be, in highly-oxygenated cells of muscle tissue in this instance.

> It may

> be that all lab animals are below a certain threshold of health, but

> it doesn't seem to be true that under all conditions the cancer will

> just vanish.

I agree that it wouldn't happen under all conditions.

Duncan