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I have questioned many of my generation, and even older, and asked about women dying from breast cancer, and perhaps 1 or 2% say they may have known someone who had breast cancer. Lung cancer and colon cancer were more prevalent.
Before all of the preservatives and chemicals were placed in our food products, there truly were less cases of cancer.
I'm not sure how old you are, but I'd guess if you are older than 50 that people in your generation just didn't talk about it. My grandmother was embarrassed to tell people I had cancer because of the still shocking number of people who believe that cancer is caused by a character flaw - and that was in 2011! There was a great essay by Susan Sontag in the 70s called Illness as Metaphor that helped address the stigma those with cancer - especially breast cancer - faced. People are still called brave for coming out with their stories!
While there is certainly an uptick of cancer diagnoses, I think better diagnosis processes make a difference. Cancers like prostate cancer and thyroid cancer have much higher diagnosis rates than they have in the past, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are more common.
And to address the OP, I was diagnosed with stage IV lymphoma when I was 23. I first began showing symptoms when I was 18 and went to doctors for YEARS before being diagnosed. My tumors were closing off my wind pipe, squeezing my lungs, and suffocating my heart by the time I was finally diagnosed, not to mention the tumors on my spine. 50 or 60 years ago, I could have died of lung or heart failure before the cancer was diagnosed and no one would have known! Same is true of leukemia - in some acute cases, you need treatment within weeks. A death of leukemia would have been blamed on something else.
No one is really sure what causes my type of cancer. There is a correlation between a Jewish background (check), exposure to Epstein-Barr/mono (nope) and exposure to 2nd hand smoke as a child (check), but only 8000 people are diagnosed with my cancer a year in the US so clearly those risk factors are not a be all, end all. No one else in my family has had cancer except for a great aunt who developed colon cancer in her 80s and a half-great aunt who developed ovarian cancer in her 50s. To our knowledge, no one else in the family has ever had cancer of any kind - certainly not blood cancer.
I 2nd or 3rd the Iodine. It's pretty amazing stuff - and I believe iodine used to be used in flour as an anti-caking agent, up until the 80's, so we may have been getting more iodine regularly through eating any flour-based products until then.
And there are several (systemic) dietary elements that have changed in recent times (last few decades) that I also wonder about the DAILY impact of:
Hormones - used in meat products. Omega 3/6 imbalance - grass-fed beef (and chicken and eggs), for example, used to provide more omega 3's than fish - but beef are rarely grass-fed now. (And don't 'get me started' on butter vs margarine, etc.) Sodium confusion - it's viewed almost like 'poison' these days, yet, it's vital for life, a key mineral in the body, and, ie, a first thing checked when you arrive at ER, etc. Plastics residuals - (xenoestrogens) in plastic products that leach into foods (plastic containers, microwave, Starbucks cups, etc). HFCS vs sugar - though neither is 'good for us' in large quantities, I just believe sugar is metabolized better and may be a factor in weight control. (Just try to find soda or foods made with sugar vs HFCS!)
And add to all that - GMO pesticide activity - when GMO-methods are used for pesticide efforts from within plants, it doesn't 'go away' at harvest time. It may be affecting our internal flora/balances or something. (And, I believe it's what 'mysteriously' affected bee populations.)
And, like I always say, these are just the things I'm aware of!!
If interested in more info on iodine - search Dr David Brownstein or Dr Jeffrey Dach and Iodine.
I believe this as well about iodine. Most people do not get enough and even if they buy iodized salt it's not enough to fill our daily requirement and a lot of people do not buy iodized salt any more. Last winter before I started taking iodine, my bra size was a DD, but now, after taking iodine and losing 40 lbs, they have shrunk back to a B! All of that was fibrocystic tissue. It wasn't the weight loss I don't think b/c I've lost that weight before and didn't change bra cup size.
Apparently a lot of the Iodine in Iodized salt has evapourated as soon as it has left the factory.
Some put on weight when they take Iodine, I know some who went up a cup size. In one case they developed fibrocystic lumps after Iodine intake and then they went away, and in another case it was theorized that the increase in cup size was due to the body storing the toxins in the fat cells because the usual elimination pathways were over burdoned.
That is part of why they suggest sea salt, vitamin C and other minerals to assist with the detox. I think the main reason why we need more Iodine than the 135 mcg RDA is due to other halides in the environment and foods displacing the Iodine. It is said that women require more Iodine than men too.
Have you read any of the Iodine books like this one?
Last edited by QuestOfTruth; 11-16-2014 at 11:32 AM..
50 or 60 years ago, I could have died of lung or heart failure before the cancer was diagnosed and no one would have known! Same is true of leukemia - in some acute cases, you need treatment within weeks. A death of leukemia would have been blamed on something else.
Good point. Back then, there were many more cases of deaths in which cause was unknown (or undisclosed due to family preference).
Cancer do not come out of nowhere. Cancer is a damaged DNA disease where your cell DNA is damaged by variety of factors. Some people DNA is more resistance of cancer, some are not.
Was it not that prevalent, or did people not see doctors as often, therefore dying of it as it spread?
Also, research has improved tremendously, so someone who might have had symptoms may have been told "it's nothing".
Afterall, women's health was not (and still isn't in heart disease) a priority in the medical community.
I have to wander if some like their thinking the 50;s were easy living years if actually lived then when it was common to hear of friend or neighbor who they did exploratory surgery ;found cancer and was sewed backup to die basically. But to answer Op question ;life style and having screenings can in fact save your life from many cancer that now can be cured if caught early enough. I was a kid of age enough to remember in mid 50s and well remember it but then the scare of children getting Polio was the health news item. while other were just accepted as natural disease people had died form for centuries. In heart disease we know a lot about what makes it the #1 killer and now to lower it; life style especially eating habits. I sometime want what the numbers would be if we didN'T have stints or open heart surgeries AVIALBLE.
When I got Leukemia, I had no early detection warning signs. It really came out of nowhere!
I had no idea what triggered it but I believe stress did. The best reason the doctors can give me was that one cell just got "triggered" and multiplied into thousands of cancerous cells.
Was it not that prevalent, or did people not see doctors as often, therefore dying of it as it spread?
Also, research has improved tremendously, so someone who might have had symptoms may have been told "it's nothing".
Afterall, women's health was not (and still isn't in heart disease) a priority in the medical community.
You have hit the nail on the head I think. I remember years ago a professor tellling us, cancer isn't new or more common that in years past, it is just more diagnosable. (if that is a word) People used to die of illnesses that were cancer, just thought to be something else, plus we didn't live to be in our 80s and 90s. This is the same with most illnesses. I am always taken back with reports that heart disease is the number one killer of women today. Of course, we live to be so old something has to go and it happens to be our hearts in many cases.
Now to the OP, cancer, from what many of us are told does not just come from nowhere. Cells can be in our body for years, probably in all our bodies, sometimes they activate, for others they say dorment forever.
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