Why chemical and nuclear wars on cancer fail

[Taka]

Has Cancer Been Completely Misunderstood?

A Failed War On Cancer

Ever since Richard Nixon officially declared a war on cancer in 1971
through the signing of the National Cancer Act,[i] over a hundred
billion dollars of taxpayer money has been spent on research and drug
development in an attempt to eradicate the disease, with trillions
more spent by the cancer patients themselves, but with disappointing
results.

Even after four decades of waging full-scale "conventional" (surgery
and chemo) and "nuclear" (radiotherapy) war against cancer, one in
every four Americans will be diagnosed with the disease within their
lifetimes – and this number is projected to grow – unabated -- not
unlike the process of cancer itself.

Could this colossal failure reflect how profoundly misunderstood the
condition is, and misguided are our attempts to prevent and treat
it?

The Question That Must Be Answered Anew: What Is Cancer?

Perhaps we need to return back to the fundamental question of 'What Is
Cancer’? After all, until we find an accurate answer to this
question, all attempts to 'prevent’ and 'treat’ a disease we do not
understand are doomed to fail.

For the past half century, the "Mutational Theory" has provided the
prevailing explanation for the cause of cancer, where, as the story
goes, accumulated mutations within our cells lead a few susceptible
ones to "go berserk," their "insane" and "violent" behavior a result
of multiple destructive events to the intelligent code within the cell
(DNA) that normally keep them acting in a 'civilized’ manner relative
to the larger multicellular community as a whole (i.e. the body). In
this view, these rogue cells replicate incessantly and form a tumor
which spreads outward in a cancerous manner (cancer = Greek for
"crab"), in many ways simulating the characteristics of an infectious
process within the host, until the growths obstruct vital processes,
resulting in morbidity and death.

According to this theory, which was heavily influenced by the
Darwinian theory of evolution and is sometimes called "Internal
Darwinism," what drives the evolution of the healthy cells into
cancerous ones is a process very similar to natural selection, i.e.
random mutations beneficial to the survival and reproduction of
cancerous cells in a tumor are naturally selected for and conserved,
driving them towards malignancy. Damage to the DNA can occur either
through inheriting defective DNA sequences ("bad genes" in the family)
or exposures to DNA-damaging chemicals (e.g. tobacco) or radiation.

While this view has some explanative value, it can also be quite
misleading. For instance, a fundamental tenet of evolution is that
random mutations are almost always harmful, resulting in immediate
cell death. Cancer cells, however, seem to get quite 'lucky’ because
they appear to thrive on them. Rather than dying like normal cells
when faced with random mutations, they exhibit the exact opposite
response: they become immortalized, incapable of undergoing the
programmed cell death required of healthy cells.

Is randomness and chaos, then, really at the root of the
transformation of healthy cells into cancer?

Tumors, after all, express highly organized behaviors, seemingly
impossible to induce through strictly random forces such as mutation…

A collection of cancer cells (tumors), for instance, are capable of
building their own blood supply (angiogenesis), are able to defend
themselves by silencing cancer-suppression genes and activating tumor-
promoter genes, secreting corrosive enzymes to move freely throughout
the body, alter their metabolism to live in low oxygen, high sugar and
acidic environments, and know how to remove their own surface-receptor
proteins to escape detection by white blood cells. Could these
complex behaviors really be a result of random mutations? And is it
possible that random mutations could result in the formation of the
same "lucky" set of genetic properties, each and every time a new
cancer forms in a human?

Random mutations, no doubt, play a major role in the initiation and
promotion of cancer, but are not alone sufficient for a complete
explanation. One group of scientists, in fact, have offered a much
more compelling explanation. They view multiple mutations causing an
unmasking of an ancient survival program within the cell….

Cancer as An Ancient Survival Program Unmasked

A brilliant new theory, introduced by Arizona State University
scientist, Paul Davies, and Australian National University scientist,
Charles Lineweaver, sheds much needed light on the true nature of
cancer. According to Davies:

"Cancer is not a random bunch of selfish rogue cells behaving badly,
but a highly-efficient pre-programmed response to stress, honed by a
long period of evolution."

In their seminal paper, titled "Cancer tumors as Metazoa 1.0: tapping
genes of ancient ancestors," Davies and Lineweaver propose that cancer
is an evolutionary throw-back, drawing from a genetic 'tool-kit’ at
least a billion years old, and which still lies buried – normally
dormant – deep within the genome of our cells. Davies calls this
subterranean genetic layer Metazoa 1.0, and it contains pathways and
programs that were once indispensable for our ancient cellular
predecessors and their early proto-communities to survive in a
radically different environment.

Without the highly differentiated cells and specialized organs of
higher multicellular/animal life (Metazoa 2.0), cells with the
genetics of Metazoa 1.0 would have favored traits that enabled them to
survive direct contact with what was a much different and harsher (to
us) environment.

For example, 1 billion years ago atmospheric oxygen was exceptionally
low, since photosynthesis has not yet evolved to produce an abundant
supply. This means that cellular life at that time would have had to
learn to thrive in a low or no oxygen environment, which is exactly
what cancer cells do, using anaerobic glycolysis for energy instead of
oxidative phosphorylation .

Davies and Lineweaver summarize their view as follows

"The genes of cellular cooperation that evolved with multicellularity
[animal life] about a billion years ago are the same genes that
malfunction to cause cancer. We hypothesize that cancer is an
atavistic condition that occurs when genetic or epigenetic malfunction
unlocks an ancient 'toolkit' of pre-existing adaptations, re-
establishing the dominance of an earlier layer of genes that
controlled loose-knit colonies of only partially differentiated cells,
similar to tumors. The existence of such a toolkit implies that the
progress of the neoplasm [cancer] in the host organism differs
distinctively from normal Darwinian evolution."

Instead of viewing the hallmark trait of cancer, namely, incessant
proliferation, as a newly evolved trait spurned by random mutations,
it would be considered the default state of the cell, having been
developed a billion years ago when 'not dying’ would be the first
priority. Remember, this ancestral assemblage of cells would not have
had the differentiation of cell type and specialization of tissue
associated with higher animals, i.e. skin, hair, claws, etc., with
which to protect themselves against the environment.

Damage to the skin in animals, for instance, results in the rapid
death and sloughing off these 'extra’ cells, to be replaced by new
healthy ones. A still barely multicellular entity would not have this
luxury, and would entrench itself within genetic traits associated
with resilience, the ability to resist all manner of environmental
assault, and would express a highly 'selfish’ form of behavior we now
consider a fundamental property of cancer.

If cancer is an ancient survival program unmasked, this does not mean
that the "Mutation Theory" does not still hold some truth. Genetic
damage and mutations do in fact contribute to cancer, but rather than
view them as 'causing’ the complex set of behaviors associated with
cancer, they unmask an already existent set of genetic programs
[atavism].* For instance, there are over 100 oncogenes known to exist
within our DNA and are shared by a vast array of different species
including the fruit fly, indicating how ancient (at least 600 million
years old) and universal they are (found in most multicellular
organisms).

Numerous studies confirm that dinosaurs had tumors. These cancer-
promoting genes are normally suppressed by more recently evolved genes
(Metazoa 2.0), such as tumor-suppressor genes, but when enough damage
to the more recently evolved genetic overlay occurs, the system goes
into "Safe Mode" and the older genetic pathways (Metazoa 1.0) are
activated once more.

Within the horizon of this new way of thinking, cancer can no longer
be viewed as some predestined gene-time bomb setting itself off within
us, nor simply a byproduct of cumulative exposures to genotoxic
substances, alone. Rather, cancer is an ancient survival response to
an increasingly toxic environment, and an increasingly unnatural diet
and compromised immune function. These cells have learned to survive
the constant abuse, and have flipped into survival mode, which is self-
centered, hyper-proliferative (constant self-repair/replication) and
aggressive (metastatic), i.e. what does not kill you makes you
stronger

Cancer As Something Our Body Does To Survive

Cancer can no longer be viewed as something bad that happens to an
intrinsically healthy body. Rather, cancer is something the body
actively does in response to an intrinsically unhealthy cellular,
bodily and planetary environment. Instead of an expression of bodily
deviance, it may be expressive of bodily intelligence, and the
capability of our cells to survive in conditions that threaten to
destroy cells beyond the critical threshold beyond which survival is
impossible.

This perspective also sheds much needed light on the devastating
nature of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Tumors contain a broad range
of cells, many of which are intrinsically benign (will never become
malignant or cause damage to the organism) and some of which keep more
malignant populations in check.

The invasive cells are more primordial in their genetic configuration
(Metazoa 1.0) due to just how much shock/damage/poisoning they have
been made to endure during their life cycles. It is exactly these
cells, therefore, that are MOST resistant to the chemo, and less
likely to die when exposed to it. The chemotherapy and radiation,
therefore, actually kill the very cells that do not represent a
threat, and select for more invasive ones.

This explains why at first the introduction of chemotherapy/radiation
may cause tumor regression, but the small population that survives
(including cancer stem cells) technically comes back even stronger
thereafter. In the same way that antibiotics like methicillin spawned
the monster that is methicillin-resistant Staphyloccocus aeureus,
which creates a population of bacteria with highly up-regulated
multidrug resistance proteins and genes, chemotherapy and radiation
CREATE a genetically more resistant population of super-cancers, and
often is the reason why the patient dies. Sadly, in these cases the
death is blamed on the "chemoresistant" and "radioresistant" cancer
and the victim is blamed, if you will, for being killed by the very
treatment they were being told they would die much sooner without.

Cancer Is "A Symptom" And Not A "Disease."

So, instead of a monolithic "disease," it makes more sense to view
cancer as a symptom of cellular and environmental conditions gone
awry; in other words, the environment of the cell has become
inhospitable to normal cell function, and in order to survive, the
cell undergoes profound genetic changes, drawing ancient genetic
pathways which we associate with the cancerous personality
( phenotype). This "ecological" view puts the center of focus back on
the preventable and treatable causes of the "disease," rather on some
vague and out-dated concept of "defective genes" beyond our ability
influence directly.

It also explains how the "disease" process may conceal an inherent
logic, if not also healing impulse, insofar as it is an attempt of the
body to find balance and survive in inherently unbalanced and
dangerous conditions. Fundamentally, we need to shift our thinking
away from the view that cancer is something unnatural that happens to
us, to one where we see that cancer is something natural our body does
to survive unnatural conditions. Change and improve those conditions,
and you do more to change cancer than attacking it as if you were
fighting a war against an enemy.

*Additional explanation of the cancer-atavism theory

*The concept of cancer-as-atavism can be explained this way: An
atavism is an older genetic trait that is no longer used, and
therefore suppressed by newly evolved genes. An example is webbed
feet. Everyone in the womb has them, but as embryogenesis proceeds
genetic sequences kick in that cause them to disappear. This is done
through a process of 'programmed cell death,’ also known as apoptosis.
The body simply turns on the apoptosis genes in the tissue associated
with webbing between the toes, and those cells peacefully disassemble
themselves, resulting in normal web-free hands and feet. Now the
interesting thing is that cancer cells ARE cancerous because they DO
NOT DIE.

They have either forgotten how to undergo programmed cell death
(apoptosis), or, have been forced through injury (genetic damage) or
environmental pressures (epigenetic changes) to suppress the genes
that enable them to die. The cancer cells, in effect, draw from an
ancient genetic tool kit which its predecessors over a billion years
ago used to survive what was at the time a very harsh environment, and
where replicating was a much more preferred trait than dying, and
where cells had yet formed highly evolved multicellular communities
found within animals.

SOURCE: http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/has-cancer-been-completely-misunderstood