Breast Cancer is Stealing our Best and Brightest

Just this past week the terrifying scourge of breast cancer took two of our best and brightest women. Unfortunately, this is not rare.

Both so very young.

One was Angelina Jolie’s mother, just 56 years of age. The second was the famously insightful reporter, Molly Ivins, whose syndicated column was read by millions every week. Molly Ivins was a gem. In a world where women’s voices are still rare, her’s could not be ignored.

She wasn’t just good at what she did, she was great. I didn’t always agree with her, but I always read her. She had a unique way of seeing the world and putting it into words that made a Molly Ivins column totally recognizable and often unforgettable. She was passionate and inspirational, and now that passion and inspiration is gone. Stolen by breast cancer. Another one lost. When will this end?   

According to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), things are not getting any better. Death rates from cancer in this country are down, albeit just barely. In 2007, NCI predicts 178,480 women and 2,030 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer; 40,460 women and 450 men will die of it. Molly Ivins was one of the 41,000 we lost.

It may be better, but it is hardly good enough. It is an epidemic, a war just like Iraq, spiraling out of control by the second.

One of my patients had a double mastectomy last week against my passionate urging not to, and is now embarking on debilitating and crippling radiation treatment. The first reports from the pathologist are grim.

Thirty-five years ago, 75 percent of all women diagnosed with breast cancer survived for five years; today, nearly 90 percent do. That’s because of both earlier detection and improved treatment. But the number of women who are having regular mammograms is actually going down, not up.

According to the latest data from the American Cancer Society, the percentage of women 40 and older who reported having a mammogram in the past two years was 76.4 percent in 2000, but had dropped to 74.6 percent by 2005.

“Although a 1.8 percent decline in mammography screening from 2000 to 2005 may not seem like much, it means that in 2005 about 1.5 million fewer women took advantage of getting this proven lifesaving test,” says Len Lichtenfeld, MD, deputy chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society.

This means thousands of women with cancer don’t know it and aren’t being treated.

A friend’s wife had a mammogram religiously every 12 months. But now her cancer is Stage III. How can that be? It is. Mammograms are notoriously inaccurate and they radiate the body, which in turn is a cancer-triggering factor.

Five-year survival rates have improved, but five years isn’t enough when you’re in your 50s or 60s, let alone your 30s and 40s, when breast cancer tends to be most aggressive. The five-year survival rate for Stage III breast cancer ranges from 54-67 percent. The overall 15-year survival rate for all breast cancer is only 57 percent.

As of August 2005, the American Cancer Society was funding 188 research projects related to breast cancer, totaling more than $103.8 million. Most of these projects, they say, extend over several years. That is supposed to sound like a lot. To me, it doesn’t.

If I had just 1/100th of that amount, I could come up with the answer! (In fact, I have part of the answer already, listed later in this newsletter.)

We talk about a war on cancer, but the truth is we’re not really fighting one. The war we’re fighting is a losing one in Iraq, not a winning one against cancer. How wrong can we be? The loss of 3,000 Americans over the duration of the war in Iraq is unacceptable, but losing 41,000 every year to breast cancer is beyond intolerable.

President Bush, whom Molly memorably called “Shrub,” was gracious about her death. But I can’t help but believe he could have prevented it, that we could have, if only we got our priorities straight. How long will it take, how many more will we lose before we do? Enough is enough.

Just a few weeks ago, writing in the face of death, Molly urged every American to do their part to stop the war in Iraq.

“We are the people who run this country. We are the deciders. And every single day, every single one of us needs to step outside and take some action to help stop this war. We need people in the streets, banging pots and pans and demanding, ‘Stop it, now!'”

We need to start a new war – a war against the cancers that take our best from us. And this one, We Can Win!

Urgent Things That Every Woman Needs To Do:

  • Read The No-Dairy Breast Cancer Prevention Program book by Dr Jane Plant. Every woman in America needs to read this book and follow the advice of a 4-time breast cancer survivor.  Buy it from your local bookstore or get a used copy from Amazon.com for pennies.
  • Eliminate all red meat, pork, supermarket chicken and sugar.  These are prime cancer-fueling foods.
  • No more milk, cheese, or ice cream or butter. Switch to organic soy or walnut milk or cashew milk. Every breast cancer patient we have helped has been a life-long consumer of milk and cheese.
  • Eat raw foods as much as possible. Salads, lightly steamed veggies and steamed brown rice.
  • Get Barlean’s brand Flaxseed Oil and have two tablespoons daily without fail. Also use this with lemon juice for the healthiest salad dressing in the world. Flax fights cancer.
Breast Cancer-Proof your body with my 6-part Program:
  • Indole 3 Carbinol 13 – Stops Breast Cancer cells from multiplying through a unique, partly unknown pathway.  More effective than Tamoxifen.
  • Super Curcumin C3 Compound – Arrests (freezes hyper-proliferating cells) cancer from multiplying.
  • AKG Shark Liver Oil Gelcaps – Shark’s Don’t Get Cancer. This Is Why.
  • Broccoli Concentrate – Now being hailed as possibly the number one anti-cancer food on the planet.
  • Immune Support MG3-C Mushroom Complex – The blockbuster Chinese anti-cancer formula.
  • Liquid/Herbal Ultra High Calcium Tonic – High Calcium intake stops Breast Cancer.
  • Have a bowl of my Miracle Potassium Broth Soup every single day. It costs pennies each day to make and could save your life. Why? Cancer hates Potassium. 
  • Keep your body as Alkaline as possible. Cancer breeds in an acidic condition but is stifled by an Alkaline condition. Fresh, raw fruits and veggies will do the trick. And no acid-forming animal protein or fast food. And NO MILK OR CHEESE!
  • Have a full “female check-up” every six months, without fail. Cancer can start in a split-second and spread like wildfire.
  • Forward this email to Mrs. Laura Bush at: first.lady@whitehouse.gov . If her husband won’t do anything, maybe she will.
May God be with you always.

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