Yeah, I looked at the NeuroLogica blog. And, it makes a point that cancer occurs more frequently among the elderly and thus less like to be found among ancient Egyptians, whose life expectancy seldom exceeded 50 years.
But, the problem about having no soft tissue to study in the remains of ancient people overlooks that the fact that late-stage cancer spreads to other tissues including bones. Cancer of the soft tissues of the prostrate, breast and thyroid, for example, often spread to bone. And, even leukemia, cancer of the blood, causes pathological changes of bone tissue.
And, A.R. David and M.R. Zimmerman didn’t say that cancer didn’t exist among ancient peoples, but the “striking rarity of malignancies in ancient physical remains might indicate that cancer was rare in antiquity.” (“Cancer: an old disease, a new disease or something in between?” Nat Rev Cancer. 2010;10(10):728-33)
That cancer is a “rarity” among ancient remains seems to be a ubiquitous comment among other investigators doing similar research on human remains at ancient sites in other parts of the world. (e.g. L. H. Luna, C.M. Aranda et al., A case of multiple metastasis in Late Holocene hunter-gatherers from the Argentine Pampean region, Internat’l J Osteoarchaeology 2008; 18(5): 492‚Äì506; M.O. Smith, A probable case of metastatic carcinoma from the late prehistoric eastern Tennessee River Valley, 2002; 12(4): 235‚Äì247)
And, the above Daily Mail report says there has been only one reported cancer case discovered among Neanderthal remains.
Nature (2003)reported on a study of cancer among dinosaurs: “Dinosaurs got cancer: Bone scans reveal tumours only in duck-billed species.” The researchers of this investigation scanned 10,000 dinosaur vertebrae from more than 700 museum specimens and “only one group – the hadrosaurs, or ‘duck-billed dinosaurs’ – suffered from cancer.” The researchers weren’t sure why only this group had the disease, but they thought it perhaps it was due to their diet of conifers, which are high in carcinogenic chemicals.
Although an ancient (3000-1500 BC) Egyptian papyrus describes breast cancer and Hippocrates noted the difference between benign and malignant tumors, people really got interested in cancer in the 1700s, as the above article points out (scrotal cancer among chimney sweeps in 1775; nasal cancer among snuff users in 1761). We may ask, was this because of the increasing incidence of the disease? It was in the 1700s that physician John Hunter (1728–1793) suggested that some cancers might be cured by surgery. Also, at about the same time, the first cancer hospital was opened in Reims, France, where people thought the disease was contagious.
David and Zimmerman say their research “poses questions about the role of carcinogenic environmental factors in modern societies.”
But, if you want the researcher who for decades has consistently presented this argument, and who has been consistently ignored (at least until quite recently) by the medical establishment seek Dr. Samuel Epstein, professor emeritus of environmental medicine at the U of Ill. School of Public Health, and chair of the “Cancer Prevention Coalition.” You might want to read “Cancer: It’s a Growth Industry” where David Ross interviews Epstein (Z magazine, October 2003).
In just the recent decades, Epstein says, the incidence (not the mortality) of brain cancer has gone up about 80 or 90%. Breast cancer, up about 60 or 65%. Testicular cancer, up an incredible 300%. The incidence of some childhood cancers, up as high as 40 to 50%. These are not exaggerations. Although the mortality rates of many cancers have gone down because of new treatment techniques, the incidences of some (not all) cancer diseases have gone up.
When asked, “Can genetics be the possible reason for this major increase in cancer?”
Epstein replies, “Not at all. There’s no chance whatsoever that the genetics of human populations has changed in the last 40-50 years. It takes tens of thousands of years for genetic effects in the general population to change.”
The suspicion that cancer is an “industrial disease” is a dark undercurrent flowing against our positivist sense of modern science. It’s not the only one…
If you look closely at the research, it’s pretty specious. Check out the skeptic’s reading over at NeuroLogica: http://theness.com/neurologicablog/?p=2402
Yeah, I looked at the NeuroLogica blog. And, it makes a point that cancer occurs more frequently among the elderly and thus less like to be found among ancient Egyptians, whose life expectancy seldom exceeded 50 years.
But, the problem about having no soft tissue to study in the remains of ancient people overlooks that the fact that late-stage cancer spreads to other tissues including bones. Cancer of the soft tissues of the prostrate, breast and thyroid, for example, often spread to bone. And, even leukemia, cancer of the blood, causes pathological changes of bone tissue.
And, A.R. David and M.R. Zimmerman didn’t say that cancer didn’t exist among ancient peoples, but the “striking rarity of malignancies in ancient physical remains might indicate that cancer was rare in antiquity.” (“Cancer: an old disease, a new disease or something in between?” Nat Rev Cancer. 2010;10(10):728-33)
That cancer is a “rarity” among ancient remains seems to be a ubiquitous comment among other investigators doing similar research on human remains at ancient sites in other parts of the world. (e.g. L. H. Luna, C.M. Aranda et al., A case of multiple metastasis in Late Holocene hunter-gatherers from the Argentine Pampean region, Internat’l J Osteoarchaeology 2008; 18(5): 492‚Äì506; M.O. Smith, A probable case of metastatic carcinoma from the late prehistoric eastern Tennessee River Valley, 2002; 12(4): 235‚Äì247)
And, the above Daily Mail report says there has been only one reported cancer case discovered among Neanderthal remains.
Nature (2003)reported on a study of cancer among dinosaurs: “Dinosaurs got cancer: Bone scans reveal tumours only in duck-billed species.” The researchers of this investigation scanned 10,000 dinosaur vertebrae from more than 700 museum specimens and “only one group – the hadrosaurs, or ‘duck-billed dinosaurs’ – suffered from cancer.” The researchers weren’t sure why only this group had the disease, but they thought it perhaps it was due to their diet of conifers, which are high in carcinogenic chemicals.
Although an ancient (3000-1500 BC) Egyptian papyrus describes breast cancer and Hippocrates noted the difference between benign and malignant tumors, people really got interested in cancer in the 1700s, as the above article points out (scrotal cancer among chimney sweeps in 1775; nasal cancer among snuff users in 1761). We may ask, was this because of the increasing incidence of the disease? It was in the 1700s that physician John Hunter (1728–1793) suggested that some cancers might be cured by surgery. Also, at about the same time, the first cancer hospital was opened in Reims, France, where people thought the disease was contagious.
David and Zimmerman say their research “poses questions about the role of carcinogenic environmental factors in modern societies.”
But, if you want the researcher who for decades has consistently presented this argument, and who has been consistently ignored (at least until quite recently) by the medical establishment seek Dr. Samuel Epstein, professor emeritus of environmental medicine at the U of Ill. School of Public Health, and chair of the “Cancer Prevention Coalition.” You might want to read “Cancer: It’s a Growth Industry” where David Ross interviews Epstein (Z magazine, October 2003).
In just the recent decades, Epstein says, the incidence (not the mortality) of brain cancer has gone up about 80 or 90%. Breast cancer, up about 60 or 65%. Testicular cancer, up an incredible 300%. The incidence of some childhood cancers, up as high as 40 to 50%. These are not exaggerations. Although the mortality rates of many cancers have gone down because of new treatment techniques, the incidences of some (not all) cancer diseases have gone up.
When asked, “Can genetics be the possible reason for this major increase in cancer?”
Epstein replies, “Not at all. There’s no chance whatsoever that the genetics of human populations has changed in the last 40-50 years. It takes tens of thousands of years for genetic effects in the general population to change.”
The suspicion that cancer is an “industrial disease” is a dark undercurrent flowing against our positivist sense of modern science. It’s not the only one…