Striving4Zen

The U.S. war on cancer has been fought for almost four decades now, since it was officially launched in 1971. It may be time to admit that the effort has often targeted the wrong enemies and used the wrong weapons.

Throughout the industrial world, the war on cancer remains focused on commercially fueled efforts to develop drugs and technologies that can find and treat the disease. But this struggle essentially ignores most of the things known to cause cancer, such as tobacco, radiation, benzene, asbestos, solvents, and some drugs and hormones. Many modern cancer-causing agents, such as gasoline exhaust, pesticides and other air pollutants, are simply deemed the inevitable price of progress.

Most cancer is not born, but made. Both public health and social justice demand a greater focus on the causes of cancer, rather than treatment. But the FDA and EPA often lack the authority and resources to monitor and control tobacco smoke, asbestos, and the cancer-causing agents in food, water and everyday products. Under antiquated laws, chemical and radiation hazards are examined one at a time, if at all. Of the nearly 80,000 chemicals regularly bought and sold today, fewer than 10% have been tested for their capacity to cause cancer or do other damage.

No matter how much efforts to treat cancer may advance, the best way to reduce cancer's toll is to keep people from getting it in the first place -- something that is being largely ignored by the modern cancer-fighting enterprise.

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Labels: cancer, eating healthy, healthy living, toxic, toxins