Have you ever noticed that there is a huge mismatch between the skills, talents, abilities and sheer numbers of the professional scaremongers among us and the topics we most need to be alarmed about?
That is, the scariest threats to human health and safety receive almost no attention from those who are most adept at frightening ordinary citizens, while threats that are trivial and maybe even nonexistent are the subject of an inordinate amount of ballyhoo.
What brings all this to mind is a President’s Cancer Panel report that reads like it was plagiarized from the junk science screeds published by anti-chemical activist groups. (It’s all the more surprising because the two-member panel was appointed by George W. Bush!)
By the way, if you enjoy a good scary movie but are turned off by excessive bloodletting, I recommend the original Steve McQueen version of “The Blob.”
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1G8hI7aSSc
Beware of the Blob
Although the cancer report doesn’t even come close to matching the drama of a good horror flick, it’s every bit as mythical.
Scary Scenario. For starters, the report tells us there are “about 80,000 chemicals in commercial use in the United States,” [How could 80,000 of anything be safe?] but federal regulators have assessed only about 200 for safety. After noting a “proliferation of chemicals in water, foods, air and household products,” the report doesn’t actually say that any of them have caused cancer in humans. [But if you’re a cautious person how could you doubt it?] After noting that “recent studies have found industrial chemicals in umbilical-cord blood, which supplies nutrients to fetuses,” the report goes on to say “babies are born ‘pre-polluted.’” [Only the heartless would point out that “pre-polluted” is hardly a scientific term.]
A Dose of Reality. Truth is that the issues raised in this report have been studied again and again. As Elizabeth Whelan told the L.A. Times the other day, “the so-called environmental trace levels of chemicals play no role whatsoever in the etiology of cancer.” That’s why the report has been panned by the American Cancer Society and responsible scientists everywhere.
The ABC’s of Chemical Risks. As explained by Professor Bruce Ames and Dr. Lois Swirsky Gold in an NCPA report published more than a decade ago:
- The ability to find chemicals in parts per billion means we can find tiny traces of chemicals almost everywhere — in a glass of water or an umbilical cord, for example — but there has never been any evidence that chemicals in tiny amounts cause cancer.
- The labeling of a chemical as a “carcinogen” is usually based on studies in which rodents are given massive doses of it (just under the dose that would kill the rodents outright).
- About one out of every two chemicals tested in this way — whether natural or manmade — has been shown to cause cancer in at least half of the rodents tested.
- Even though only a few hundred chemicals have been tested, it seems likely that about one-half of all chemicals will produce cancer in rodents if administered in such massive amounts.
- The reason why only a couple of hundred chemicals have ever been tested in this way is that it finally dawned on the scientists that the high-dosage bombardment, rather than the chemical itself, was probably producing the cancer and that no useful information was being gleaned anyway. (And — dare I say it — maybe they felt a tinge of sympathy for the mice!)
- It is impossible to avoid exposure to small quantities of carcinogens. There is no diet that lacks carcinogens. As previously reported at this blog, a typical Thanksgiving dinner is teeming with dozens of natural carcinogens.
What Really Causes Cancer. Smoking, poor nutrition, obesity and lack of exercise are all greater contributors to cancer than chemicals:
The cancer society estimates that about 6 percent of all cancers in the United States — 34,000 cases a year — are related to environmental causes (4 percent from occupational exposures, 2 percent from the community or other settings).
I’ll write more about the Bruce Ames theory of cancer in a future Alert.
The Blob: Perfect metaphor for ObamaCare.
Great video pairing.
Great post. Hard to believe those were Bush appointees. I doubt if the report would have been any worse if Obama had appinted the panel.
Table salt? Forget it. It’s a chemical. Sugar? Same thing. Water? Still another chemical. Honey is just a mixture of chemicals, so don’t eat it. Actually, so is hamburger, carrots, rice, …you name it. Don’t eat them. Clothing, hardwood floors, newspapers, pet cats and stray dogs, and all people are nothing but collections of chemicals. Avoid them. Whatever you do, don’t have anything to do with chemicals.
I’m still a little sad that poor nutrition is such an indicator in cancer. It seems easier to avoid chemicals than to avoid chili cheese fries. (Or at least in the quantities in which I consume them!)
Perfect title for the Health Alert.
From Sermo:
Nurses don’t want to go to NP’s themselves!!
Recently I overheard several interesting coversations among nurses at work. I work in academic settings as a med school faculty. We also have a NP school in the area that rotate their students near us.
I overheard one of our ICU RN’s on the phone with her doctor’s office. She said, “make sure I am scheduled with the MD, not one of his nurse practitioners or PA’s.” And after she hung up, she turned around and told other nurses that she couldn’t believe the nerve of the doctor’s office, trying to set her up with one of the NP’s instead of the “real doctor,” when they knew that she is a nurse herself.
And I’ve caught very similar discussions among the nursing staff throughout the hospital. I find that nurses by and large do not want to be seen by NP’s or PA’s. They want to be seen by the MD/DO’s.
Go figure.
I don’t mean to sidetrack such an important topic, but I am quite taken by THE BLOB theme song in the video. How did I miss this all these years?!? How did Steve McQueen ever salvage a career after this?!?
Beware of The Blob, it creeps
And leaps and glides and slides
Across the floor
Right through the door
And all around the wall
A splotch, a blotch
Be careful of The Blob
Thanks attila for giving us the lyrics. We can sing along.
Great post. Much needed. Very timely.
The “Blob” with Steve McQueen is a classic!!
For some reason, it was always on around 3 or 4 am in my early years of residency.
My analysis of the movie is that the audience becomes a blob watching it over and over….always wondering why the victims didnt just run away rather than stand there an be consumed.
Kind of like doctors in today’s health care debate. Stop screaming and do something.
What a great flick…
Chemicals derived from petroleum mimick the hormone estrogen. They bind to estrogen receptors on human cells. I found this out after a partial hysterectomy, but since eliminating as many as these “xenohormones” as I possibly could from my immediate environment I have had none of the symptoms I had before doing so. Household cleaning products, laundry products and personal toiletries are the worst offenders. My own personal experience tells me that yes, chemicals can cause cancer so I don’t put a lot of stock in scientific studies. I work around some of the most dangerous chemicals on the planet and I don’t inhale them or let them touch my skin and I detox my body regularly. So, all I can say is education and knowledge, not what polictically appointed panels or scientific studies on rats and mice have to say, will do a lot more to eliminate the problem of environmental chemical contamination and cancer (especially in women).
Despite being dismissed by the American Cancer Society among other reputable organizations with expertise in the field of cancer research, the Obama administration will probably use this report to back calls for increased screening and regulation of chemicals based upon the “Precautionary Principle.” Environmental lobbyists in the U.S., a critical special interest group whose backing the administration covets, are trying to bring European style chemical regulations to the U.S. under which traditional notions of burden of proof are turned on their heads. In Europe, chemicals, whether novel, new creations or those in widespread use for decades without any evidence of harm, now must prove that they cause no harm before they can be brought to the market or, in the case of chemicals currently in use, if they wish to continue in use. Europe is falling behind the U.S. and the rest of the world in the fields of chemical engineering and biotechnology as a result of these laws, yet there is no evidence that the public’s health has benefitted. Now, it seems, that the Obama adminstration would like to apply European style “guilty until you prove yourself innocent” rules here.
Obama’s administration has a game plan to demonize and scare the public into allowing them to regulate and bureaucratize our nation.
Do not believe that any of this is not just another part of their agenda.
To win the argument, we need to have people think for themselves, realistically, and not be dragged along by what “feels good”.
The Blob could very well signify the over-reaching polticalization of our nation.
What Sterling Burnett is talking about is scarier than the blob.
The Obama administration has made extensive efforts to create a stricter regulatory framework for the ownership and distribution of dihydrogen monoxide, a chemical so dangerous it kills hundreds of thousands of people every year.
Does not surprise me at all that George W. appointed these guys.
Bush. Obama. The name or party of the president makes a small difference. The illegitimate “studies” and “commissions” will always ask for more regulation, law, and oppression. They are not frogs, they are scorpions. Imagine any such body reporting that “…we found no problem. Maybe there is no problem, or maybe there is but we are too stupid to find it. It was a mistake to appoint us.”
None of this–FDA, health, science, research, education, energy–is any of the federal governments business.
Leave us alone.