CANCER CURE HOPE.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 300, 19 December 1922, Page 3

CANCER CURE HOPE.

RESULTS OF NEW TREATMENT.

LIVERPOOL PROFESSORS DISCOVERY. Hope for cancer sufferers is held out as a result of investigations conducted by Professor Blair Bell, of Liverpool. " (From an encouraging report in the "Lancet" it appears that lead administered in colloid form has in a number of cases arrested the disease. So far 55 different preparations have been tried, and the work of research, which is being financed by two well-known public men, is being continued under the care of a committee of experts. j Some years, it is stated, must elapse i before anv final report can be given. I The action of the heavy metals on the ; living cells of the human body has been much studied of late. The ordinary framework of the body is. of course, built up of the lighter chemical elements —-hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, chlorine, sulphur, and phosphorus, while the onlv metal presented in considerable quantity, apart from the übiquitous sod'mmand potassium, is the calcium of ! the bones.

Iron, which is still one of the lighter metals, although an essential component of the red cells of the blood, does not amount to }oz. altogether. Traces of other metals are always to be found in the cremated remains of the body, although it is not known what part they play in human economy. ACTION" OF. METALS. Speaking generally, all the metals with which the body is not familiar are poisonous in some degree, and the heavier metals are more poisonous than the lighter. Their harmful action seems to be exerted by entering into chemical combination with the various cells of the body, and to diverting them from their proper use. Thus it has long been known that lead has a special attraction for nerve cells and for the cells of the reproductive system, so that large doses of lead may give rise to paralysis of the muscles and sterility.

Some cells are more easily damaged than others, and it is fortunate that the parasitic cells of certain diseases are more sensitive to metals such as mercury and antimony than are the cells of the body. Hence the success of mercury in syphilis and antimony in bilharzia. MYSTERY OK THE DISEASE. Whatever the cause of cancer may ultimately be found to be, some of its results, at any rate, are due to the uncontrolled growth of certain body cells at the expense of the others. The suggestion naturally arose whether the same metal which controlled the proper exuberance of reproductive cells might not also be called in to control the improper exuberance of cancer cells.

This idea, lay at the root of the important work on cancer by Professor Blair Bell, of Liverpool, a preliminary report of which appears in the "Lancet."

Lead administered in colloid form to patients with cancer was actually found to show a preference for cancer cells, so that in a number of cases the growth of a tumour was arrested without serious damage to the other tissues of the body. Out of a total number of 50 eases treated over a period of three years, four are believed to have been cured, and 11 improved, and these were all patients who would presumably have gone downhill without the treatment. In the four eases cured the cancer was, situated in the breast or ovaries. COMMITTEE OF EXPERTS.

The work is as yet only in the preliminary stage. It is being financed bytwo well-known public men, and ig under the care of a committee of experts. Fifty-five different preparations of lead have been tried, and no conclusion has yet been reached as to the best preparation or the dose required to be effective without danger to life. r?ome years must elapse before any final report can be given, but Professor Bell and his committee thought it fair to let otlhers kno-w at this stage of the new and bright hope which has arisen, for, he writes. "Some apparently moribund patients have steadily improved."