SALT AND CANCER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11878, 1 February 1902, Page 2 (Supplement)

SALT AND CANCER.

NEW THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OS' THE DISEASE. Excess of salt in food is advanced by Dr. James Braithwaite, of Leeds, as one of the four factors which originate cancer. Dr. Braithwaite puts forward his theory in the Lancet. Salt, ho says, is an essential factor in the origin of cancer, but is inoperative without at least one, probably two, of three other factors. The excess may bo duo to an individual taste for salt, or to the eating of toe much salt meat, or of too much ordinary meat which involves much salt. .

I •: The other factors are (1) over-nourish-i msnt, especially from meat, (2) an impure j condition of the body owing to the non-use of food eaten, and (3) some local irritant or stimulant, such as friction from the stem of a pipe, or some micro-organism. But salt must always be presint. The idea came to Dr. Braithwaite from j noticing that cancer is seldom met with i among the Jewesses who attend the women's department of the Leeds Infirmary. The late medical officer of the Jewish Hospital for Incurables, says that he has never seen a cancer case among Jews. Tho difference of diet between Jews and Gentiles consists mainly, the doctor says, in the absence of bacon and ham from the diet of the former, and as, according to Professor J. Macfadyean, principal of the Royal • Vetinary College, the pig is the only domestic animal in which no case of cancer has been met with, i£ must be the salt, not the . iltjsh of the animal, which is to blame. Jews also eat less butcher's meat, and more of fowl, and fish. These points_ all tend to the conclusion that salt is the active factor. : Here are some points that the doctor makes in support of his theory that salt is to blame: Savages, are far as known, are exempt from cancer. . They get no salt. ■ All domestic animals except the pig are subject to cancer, and salt is given to sheep, cows, and horses, but never to pigs. Wild carnivora with a pure meat diet are exempt. ,On the other hand, when confined in zoological gardens they are given salt and they became subject to cancer. An African hippopotamus recently died from: cancer at the Zoological Gardens in London. Salt had been given to it. Wherever there is an extensive cancer field, or a district in which the inhabitants seem to be especially prone to the disease; it will be found, he says, that people have an ; excessive meat diet, : largely consisting of ham and bacon. \ This Dr. . Braithwaite noticed in the notorious Malton Pickering district, as well as in Wetherby. One common factor he found in these places was that the fanning, classes eat meat or bacon three times a day. . ' . •