DISCREDITED CAUSES OF CANCER

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21385, 13 July 1931, Page 8

DISCREDITED CAUSES OF CANCER

THE REAL REMEDY Although the definite causes of cancer have not yet been found, it is possible to give some idea of the things that are not specifically responsible. “ Not the food we eat, but the way.- wo eat it, may give rise to cancer,” says Dr D. A. Welch, professor of pathology in the University of Sydney. “Grass eaters (horses and cattle), flesh eaters (dogs and cats), and mixed eaters (man), all are subject to cancer. A vegetarian diet doe not protect against cancer, neither does a flesh diet predispose to it. Many animals in domesticity are saved from cancer because we kill them for our food before they reach the cancer age. “ Nor can civilisation be blamed for our cancers, because the primitive races of mankind are also liable, probably not to the same extent as we are, for three reasons —(1) because we have acquired certain injurious habits which I need not specify; (2) because we have reached a higher biological development with its attendant penalties; and (3) because we attain a greater average age and thus prolong the cancer period. > “ The remedy that will at once occur to some minds is to go back to primitive life, to withdraw from civilisation. 1 am in sympathy with that remedy so far as it means the reform of some of our hurtful habits. But to turn down our rich inheritance of. civilised life is to turn back the hands of the clock. The real remedy is to turn bade the onslaught of cancer.” To “ turn back the onslaught of cancer,” is the great aim of the British Empire Cancer Crusade, of which the King is patron. New Zealand must do its part, not only in research, but in helping to provide the funds for the extensive work that is demanded for the conquest of cancer.