The internet is awash with misinformation about cancer, with potentially tragic consequences for patients. The recent Channel 4 documentary “You’re killing my son” told the story of Neon Roberts, a young boy whose treatment for a brain tumour was halted by his mother Sally, who remained convinced that radiotherapy would cause long-term harm and wanted to try alternative medical treatments.
After a difficult court battle, Neon received radiotherapy, leaving his mother somewhat unimpressed. “Death by doctor is very common, but thankfully, because of the internet these days a number of us have educated ourselves,” she says in the documentary. “There’s so many other options that we’ve been deprived of, denied.”
The Neon Roberts case is tragic and reveals the quagmire of misinformation that surrounds the disease, but Ms Roberts’s comment should not be completely dismissed. Misguided though she might be, her point that the internet is full of information about cancer cannot be denied. But differentiating between fact and fiction can be difficult and a host of myths about cancer have found new life online.
While it would be impossible to address all the legends on the subject, it is worth dispelling some of the more persistent misunderstandings.
- Cancer rates are rising
This statement is true in one respect but it is often framed as “proof-positive” that our world is becoming more carcinogenic. Age is the single biggest risk factor associated with developing cancer and as we’re living longer it’s hardly surprising that rates are increasing. This merely means we are now less likely to die of the host of plagues and injuries that ravaged generations before us. What is heartening is that survival rates have also improved substantially due to more effective diagnostic techniques and treatments.
2.Sharks don’t get cancer
The perceived immunity of sharks to cancer has led to their slaughter to harvest the allegedly curative cartilage; not only is this no good for sharks, it’s no good for humans either. Sharks do get cancer – indeed, pretty much all complex multicellular organisms do, from dogs to elephants.
3.Cancer is a modern disease
Egyptian doctors were recording cancers of the breast sometime between 1500 and 3000BC. By 400BC, the Greek physician Hippocrates (he of the oath) had distinguished between benign and malignant tumours. The reality is that cancer is a truly ancient disease, and has likely existed since the dawn of humanity and before it in the primate species from which we are descended.
4.Radiotherapy and chemotherapy are poisons
In a manner of speaking, yes – that’s the idea. Both radiotherapy and chemotherapy damage DNA. Tumour cells are mutants and while they proliferate far more than they ought, they are much more susceptible to damage and much less likely to be repaired successfully than surrounding healthy tissue. As a consequence, a well-planned radiotherapy dose is concentrated on areas where tumours have been located, preferentially killing tumour cells and largely sparing healthy tissue and organs.
Chemotherapy targets cells that divide rapidly, such as cancer cells. This can also affect non-tumour cells that divide rapidly, such as bone marrow and hair follicles.
The aim of both therapies is to kill off tumour cells while ideally sparing non-tumour cells and this is why they are effective and why they have side-effects. The “poison” mantra is often a banner hoisted by those championing some alleged alternative treatment with no side effects, conveniently ignoring the fact that a cancer treatment without side effects is unlikely to be killing any cancer cells.
5.There is a cure, but large conglomerates are suppressing it
The assertion that there is a “supressed” cure for cancer is a depressingly common one. A number of documentaries purport to investigate alternative cancer cures, from healing oils to homeopathy, all allegedly suppressed by the “cancer industry” to protect its cash cow.
The prognosis and survival rates for different cancers vary hugely – slow growing, promptly diagnosed and easily accessed tumours tend to have a good prognosis. Non-melanoma skin cancer and breast cancers, for example, usually have relatively good prognoses. Others tumours grow rapidly or present with clinical symptoms only when quite advanced, rendering them harder to treat.
If big pharma did possess a cure for cancer, then surely their senior executives and researchers would never die of the disease? And a secret like that is impossible to contain for long, no matter how unethical the companies involved.
Also the final nail in the outlandish coffin of this argument surely is, if there were an effective cure for cancer, why on earth would a pharmaceutical company NOT sell it?
6.Cancer can be cured by X
The spectrum of alleged cancer cures is alarmingly wide, but typically the product is “natural” and easily acquired – for example, apricot seeds, graviola, mistletoe and even baking soda have been championed as cancer cures despite little or no clinical evidence.
Exotic combinations of everything from herbs to vitamins are sold and marketed as potential cures, but there is simply no evidence that they work. The FDA keeps a list of known fake cancer treatments in an attempt to combat such misinformation.
To quote the late, great Patrick Swayze, who died of pancreatic cancer in 2009: “If anybody had that cure out there like so many people swear to me they do, you’d be two things: you’d be very rich, and you’d be very famous.”
Cancer is scary, but it should not be forgotten that treatment options and outcomes have never been better and continue to improve. As the Neon Roberts case demonstrates aptly, misinformation can cause serious and potentially tragic problems. It is natural for people to have concerns and questions, and a talk with one’s physician, nurse or healthcare adviser can do much to answer these and assuage fears.
This article was taken in part from www.theguardian.com/science and was written by David Robert Grimes is a physicist and researcher at Oxford University who writes for The Irish Times. He tweets as @drg1985 and blogs at Three men make a tiger
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