The Casino-Hospital

Vincent Coppola, Matt Strelecki and Stan Winokur wrote a book called The Big Casino. It contains 42 articles written by many America’s top cancer doctors. They shared stories that they could not forget about their cancer patients. The title of the book, The Big Casino, suggests that patients seeking treatments in the hospitals in America are not much different than gamblers going to the casinos in Las Vegas or Macau!

Take time to reflect on this. Is going to the hospital for your cancer treatment like going into a casino?  Patients and their families put their full trust in their doctors. Cancer treatment these days would cost a lot of money. Some patients would even have to sell their house or land to pay for the hospital bills. Their hope is that the treatment they get in the casino-hospital will make them well again – CURED! That’s the gamble they are taking.

All gamblers know that they cannot win all the time. In fact, you lose more often than you win in this cancer game. Let us examine the reality of what can happen in the casino-hospital.

No Cure for Cancer

Professor Gershom Zajicek, Faculty of Medicine of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (http://www.what-is-cancer.com) said:

• You want to be cured. Unfortunately, most chronic illnesses, e.g. cancer, are essentially incurable. Cure is unrealistic. The only option is to attain a prolonged remission.

• Cancer is generally incurable … most statements about cancer do not indicate successful treatment and the vast literature on cancer has to be regarded with scepticism.

Nearer home, a renowned oncologist in Singapore (The Straits Times, Mind Your Body Supplement, Page 22, 29 Nov. 2006) said:

      ·    Oncology is not like other medical specialties where doing well is the norm.

      ·    In oncology, even prolonging a patient’s life for 3 months to a year is considered an achievement.

      ·    Achieving a cure is like striking a jackpot!

      ·    Not all cancers can be cured.

      ·    As doctors, we try our best to cure those who can be cured, to control the disease for those whose lives can be extended, and to comfort those for whom little can be done. 

Chemo-drugs Are Not Really Effective

Allen Rose, the worldwide vice-president of Glaxo-SmithKline (Daily Express, 8 Dec. 2003, The Sun, 9 Dec. 2003) said:

• Drugs in the market don’t work on everybody.

• Drugs for cancer are only effective in 25% of the patients.

Dr. Cynthia Foster (in Stop the Medicine) wrote:

• There are plenty of statistics to show that people die sooner if they follow the doctor’s advice and have all the cancer treatments than if they just do nothing.

• Doing nothing means not bankrupting themselves with the expensive treatments, not being subjected to medical mistakes and horrible complications. No suffering from dangerous drug toxicity.

Dr. Candace Pert (in Molecules of Emotion) said:

• State-of-the-art chemotherapy … was nothing more than different combinations of the same toxic drugs given in different schedules. It continues to kill more people every year, often a slow painful death … by toxic treatments.

Dr. David Agus, a renowned oncologist (in The End of Illness) wrote:

• If you come to me for help in treating advanced cancer detected late in the game, your game is likely to be over soon. I say it because it’s the truth. It’s a shame that the technology and innovation in medical research and treatments are so archaic, outdated and dare I say, in some cases barbaric.

Sweet Empty Promise

Within five years, cancer will have been removed from the list of fatal maladies.

The above was the optimistic promise given to U.S. President William Howard Taft in 1910 when he visited   Gratwick Laboratory in Buffalo (now Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center). More than a century later, it’s reasonable to ask, What’s taking so long? (https://www.roswellpark.org/cancertalk/201909/cure-cancer-whats-taking-so-long)

On 23 December 1971 (almost 50 years ago) another US President, Richard Nixon tried to fix this cancer problem by signing the National Cancer Act of 1971, launching what was known as the “War on Cancer”. The aim was to find a cure for cancer by increasing research activities and developing more effective treatments for this dreaded disease. After spending billions and billions of dollars on research and decades of hit-or-miss treatment, cancer in general remains a major cause of death up to this day. In short, the war failed.

In an article, Scientists: We Will Never Find A Cure For Cancer (https://sciencenordic.com/cancer-denmark-videnskabdk/scientists-we-will-never-find-a-cure-for-cancer/1439518)  Dr. Jørgen Olsen, head of research at The Danish Cancer Society was quoted as saying:

• If all the positive cancer breakthrough headlines are to be believed, then the cure for cancer is right around the corner. But that is a far cry from reality. I think it’s an illusion to imagine that after millions of years of this disease we’ll suddenly find a solution. I don’t think that we’ll ever beat it, but I think that we’ll get it under control so that it becomes chronic but not deadly.

Christopher Wanejk, in an article, Forty Years After Moon Landing: Why Can’t We Cure Cancer? (https://www.livescience.com/5566-40-years-moon-landing-cure-cancer.html) wrote:

• With $200 billion spent and tens of millions of cancer deaths accumulated since 1971, most would say we are losing the war on cancer. Cancer is the top killer worldwide, responsible for 7.4 million or 13% of all deaths annually. In America, cancer will soon overtake heart disease as the top killer, claiming more than half million lives annually.
• … don’t except the war to end anytime soon. We’re only really very good at curing mice of cancer.
• Overall, during the mid-1970s, the 5-year survival rate among adults for all cancers combined was 50%, today it is about 65%. Admittedly this isn’t that impressive given the amount of resources spent.
• Cures for the major killers, such as cancers of the lung, breast and liver, remain elusive primarily because of the unpredictable nature of cancer cells.

Dr. E.H. Ng, Chairman of Medical Advisor of Breast Cancer Foundation, Singapore (in the Foreword of Cheers to Life) rightfully pointed out the reality of today’s cancer world:

• Bare facts, statistics and exhortations. Doctors are good at dispensing these. They roll out of their tongues smoothly, falling heavily upon our patients’ ears, impressing upon them the potency of this disease.

• After all is said and done, medical science remains remotely far from being able to assure everyone that cancer can be kept at bay or that doctors can cure the afflicted.