Data Digging
Most Recent
11th
Mar
2010
- ISBN13: 9780465015689
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
The Secret History of the War on Cancer
Product Description
Why has the “War on Cancer” languished, focusing mainly on finding and treating the disease and downplaying the need to control and combat cancer’s basic causes—tobacco, the workplace, radiation, and the general environment? This war has targeted the wrong enemies with the wrong weapons, failing to address well-known cancer causes.As epidemiologist Devra Davis shows in this superbly researched exposé, this is no accident. The War on Cancer has followed the … More >>
The Secret History of the War on Cancer
Sorry that I can’t provide a link (if I did, Amazon would delete this review), so do a search on aspartame (and spell it correctly; one reviewer didn’t), cancer and “National Cancer Institute” and you’ll find a document titled, “Aspartame and Cancer: Questions and Answers – National Cancer Institute.”
I use a fair amount of aspartame, so I was just as concerned as everyone else chiming in on this book. But, quite frankly, I’d go with the latest from the NCI rather than any one author or researcher. I have to admit, however, that I will attempt to reduce my aspartame intake.
When I was a child more than 70 years ago, my father – a chain smoker – warned me of the evils of tobacco as his father had warned him. Unlike my father, I took it to heart. But I expected this book to be more substantive than the obvious truth that foreign substances pollute the atmosphere and harm us. After reading several glowing reviews, I hoped to learn something beyond the mix of verbal salad I found here. If you pick through this Fiddler on the Roof family anecdote, personal memoir, enthusiasm for organic food, and occasional meta-analysis of hoary research studies, you will rediscover that carcinogens like tobacco, arsenic and benzene were suspect long ago [not to mention naturally occurring phenomena like sunshine and dust]. The reader learns once again that reputable researchers have traded in their souls for corporate rewards and that ours is an age of aggregate industrial waste. Imagine.
The book suffers from a want of focus that no editor could have rescued. What we learn once again is that gifted scientists can often be very ungifted writers.
Heard about this book from a radio interview with the author and it seemed like I’d get lots of answers to questions I had about why there is such a steady increase in the occurance of Cancers. I’ve wondered if it was just because of the media giving us more information or if perhaps, Cancers were truly become as common as the cold. Devra Davis takes us back …way back, though history … she details who, how, and why man-made environmental decisions have added fuel to the fire. This may be just my perception, but I find book very frightening and informative.
The Secret History of the War on Cancer is an inflated account of certain anecdotal information, which is out of date and largely irrelevant. It’s poorly written and tired and given the emotive title, an in appropriate treatment of the information. The information is repetitive and could be condensed into a wee booklet. The motives for writing such a text are unclear. There is no important information in this book.
I just heard this interview on NPR. I was in my garage and couldn’t get out of my car unil it was over. We avoid products with hormones and we eat organic. This confirms that we are on the right track. We started reading the ingredients on our lotion to avoid estrogen and other hormones — I did not think about my hair products. Not that we don’t have enough to worry about already – but I am looking forward to this read.