Posted on 08/05/2010 7:02:02 AM PDT by toma29
Perhaps it is enough to hate high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) because the federal government has encouraged its production for decades by imposing high tariffs on sugar imports and by subsidizing corn farmers. (It’s certainly enough for me.) In addition, HFCS-haters blame the sugar for making Americans ever fatter and less healthy. So with so much to hate to go around, when UCLA researchers reported earlier this week that feeding HFCS to pancreatic cancer cells boosts their proliferation in lab dishes, the media jumped on the story. The study’s chief author even suggested that a federal effort should be launched to reduce refined fructose intake modeled on earlier anti-smoking campaigns. Can it be long before health nannies like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the Center for Science in the Public Interest begin crusading against the offending sweetener? Of course, this is not the first cancer panic over sweeteners, all of which proved false.
So before jumping on the ban-wagon, let’s consider a couple of points. HFCS generally contains a mixture of 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose. The favored sweetener, sucrose (a.k.a. table sugar) is actually a molecule combined 50/50 of fructose and glucose. When sucrose is digested in the stomach it is dissociated into the two molecules which are then absorbed into the bloodstream.
The authors of the UCLA study ominously note that our consumption of HFCS has gone up 10-fold since 1970, and you know the conclusion you’re supposed to reach: cancer epidemic! But according to Cancer Facts & Figures 2010 issued by the American Cancer Society: "Incidence rates of pancreatic cancer have been stable in men since 1981, but have been increasing in women by 1.7% per year since 2000." In fact, the overall cancer incidence rate in the U.S. has been going down for nearly a decade, even as Americans pigged out on all those cakes and soft drinks sweetened by HFCS. But it would be silly to argue that HCFS consumption is preventing cancer.
Since cancer feeds on sugar and hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils, then HFCS would certainly be a factor.
If you feed enough of almost any known substance into a lab dish with cancer cells they will grow.
And the author did not note that while cancer rates are dropping, the amount of younger people getting cancer is frightening. I’m 31 and I know several people in my age group that have had cancer or have cancer now. People couldn’t say that 30 years ago.
Fructose studies that say everything causes cancer....
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
There’s no cure, there’s no answer
Everything gives you cancer
Don’t touch that dial
Don’t try to smile
Just take this pill
It’s in your file
Don’t work hard
Don’t play hard
Don’t plan for the graveyard
Remember -
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
There’s no cure, there’s no answer
Everything gives you cancer
Don’t work by night
Don’t sleep by day
You’ll feel all right
But you will pay
No caffeine
No protein
No booze or
Nicotine
Remember -
Funny they only picked on HFCS, not sucrose. I guess they want that corn now to go to ethanol they can subsidize and add to our gas.
My 14 year-old daughter just had a multi-visceral transplant to treat a pancreatic neuroendocrine tumor that had spread to her liver and had attached itself to her stomach, kidney and back. It was a huge, nasty thing that was barely resectable. In one place the pathology report was .1 cm ‘negative at the margin’ and the surgeon had removed as much internal tissue as he possibly could.
We thought her stomach pain was menstrual cramps until her weight-loss became alarming. Even then it took 3 months before her doctor did a CT scan and discovered it. This is just not anything that 14 year-old kids get, or didn’t used to be.
Now she will be fighting transplant-related issues for the rest of her life, but there was no alternative. Chemo doesn’t work against this kind of cancer. 6 months of chemo only kept it from spreading more than it did. .1 cm more and we would have been facing the reality of watching her die from this.
14 years-old. My God, my God.
I’d love to see an article on the money trail that resulted in the high tariffs on imported sugar.
I’m not a big fan of both HFCS or corn gas. Personally, we avoid HFCS at all costs. The problem I have with it is that it is needlessly in so many things. Bread, yogurt, fat-free creamer, etc. Why does it need to be in these things? Because it extends shelf life. I really don’t want to eat something that has a shelf life of five years. I’ve found that cooking from scratch is not only much healthier, but also much cheaper. Plus I can eliminate hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated oils and MSG from my family’s meals.
What will it take for the medical community to admit the correlation between Birth Contol Pills and Breast Cancer?
They pretend to have conducted studies, but the “control group” has NEVER been comprised of women who’ve never taken the Pill.
That is scientific fraud!
True, but there's many factors that play into that, specifically, the population has grown tremendously.
Mrs. Puppage was diagnosed with breast cancer at 34....6 months after we were married.
Whatever the reason, you're absolutely correct, younger people are indeed being diagnosed more often than years past.
Do a google search on Vitamin D and the studies that have been done at UCSD. Apparently, the USDA requirement for Vitamin D in our diet barely keeps us above rickets. Most people are woefully vitamin D deficient and those deficiencies have been linked to several types of cancer. Studies are showing that by raising the level of Vitamin D in your blood to a prescribed level certain types of cancer are reduced by as much as 75%. Another good idea is to stay out of tanning beds. A friend of mine’s son died of Melanoma recently. He was 31. He used tanning beds all the time.
Does anyone else see the irony in Reason asking if it’s time to panic?
See my post #8.
My daughter is 14 years-old.
That must have been a hellish experience for you all. Thank God your daughter is all right, and thank God for modern medicine.
Might be a good time to switch to eating food rather then parts of food.
Highly processed sugar in any form is poison as well as all the industrial processed seed oils.
Genetically altered fruits, which is most, are also higher in sugar than their original form and should be avoided.
Your daughter and your family are in my prayers.
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