Archive for the ‘General Cancer Research’ Category

Are prostate cancer treatments being neglected by NICE?

Comments Off
Posted 25 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Abiraterone, Abiraterone, Prostate Cancer
Prostate cancerProstate cancer affects 250,000 men in Britain

Through writing this blog I have found myself at events at which I am asked to speak, at which I discover the world of cancer research or – as happened last Tuesday – at a House of Commons briefing. Thanks to an invitation from Owen Sharp, CEO of The Prostate Cancer Charity, a whole new world opened up to me.

Chaired by John Leech MP – who is a huge supporter of The Prostate Cancer Charity – the subject of this briefing was the drug Abiraterone.

As I am sure you are well aware, NICE’s draft decision to deny Abiraterone’s use by the NHS has caused much distress to those men whose cancer is at an advanced stage (ie it has spread to other parts of the body) and has stopped responding to hormone and chemotherapy treatments.

The argument put forward by NICE is that the pharmaceutical company is charging too much for a drug which will be used by too many men – and, therefore, should not be in the “end of life” category.

Apart from a chemotherapy drug called Cabazitaxel (which does not offer such a long extension of life and comes with side effects), these men are left with no alternative but palliative care. Abiraterone has been proven to extend the lives of men with prostate cancer by (on average) four months, pain-free and with renewed levels of energy. It is not a chemotherapy treatment and is taken as a pill four times a day, along with the steroid prednisolone.

The four men in the room – all with prostate cancer – who have been taking the drug (three who managed to obtain it by winning their appeals to the Strategic Health Authority and one who took part in a Royal Marsden trial) emphasised that the quality of their lives has been improved enormously – no pain, no fatigue. In fact, they felt their old selves once again and their PSA levels dropped almost overnight.

Like all drugs, Abiraterone will stop working eventually – for the actor Ian Liston, it stopped being effective after three and a half years, but he, like the others, described how being physically stronger (thanks to Abiraterone) will enable them to cope with future therapies. “The difference it makes to the quality of your life cannot be underestimated.”

Dr Simon Chowdhury – Consultant Oncologist at Guy’s, King’s and St. Thomas’ Hospitals in London – echoed the point I made in a previous blog post. He said that it is a “travesty that a drug developed in the UK is not now available to UK patients.” I would reiterate my comment that Abiraterone was developed by Cancer Research UK, some of whose funding comes from the very people who now need the drug for which they have paid towards its development. This cannot be right and, if NICE’s final decision is to refuse Abiraterone’s use by the NHS, it may well disillusion people to such an extent that they will think twice about making any further donations to cancer research.

We heard, too, from Hugh Gunn, a prostate cancer sufferer, who works to raise awareness of the disease and is the current Treasurer of the Prostate Cancer Support Federation. On being diagnosed in 2005 he was given 30 months to live, and was prescribed intermittent hormone therapy and finished chemotherapy in December last year when,”after feeling close to the end, I won my appeal to my Strategic Health Authority and have been able to enjoy a wonderful four months with my family. On Abiraterone, the pelvic pains, lack of appetite and loss of energy have all disappeared”.

However, Hugh pointed out that, when he approached his local Cancer Drugs Fund, he discovered the East Midlands CDF was the only one in the country not funding Abiraterone. Finally, the decision was overturned but, as he said, “it is very distressing to have to fight for something to save your life.” Some CDFs meet on a regular basis – Dr Chowdhury can rely on his Fund to make a decision in 48 hours – but in other areas, men are dying before the CDF even begin the discussion.

There was a distinct feeling among those gathered in Portcullis House that prostate cancer is the forgotten cancer and that there is sexual discrimination at work here. Particularly as, after a Freedom of Information request by The Prostate Cancer Charity, it was discovered that half of the CDFs insist on a choice being made between Abiraterone and Cabazitaxel. If Abiraterone does not work – and, like all drugs, it fails for some people – no further applications for the other drug are allowed. So you could be kippered either way. The consensus was that this rule would not be applied to drugs for breast cancer.

GPs did not escape unscathed either. It was suggested that far too many are still under the misconception that a man will die with, not from, prostate cancer. It is estimated that there are 250,000 men living with the disease and, all too often, it is already at an advanced stage when the diagnosis takes place.

NICE is due to make its final decision in June, and the Prostate Cancer Charity asks everyone to log onto their website and use the tool you will find there to alert your MP to fight on behalf of me: email NICE and the SMC in Scotland (which has already decided against recommending Abiraterone) and persuade them to change their minds; or have a go at Janssen’s (Abiraterone’s manufacturer) to lower its price.

As Dr Chowdhury said: “This is the ideal cancer drug – it does not cure but it is highly active, administrated orally, has no toxicity, is easy to monitor, easy to produce and relatively cheap.”

 

Unnecessary prostate cancer screening remains common

Comments Off
Posted 25 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Prostate Cancer, PSA testing, Watchful Waiting

Health
By Amanda Gardner, Health.com
updated 4:05 PM EDT, Tue April 24, 2012

PSA tests aren’t harmful, but studies have shown that positive results can lead to psychological distress and overtreatment.
PSA tests aren’t harmful, but studies have shown that positive results can lead to psychological distress and overtreatment.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Since 2008, experts have discouraged the use of PSA tests for men over 75
Tumors in this population tend to be slow-growing and asymptomatic
Yet data shows that 44% of men in that age bracket underwent PSA screening

(Health.com) — When billionaire investor Warren Buffett revealed last week that he has been diagnosed with early-stage prostate cancer, the reaction — including from Buffett himself — amounted to a collective shrug.

Buffett said his doctors told him the cancer is “not remotely life-threatening or even debilitating in any meaningful way,” which led some observers to wonder why the 81-year-old had bothered to get screened for the disease in the first place.

Since 2008, an independent panel of experts that advises the federal government on preventive care has discouraged the use of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) tests — a type of blood test — to screen for cancer in men ages 75 and up. Tumors in this population tend to be slow-growing and asymptomatic, so early detection may carry more risks than benefits, the panel concluded.

Health.com: What men must know about PSA tests

Buffett’s diagnosis isn’t the only sign that this recommendation hasn’t sunk in. According to a research letter published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, PSA testing rates in men over age 75 have remained steady since the panel released its guidelines in 2008.

National survey data shows that 43% of men in that age bracket underwent PSA screening in 2005. In 2010, the researchers found, 44% reported having a PSA test done — a statistically negligible difference.

“Screening patterns couldn’t have been more similar before and after,” says lead researcher Scott E. Eggener, M.D., an assistant professor of surgery at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

PSA tests aren’t harmful in and of themselves, but studies have shown that positive results can lead to psychological distress, unnecessary biopsies, and overtreatment.

In older men, most early-stage tumors don’t require treatment because the men are likely to succumb to something else before the tumor becomes dangerous. Treatments, including surgery and radiation, may be riskier than continuing to monitor a tumor, since they carry a risk of incontinence and sexual dysfunction. (Buffet, for his part, has elected to undergo radiation.)

Health.com: Do you really need that medical test?

So why haven’t screening rates budged? The researchers can only speculate, but it could be that doctors and patients simply aren’t aware of the new guidelines. Another, more troubling possibility is that some prostate cancer specialists are recommending PSA tests to collect the reimbursement fee and generate business.

Eggener says neither of these scenarios is especially likely, however. The media coverage surrounding the 2008 guidelines has been hard to miss, he says, and although there may be a “subset” of specialists who are “consciously or unconsciously” overscreening and overtreating their patients, most PSA tests are ordered by primary care physicians with no financial stake in a diagnosis.

What’s more likely is that doctors and patients are accustomed to viewing screening as a good thing, and are unable or unwilling to let that belief go despite all the data to the contrary. “Physicians and patients latch onto the concept of screening for cancer and catching cancers early,” Eggener says.

The ongoing discussion surrounding the appropriate amount of cancer screening extends beyond prostate cancer. The panel that issued the 2008 guidelines, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), has spurred controversy in recent years by relaxing its screening recommendations for breast and cervical cancer as well.

Health.com: A guide to breast cancer screening

In 2011, the task force released draft guidelines that extended its recommendation against PSA testing to men of all ages. The current trend suggests the new guidelines may go unheeded, especially since not everyone agrees that PSA tests should be universally discouraged.

Even among men in the 75-and-over bracket, Eggener says, screening might make sense for certain patients. Older men in relatively poor health probably won’t benefit from early detection and treatment, he says, but that might not be true for a healthy and active 75-year-old who’s likely to live long enough for a tumor to spread.

“It’s very reasonable to check PSA levels, because it might save that guy’s life,” he says.

Cancer As Big Business; Is There a Repressed Cure?

Comments Off
Posted 23 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Complementary and Alternative Medicine
Saturday, April 21, 2012 – 21:44 Special to HuntingtonNews.Net

Cancer is a disease defined by abnormal growth of cells into tumors, according to the molecular theory. Have we been misinformed  about the definition of the word Health and how to cure cancer.

Watch and learn as this video describes the true definition of the word health that 99% of Americans don’t know about the alleged cure for cancer, skin cancer, lung cancer, graviola and cancer, brain tumor, stomach cancer, pituitary cancer, liver cancer, Pancreatic Cancer, breast cancer, leukemia, Kidney Cancer, Cervical Cancer, Colon Cancer, ovarian cancer, Thyroid Cancer. Understand what it takes to be the 1% that lives the life of your dreams on the Cruise Ship!

For an astonishing alternative perspective on medical treatment, you can view this intriguing video concerning prescription drugs versus homopathic (holistic medicine)

Cancer Research Held Back by … Wrong Labels?

Comments Off
Posted 21 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Ethics of Science, Finance and Politics of cancer research and treatment, General Cancer Research

Cell lines used in study are often misidentified: Wall Street Journal

By Mark Russell,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 21, 2012 9:40 AM CDT
(Newser) – As many as one-third of cancer cell lines used by scientists around the world could be wrongly labeled, undermining huge amounts of medical research, reports the Wall Street Journal. For basic biology research, the problem is probably not so serious. But for the study of specific cancers and treatment, wrongly labeled cell lines means money and resources are often completely wasted. (The article begins with an anecdote from a scientist who had to pull his paper on head and neck cancer, because he discovered the cells he was working on were actually from cervical cancer.) Worse, critics say, is the possibility that misidentified cell lines could have led to drugs that are inappropriate for some types of cancer.

It’s a problem that has been known since the 1960s, but largely ignored by scientists afraid the discovery might invalidate their research and hurt their careers. It seems to stem from basic carelessness: Cells are drawn from tumors, grown in labs, and stored for years in freezers, where the mixup often occurs. The National Center for Biotechnology Information is trying to clean up the mess and establish new standards, but the NIH, for instance, still does not require authentification of cell lines when it doles out grant money. “Screaming and shouting, it doesn’t do any good,” says one pathologist. “The whole ethos of science is to strive for the truth and produce a balanced argument about the evidence. Yet, all this crap is being produced.

New Drug Could Slow Spread of Prostate Cancer

Comments Off
Posted 21 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category KBU2046, Lung Metastases, Metastases, Prostate Cancer
 April 20, 2012

In mice, stops disease from spreading to nearby tissues and bone

Jessica Berman

Scientists report they have developed a drug that can prevent prostate cancer from spreading to nearby tissues and bone, increasing the chances of successful treatment.

The experimental compound doesn’t cure prostate cancer. It contains the disease so more traditional cancer therapies, such as surgery and radiation, have a chance to work.

Raymond Bergan is director of experimental therapeutics at the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center at Northwestern University in Illinois, where the drug was developed.

Using breast cancer as an analogy, Bergan says it’s not the original cancer that’s lethal, but its spread or metastasis.

“The relevance of that is life versus death, literally,” he says. “If the cancer is localized, it’s very treatable, curable. If the cancer has spread throughout the body, it will take her life. We can treat it, but it will take her life.”

The new drug, called KBU2046, is a small molecule that attaches to tumor proteins involved in metastasis and disables them, so they can’t travel to distant organs. Bergan says it’s like turning off a switch that tells the cells to keep moving all the time.

Bergan and his colleagues transplanted aggressive human prostate cancer cells into mice, and then fed them the drug for five weeks. The compound prevented metastasis of the cancer to the lungs, a frequent site of tumor spread in men with prostate cancer.

Toxicity studies showed the compound is safe. Unlike other cancer therapies, which can cause significant side effects, investigators say the experimental drug spares healthy cells, causing minimal side effects.

Bergan is confident that KBU2046 will work to contain other cancers as well.

“We don’t think it’s specific to prostate cancer. We’ve done some early tests with other cancer cells in the laboratory and it appears to stop them from moving.”

Bergan stresses that drugs developed using animal models don’t always work in humans, and he’s looking forward to trials involving cancer patients.

Breast Cancer Redefined into 10 Genetic Subtypes, May Lead to Better Treatment

Comments Off
Posted 20 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Breast Cancer, genetic research

A group of scientists have reclassified breast cancer as having 10 genetic subtypes, instead of having four as previously thought, in a breakthrough study that could change the way that breast cancer is currently diagnosed and treated.

By Christine Hsu | April 18, 2012

A group of scientists have reclassified breast cancer as having 10 genetic subtypes, instead of having four as previously thought, in a breakthrough study that could change the way that breast cancer is currently diagnosed and treated.

The discovery published in April 18 the journal Nature, which found breast cancer to be a culmination of at least 10 diseases also identified several completely new genes that drive breast cancer, offering potential targets for new kinds of drugs.

These newly identified genes that impact the function of cell signaling pathways, networks that control cell growth and division, could enable researchers to pinpoint how these gene faults disrupt important cell processes to cause cancer.

Researchers said that the latest findings mean that people should now see cancer as an “umbrella term” for a larger number of diseases.

The findings will also allow doctors to better predict survival times in patients and personalize treatment to match specific tumor types, said co-author Carlos Caldas at Cancer Research UK’s Cambridge Research Institute.

“Essentially we’ve moved from knowing what a breast tumor looks like under a microscope to pinpointing its molecular anatomy,” Caldas said in a statement.

“This research won’t affect women diagnosed with breast cancer today. But in the future, breast cancer patients will receive treatment targeted to the genetic fingerprint of their tumor.”

Breast cancer accounts for 16 percent of all female cancer cases, making it the most common cancer among women worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation in the United States conducted a study last year and found that the breast cancer cases around the world have more than doubled in the last 30 years, from 641,000 cases in 1980 to 1.6 million cases in 2010, a growing rate that dramatically exceeds the global population growth.

Researchers at Cancer Research UK’s Cambridge Research Institute and the BC Cancer Agency in Vancouver analyzed the genetic material, DNA and RNA, of 2,000 frozen tumor samples from patients diagnosed with the disease at five different hospitals for mutations and other changes and grouped them into 10 subtypes with common genetic features that correlate with survival.

Researchers explained that the combined analysis of DNA and RNA, which translates DNA into proteins, uncover the identity of oncogenes, genes that drive cancer, and of tumor suppressor genes, which protect against the disease.

The current method of diagnosing and treating women with breast cancer involves analyzing tumor samples for the presence of biomarkers such as estrogen receptors or the cell surface receptor HER2, Caldas said in a news conference.

While the results of current test only determine which of the four existing subtypes of breast cancer a patient has, depending on the presence of two hormone receptors ER and HER-2, which ultimately influences the treatment and prognosis the patient receives, the new classification of 10 subtypes means that patients will know more precisely which type of cancer they have and as newer and more targeted drugs are developed, patients should be able to receive more effective or tailored treatments.

Caldas said that seven of the new subtypes found in the study were defined as ER-positive and HER-2 negative, and cancer survival time for each of the seven genetic subtypes varied widely from 80 percent to less than 40 percent after 15 years from diagnosis.

Researchers said that more research is needed to determine how tumors in each subgroup behave, like how they grow and how fast they spread. Other research is needed in the laboratory and in patients to find the most effective way to treat each of the 10 subtypes of the disease.

“The new molecular map of breast cancer points us to new drug targets for treating breast cancer and also defines the groups of patients who would benefit most,” co-author Professor Samuel Aparicio at the BC Cancer Agency in Vancouver said in a statement. “The size of this study is unprecedented and provides insights into the disease such as the role of immune response, which will stimulate other avenues of research.”

“This landmark study will completely change the way we look at breast cancer. It’s the result of decades of research by our scientists to identify the causes and drivers of the disease, which included a pivotal role in decoding the well-known BRCA genes,” Harpal Kumar, Cancer Research UK’s chief executive added.

Ultrasound beam can destroy prostate cancer without side effects, study finds

Comments Off
Posted 20 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Prostate Cancer, Ultrasound, Ultrasound -targeted microbubble-destruction (UTMD)

Published April 17, 2012

| NewsCore

advertisement

A high-powered ultrasound beam can destroy prostate cancer without causing the serious side effects that plague other treatments, a London study found.

Trials in London and Basingstoke, southeastern England, found it was possible to obliterate tumor cells without damaging delicate surrounding tissues.

Conventional surgery or radiotherapy for prostate cancer leaves half of men impotent and a fifth incontinent. The side effects are so common that many men with slow-growing tumors are advised not to have treatment.

Doctors used an experimental procedure High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (HIFU) to destroy tumors during the trial.

None of the 41 men treated had incontinence and only 10 percent had impotence, the Lancet Oncology journal reported.

Dr. Hashim Ahmed, of University College London Hospital, said, “We’re optimistic that men diagnosed with prostate cancer may soon be able to undergo a day-case surgical procedure, which can be safely repeated once or twice, to treat their condition with very few side effects. That could mean a significant improvement in their quality of life.”

The doctors used high-resolution MRI scans of the men’s prostates to map the precise location of the tumors. They then used HIFU machines to focus ultrasound waves onto an area the size of a grain of rice.

This heats the cells, killing them without affecting nearby tissues.

 

Live imaging shows response to cancer drugs can be boosted by altering tumor microenvironment

Comments Off
Posted 16 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Chemotherapy, Cisplatin, doxorubicin
Posted On: April 16, 2012 – 4:30pm

Cold Spring Harbor, NY – It should be possible to significantly improve the response of common cancers to existing “classical” chemotherapy drugs, say scientists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), by introducing agents that alter the interaction of cancer cells with their immediate surroundings, called the tumor microenvironment.

In research published online today in the journal Cancer Cell, CSHL Assistant Professor Mikala Egeblad and her team report using “live” microscopy to observe how cancer cells in mouse tumors react to the widely used chemotherapeutic agent doxorubicin. They found that selective inhibition of two factors that regulate the tumor microenvironment — enzymes called matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) and a class of immune signaling molecules called chemokines — made breast tumors in mice more responsive to the drug.

It is well known that genetic mutations and epigenetic changes in cancer cells contribute to a tumor’s capacity to resist treatment. But tumors contain many other cells besides cancer cells and surprisingly little is known about how factors secreted from these non-cancerous cells — “stromal” cells, which constitute the tumor microenvironment – influence drug resistance. Such cells include white blood cells, some of which are inflammatory.

Egeblad’s team used real-time microscopic imaging to scrutinize how cancer cells react to doxorubicin in the context of different tumor microenvironments. The resulting time-lapse movies revealed how drugs flowed through – and leaked out of – blood vessels feeding tumors; the manner and rate at which drugs killed cancer cells in tumors of different stages of advancement; and dynamics of the interactions between cells of the tumor and those of the surrounding stromal tissue, before, during and after drug administration.

“We were able to see clearly that the microenvironment contributes critically to drug response,” Egeblad says, “specifically via regulation of the permeability, or ‘leakiness,’ of blood vessels running through and around the tumor, and also by impacting the local recruitment of inflammatory cells.”

When viewed at the microscopic level, resistance to doxorubicin was found to be associated with tumor stage. Observing tumors continuously following drug administration led to the discovery that this response correlated with the ability of blood vessels to transport doxorubicin to the cancer cells, which was comparatively greatest not early or late, but at intermediate stages of tumor development.

Mice engineered to lack the gene that encodes the MMP9 enzyme, which helps regulate the permeability of blood vessels, “had significantly leakier blood vessels, and this corresponded strikingly with a better response to doxorubicin,” according to Egeblad.

Existing chemical inhibitors of MMP enzymes have failed in clinical trials, she noted. “But our data suggest that these or other drugs that affect vascular permeability could be used to achieve better responses to chemotherapies.”

Another important discovery gleaned from the CSHL team’s real-time imaging was that myeloid cells — inflammatory cells that are one of the most common kinds of non-cancerous cells in tumors — were consistently recruited to the tumor site during chemotherapy [video clip to be posted]. Myeloid cells tend to be drawn to places where cells have died. The team found that this attraction, called chemotaxis, is the result of the activation of signaling by CCL2, a member of a class of immune cell recruiting molecules called chemokines.

By knocking out the gene encoding the receptors (called CCR2) for this chemokine, the team was able to diminish myeloid cell recruitment to the tumor. Importantly, this also resulted in a significantly improved response to doxorubicin and to another commonly used chemotherapy drug, cisplatin. This observation is important because it points to a novel way of potentially boosting the cancer cell-killing effectiveness of chemotherapeutic drugs.

The CSHL team now has the goal of finding additional ways to boost the response chemotherapy by determining how the myeloid cells that are recruited to tumors during chemotherapy contribute to the response of cancer cells to drug treatment.

 

 

Obama betrays the left; cheers continued expansion of drug war, criminalization of plant-based medicine

Comments Off
Posted 16 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Finance and Politics of cancer research and treatment, Legal, Marijuana

 

 

(NaturalNews) If you happen to need even more evidence that President Obama has gutted his campaign promises and betrayed not only the left but also African Americans who enthusiastically supported his election, he has just gone public with his support for the continued war on drugs. Keeping marijuana criminalized, it seems — and keeping more African Americans in prison — is a top priority for the Obama administration.

This means Obama supports the midnight DEA raids on our citizenry; the filling of prisons with small-time pot smokers; the disproportionately punitive sentences handed down to black men and women across America who aren’t really criminals at all… they merely suffer from a chemical addiction that would more rightly be considered a medical issue.

Nearly every country in Latin America has now openly and publicize recognized that the so-called “war on drugs” is a complete and total failure. But Obama thinks it’s just great! Fill the prisons! Prosecute more blacks! Buy more guns and night vision gear for the DEA! That’s what Obama’s America stands for, it seems.

“I personally and my administration’s position is that legalization is not the answer,” Obama said just hours before the meeting of Latin American leaders at the Convention Centre in Cartagena, Colombia, for the Americas Summit (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-17716926). Meanwhile, Obama’s top Secret Service agents and military commanders were banging Colombian whores in the background, then refusing to pay them their $47 prostitution fee. (http://www.naturalnews.com/035580_Secret_Service_Colombia_prostitutes…) Obama had “no comment” on that particular issue.

Let’s get real about all this. Marijuana prohibition simply doesn’t work. At least not for reducing crime and drug addiction. Anyone who thinks prohibition works is completely delusional. But it does work for certain special interests. What are those special interests, anyway?

Who BENEFITS from the continued criminalization of marijuana?

If you really want to know why prohibition remains in place with marijuana, it’s simple to find out why. Just ask yourself “Who benefits?”

• The DEA. Without a drug “problem,” the DEA won’t get hundreds of millions of dollars worth of increases in operating budgets from the federal purse strings. If drugs were decriminalized, the DEA would have to be sharply downsized (which would be a great thing for liberty and safety but a terrible thing for the DEA honchos).

• Private prisons. Thanks to illegal agreements between prison operators and state governments, prisons can put prisoners to work at slave labor wages — just a few cents an hour — manufacturing goods that the corporate prison owners sell for pure profit. If you thought the Nike sweatshops in Asia were bad, go visit a prison in the USA some time and watch the slave labor taking place right here at home.

• Local police. The “drug war” is the excuse that local police departments use to receive more grant money for weapons, assault gear and now even armored assault vehicles to be used against the citizens. Without the drug war excuse, all this grant money disappears and these cops have to go back to actually serving the community instead of bashing in doors like a bunch of cocaine cowboys.

• The government drug runners! It’s now a well-known fact that the ATF, DEA and other government agencies are all heavily involved in running drugs across America. Just Google any of these terms if you want to check it out for yourself. The ATF is even engaged in money laundering through the globalist banks. This is why government crackdowns on drugs are highly selectively — drug raids are really just a way to eliminate the competition so that the biggest drug dealer of all — the government itself — can continue to rake in the maximum profits. Legalizing drugs would obviously cause street prices to collapse, sucking all the profits out of the government-run drug business.

• Local District Attorneys and prosecutors. Without the drug war to give them a juicy field of easy targets to prosecute, their careers would take a huge hit. It’s so much harder to arrest real criminals than to go after pot smokers and raw milk farmers, isn’t it? Gee, imagine the difficulty of actually fighting REAL crime for a change?

• Big Government. The entire government benefits from the continued criminalization of drugs. For starters, it establishes the outrageous precedent that government can outlaw a native plant — even a plant that has grown wild across North America for hundreds of years. This alone is an outrageous encroachment on fundamental human freedom. Beyond that, the government can always point to “drug violence” as another excuse to squash our freedoms and put in place a tyrannical police state. It’s all “for your own good,” of course. Isn’t it always?

• Big Pharma and the hospital industry. Because recreational drugs are illegal, they’re often cut with dangerous chemicals that cause liver damage and kidney damage. This results in yet more repeat business for hospitals and the drug industry. If street drugs were legalized, they would be standardized and regulated, and adulteration of those products would be extremely rare. They would be safer to use, in other words, which is exactly what the pharmaceutical industry is dead set against. They only make money when people are damaged or sick from using street drugs concocted in somebody’s trailer.

Who LOSES from the drug war? You!

So we’ve covered the beneficiaries of the drug war, but who loses from it? You do, of course: Your liberties, freedoms, tax dollars and personal safety are all threatened by the existence of the war on drugs. Decriminalizing and regulating these drugs would have an enormously positive impact on you and your life.

If drugs were decriminalized, here’s what would happen:

• Drug gangs would vanish as their source of revenues (illegal drugs at black market prices) dry up.

• Drug-related crime would sharply fall.

• State revenues would skyrocket from the regulated sale of legalized marijuana.

• The corrupt prison industry would collapse to perhaps only 25% of its current size.

• Your personal safety and security would be greatly enhanced due to the lack of drug violence, shootings, home invasions and more.

• Mexican drug gangs would lose their power base, resulting in a sharp drop in crime along the border.

• Former “criminal” pot smokers would once again become taxpaying members of the workforce, contributing to the financial upkeep of society rather than draining it as prisoners.

• The happiness index across society would sharply rise.

Even the Red Cross says decriminalize marijuana

It’s all pure economics, my friends. Cause and effect. Legalize recreational drugs and you end the violence, the crime, the prison system overload and the entire underground market for the stuff.

It’s all so obvious that even the Red Cross has called for decriminalization (http://copssaylegalize.blogspot.com/2012/03/red-cross-calls-for-drug….).

At the same time, countless members of the FBI, DEA and active-duty police organizations are also openly calling for decriminalization (http://www.leap.cc/).

The rational argument for ending prohibition is further detailed at www.Norml.org

There are no rational reasons for keeping marijuana criminalized. There are only political reasons for doing so. That’s why Obama continues to support the irrational war on drugs — because it’s a political issue.

Obama, the betrayer of the political left

Obama, of course, is a teleprompter-reading puppet of the global elite. He does what they tell him to do, and right now they’re telling him to keep pushing Drug War propaganda because it’s a highly effective way to expand the police state and keep people living in fear while denying them access to plant-based medicine.

Obama, it turns out, has betrayed the left so many times I can hardly keep count: He supports the GMO industry, he signed the NDAA which expands secret arrests and secret Gitmo-style prisons, he’s an opponent of farm and food freedom (http://www.naturalnews.com/035301_Obama_executive_orders_food_supply….) and he has proven himself to be nothing more than a big business operative who defends the status quo while preaching “hope and change” that he never delivers.

Obama has assaulted free speech, due process (http://www.naturalnews.com/034537_NDAA_Bill_of_Rights_Obama.html), medical freedom and parental rights. In doing so, he has betrayed many of the top priorities of the very people who once put him into office.

He wants to keep marijuana criminalized because that’s what the police state fascist system of corporate control wants.

Of course, this doesn’t mean the alternatives we’re given are going to be any better. This is not some pitch for Romney, for God’s sake. That guy is just as much of a corporate sellout as Obama (and Bush before him). Elections are created to present the illusion that the People have a choice when, in reality, all they’re voting for is which color of puppet they want to see on television while we’re all being imprisoned, exploited, enslaved and oppressed by a growing fascist state.

Care to guess which candidate would have decriminalized marijuana from the get-go? His name is Ron Paul, and the ideas of freedom and liberty that he espouses are the real answer for the future of our nation. No matter who shows up in the ballot box this November, Ron Paul is my President, because he’s the only candidate who is deeply committed to legalizing freedom in America.

Parker Waichman LLP Warns that Cancer Research Study Reports Injectable Contraceptive Doubles Breast Cancer Risk

Comments Off
Posted 15 Apr 2012 — by James Street
Category Birth Control, Breast Cancer, Carcinogens, Legal Issues

Cancer researchers are reporting that young women who have been taking Depo-Provera for more than a year may be twice as likely to develop invasive breast cancer. Parker Waichman LLP is currently investigating this possible Depo-Provera side effect, and is actively assessing potential Depo-Provera breast cancer lawsuit claims.

New York, New York (PRWEB) April 09, 2012

Parker Waichman LLP, a national law firm representing victims of defective drugs and medical devices, is evaluating potential lawsuit claims related to Depo-Provera (depo-medroxyprogesterone acetate or DMPA) and breast cancer. The birth control shots, which are given once every three months, prevent pregnancy solely through progestin; many other contraceptives incorporate a progestin-estrogen combination. According to a new study published in the April 15th issue of Cancer Research, the injectable contraceptive can double the risk of invasive breast cancer in young women. [cancerres.aacrjournals.org/content/early/2012/02/25/0008-5472.CAN-11-4064.abstract?sid=b94f53d7-cd3e-4624-af50-5a8b0a5cc970]

This is not the first time Depo-Provera has been associated with an increased risk of breast cancer. According to the Cancer Research study, the contraceptives shot contains the same progestin as the menopausal hormone therapy regimen found to increase breast cancer risk among postmenopausal women in the Women’s Health Initiative clinical trial. Lead researcher on the Cancer Research study and breast cancer epidemiologist Christopher I. Li M.D., Ph.D, of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, also notes that multiple studies involving young women and DPMA have produced mixed findings. “Our study adds to the body of knowledge from international studies conducted in a diverse group of countries – Kenya, New Zealand, Thailand, Mexico and Costa Rica – which have shown that one of the risks associated with DMPA use may be an increased risk of breast cancer,” Dr. Li said in a press release issued by the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center. Dr. Li’s study is the first major U.S. based study showing that Depo-Provera can also pose this danger to younger women; his team studied nearly 2,000 women between the ages of 20 to 44, the release said. [fhcrc.org/content/public/en/news/releases/2012/04/dmpa-breast-cancer-risk-chris-li.html]

Depo-Provera has also been linked to other serious side effects, such as bone loss. The risks associated with the injectable birth control appeared so severe that the FDA has advised it as a last resort, stating that “Depo-Provera Contraceptive should be used as a long-term birth control method (eg, longer than 2 years) only if other birth control methods are inadequate.” [fda.gov/Safety/MedWatch/SafetyInformation/SafetyAlertsforHumanMedicalProducts/ucm154784.htm?utm_campaign=Google2&utm_source=fdaSearch&utm_medium=website&utm_term=depo-provera&utm_content=1]

The new study, however, shows that the risk of breast cancer in young women can increase 2.2-fold after only one year. The study also found that the risk seemed to decline months after women stopped taking Depo-Provera, which only strengthens the correlation. Li’s findings echo the FDA’s cautioning advice about Depo-Provera. “In the United States many women have numerous options for contraception, and so it is important to balance their risks and benefits when making contraceptive choices” Dr. Li said, according to the statement from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center.

In addition to reviewing cases concerning Depo-Provera and breast cancer, Parker Waichman LLP also helps victims affected by other contraceptives, including Yaz, Yasmin andNuvaRing.

Parker Waichman LLP offers free legal consultations to breast cancer patients attributing their diagnosis to Depo-Provera. If you or a loved one were diagnosed with breast cancer and you believe it to be a result of Depo-Provera injections, please contact their office by visiting the firm’s at Depo-Provera page http://www.yourlawyer.com. Free case evaluations are also available by calling 1 800 LAW INFO (1-800-529-4636).

For more information regarding Depo-Provera breast cancer lawsuits and Parker Waichman LLP, please visit: http://www.yourlawyer.com or call 1-800-LAW-INFO (1-800-529-4636).

Contact: Parker Waichman LLP

Herbert Waichman, Partner
(800) LAW-INFO
(800) 529-4636

http://www.yourlawyer.com

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →