One of the greatest follies of modern medicine is the declaration that cancer is a genetic disease. A genetic disease is  caused by an abnormality in an individual's genome.  (MedicineNet.com ).  Some hereditary diseases, like Huntington’s  are associated with a change of one gene. Most hereditary diseases involve more than one gene, and are  known as polygenic disorders.

Cancer is regarded as a polygenic disorder.  Its evolution   is driven by genetic errors, known as mutations which according to medicine cause cancer.   True, tumor evolution is associated with gene mutations, yet there is no evidence that these actually cause cancer.

Breast cancer genes:  BRCA1 and  BRCA2

Recently mutations of two genes associated with breast and ovary cancers were discovered, BRCA1 and BRCA2,  and oncology makes us believe that they cause cancer,  which has never been verified experimentally. At best these mutations indicate that their carriers are prone to get cancer some time during their life. Their risk to get cancer is higher than that of the average female population. Genetic counselors advise young women carrying these mutations to remove their breasts and save themselves from their poor fate.

Is this advice justified? A meta-analysis of the risk facing these  women  was published recently.  It indicates that their cumulative risk to get cancer rises with age . However a  closer inspection of the data reveals that the risk never hits the probability of one, which would mean that all   women would get cancer. According to figure  D the cumulative risk  does not exceed 0.4, which means that at least 60% of women carrying BRCA mutations will neither get breast nor ovarian cancers! Should they still be encouraged to remove their breasts as a preventive measure?

=======================================================================

(A) Breast cancer risk for BRCA1 carriers, (B) breast cancer for BRCA2 carriers, (C) ovarian cancer for BRCA1 carriers, and (D) ovarian cancer for BRCA2 carriers. The cumulative risk estimates from published studies (thin vertical bars) and the meta-analytic mean (thick vertical bars, height represents 95% CIs). Within each 10-year age interval, the published studies are arranged in the following order (left to right): Ford et al⁶ and Easton et al,⁷ Struewing et al,⁸ Hopper et al,⁹ Satagopan et al,^10,11 Scott et al,¹² Antoniou et al,¹³ King et al,¹⁴ Marroni et al,¹⁵ and Chen et al.¹⁶ An "x" represents not available

Sining Chen, Giovanni Parmigiani  Meta-Analysis of BRCA1 and BRCA2 Penetrance
Journal of Clinical Oncology, Vol 25, No 11 (April 10), 2007: pp. 1329-1333
==========================================================================
Penetrance

This observation makes genetic counselors extremely uneasy since it shows that not every BRCA mutation “causes” cancer. It supports the notion that cancer might not be a genetic disease. Although these mutations are associated with cancer they may not  cause it. Why then remove the breasts? In order to save their theory, geneticists conjured  the term penetrance:

-- It is the frequency, under given environmental conditions, with which a specific phenotype is expressed by those individuals with a specific genotype.  (Annswes.com)

-- A term used in genetics that describes the extent to which the properties controlled by a gene, its phenotype, will be expressed. (Wikipedia)

“Expressed” actually means that cancer does not show up and these women will remain healthy.  This conclusion undermines the current dogma (folly). This is why geneticists adhere to “penetrance”.  They claim that all BRCA mutation carriers are sick even if their cancer did not show up and their breasts have to be removed. 

More on this topic: Beware of the Gene:

Mutation frequencies in BRCA1 gene

The following study indicates that the BRCA1 gene may mutate at different sites. The figure indicates the risk to get cancer involved with each mutation type.
=========================================================================================


Relative risks of ovarian and breast cancers in the general Ontario population for BRCA1 mutations within 500 nucleotides of the position plotted. Ovary = solid circles and solid line (smoothed); breast = open circles and dashed line (smoothed). The thin line at the bottom indicates locations of the 5'-untranslated region and exons 2, 3, and 5–24 according to positions in the cDNA. The long middle span in this line is exon 11

Harvey A. Risch, John R. McLaughlin, David E. C. Cole, Barry Rosen, Linda Bradley, Isabel Fan, James Tang, Song Li, Shiyu Zhang, Patricia A. Shaw, Steven A. Narod 
Population BRCA1 and BRCA2 Mutation Frequencies and Cancer Penetrances: A Kin–Cohort Study in Ontario, Canada
JNCI Journal of the National Cancer Institute 2006 98(23):1694-1706
=============================================================================
Note that the cumulative risk to get breast cancer does not exceed 20%. Thus 80% of   women with one of these mutations will never get cancer! Again, as the title of the study indicates,  the authors take refuge in the safe haven of “penetrance.”

Penetrance is inversely proportional to the resistance to cancer.

Contrary to the fatalistic view of medicine, cancer does not evolve in a  helpless host. From its very beginning patients mobilize healing processes in order to live with it in peace. Some succeed and will never get cancer and are collectively regarded as patients with low penetrance. Here they are regarded as Cancer Yogis,   patients with heightened resistance to cancer. This site attempts to reveal their secret, and apply it for boosting cancer  resistance   in patients.

Cancer is more than just the tumor

Cancer is a systemic disease manifested by ongoing cachexia, para-neoplasia, and a tumor.  It is driven by a cachexia and less by the tumor. The observed mutations do not drive the disease, they accompany it. They may even represent healing processes in cancer.

More on this topic: Pernicious cachexia 

Contents
Home