EVERYONE seems to know a friend or loved one with cancer these days. Some experts say we must change our lifestyles to prevent it while others claim it is simply a disease of the modern world.

Article taken from the Daily Express - 4/11/10 http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/209444

Almost every day another name gets added to that most unpopular of roll calls: the celebrity cancer register. This week presenter Danny Baker joined actors Michael Douglas, the late Simon McCorkindale and Jennifer Saunders in one of the West’s least exclusive clubs. Other victims include celebrities who are surely among the fittest in their age group, such as tennis legend Martina Navratilova and Kylie Minogue.

Professor Rosalie David at the university said: “In industrialised societies cancer is second only to cardiovascular disease as a cause of death. But in ancient times it was extremely rare. There is really nothing in the natural environment that can cause cancer so it has to be a man-made disease, down to pollution and changes to our diet
and lifestyle.”

However Cancer Research UK disputes claims that cancer was unknown in the Ancient World and cites several natural causes of the disease. UV radiation from the sun, bacteria, viruses and the radio- active gas radon are as natural as breathing and all linked to cancer.

Even here man’s influence may be at play. Cases of the most dan- gerous form of skin cancer, malignant melanoma, have more than quadrupled over the past 30 years in Britain. This is almost certainly because package holidays have let us worship the sun in droves in climates too extreme for our sensitive northern skins. What has also changed in recent years is the weakening of Earth’s natural protection against UV radiation, the ozone layer, thanks to damage from man-made chemicals.

Cancer Research UK says that lifestyle factors – smoking, drinking and obesity – all add to the cancer risk. But again alcohol is far from new. Britons have been boozing for centuries. It’s what we’re good at. And a visit to a cancer clinic does not reveal a gaggle of Teletubbies of whom you could say: “You ate too many pies. You drank too many pints. It’s your own stupid fault.”

I don’t pretend to know why there is a surge in cancer rates.  Greater minds than mine have yet to find a clear answer. Obviously we are living longer and in the West detection rates are dramatically better than when I was a child. But that surely cannot explain the doubling and trebling over such a short period of these cancers. You have to wonder whether there is something in the air we breathe, the water we drink or the food we eat. Is that panoply of must-have electric gizmos having unforeseen effects? Are modern lives now so stressful that our bodies are rebelling?

One of the prime suspects has to be the huge battery of chemicals in daily use. In 2005 scores of scientists from across Europe put their names to the Prague Declaration to express their concerns about exposure to hormone disrupting or gender-bending chemicals. They said: “The incidence of cancers such as breast, testis and prostate continues to increase in many European countries, although there are notable differences between countries... This shows that these cancers are linked to factors in the environment, including the diet.”

In 2006 the European Commission said long-term exposure to pesticides can lead to “serious disturbances to the immune system, sexual disorders, cancers, sterility, birth defects, damage to the nervous system and genetic damage”.

Yet the chemicals industry had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the EU’s agreement on the Registration and Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals. And veteran campaigner Georgina Downs is still battling for rural residents to be given the right to be told which chemicals are being sprayed on nearby fields and when.

It is only right to point out that Cancer Research UK describes the evidence linking pesticide use to cancer as “inconclusive”. Moreover the amounts of pesticides found on fruits and vegetables are “tiny”. A spokeswoman said: “There is no evidence that they can damage health.”

That may well be the case but none of us goes through life being exposed to one chemical at a time. We are daily exposed to a cocktail of chemicals and there is little research on the effects that this ever-changing mixture might have.

Exposure to hormone-disrupting and potentially carcinogenic chemicals comes from all sorts of sources: plastic bottles, make-up and even our furniture.

We would find it hard to live without many of them and paradoxically some, such as brominated flame retardants, save lives. Similarly we rely on those villainous pesticides for cheap food. But something is going on in our wider environment.

In Europe male fish exposed to sewage treatment have become gender-benders with eggs in their testes. The widespread use of the now banned insecticide DDT in the Fifties caused birds of prey numbers to crash as the poison worked its way up the food chain. If these chemicals can cause such damage to wildlife why be surprised should their tentacles reach man?

If this hidden exposure is a problem there is not a lot you can do. The price of so many organic foods, for instance, means that shunning pesticides completely is an option open to few.

The glimmer of hope is that the treatment of cancer is improving every year. In the Seventies five out of 10 women with breast cancer survived beyond five years. Now the figure is more than eight out of 10. For prostate cancer the survival rate has risen in the same period from 30 per cent to 75 per cent.

Anyone who develops cancer, therefore, can look forward with some confidence to beating this nasty, insidious disease. And in the meantime there’s only one thing to do: enjoy yourself while you can.

“Do not underestimate chemicals”

Phil Dolling, TÜV SÜD REACh consultant commented “The Registration, Authorisation, Evaluation and Restriction of Chemicals legislation (REACh) is an extremely important piece of European Law and compliance with it is paramount in ensuring that potentially dangerous chemicals do not find their way into everyday consumer items.  We must never take for granted the importance of human health and protection of our environment.   We continually help our clients demonstrate compliance with REACh but even then the rapid alert system for non food products (RAPEX) lists non-conforming items every week as a result of market surveillance actions conducted throughout Europe.  Chemicals are found everywhere in common items such as cosmetics, paint and plastics.  Letting potentially hazardous chemicals slip into the supply chain is very dangerous, it just isn’t worth the gamble”.

For further information about REACh please contact our REACh compliance team on +44 (0)1489 558213 or email info@tuvps.co.uk

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