"Cancergate"
In this video, Samuel Epstein spends about 41 minutes speaking on ""Cancergate"" at the 33rd Annual Cancer Convention held on Labor Day weekend by the Cancer Control Society.
About Samuel Epstein
SAMUEL EPSTEIN, M.D. was born and educated in England. He received his Doctorate of Medicine with honors at Guy's Hospital, London in 1950, and he became a qualified Specialist in Pathology, Tropical Medicine and Internal Medicine. He had a distinguished medical career in England, including Specialist in Pathology, Royal Army Medical Corps, where he was awarded 3 major military prizes, lecturer in Pathology and Bacteriology, University of London, and British Empire Cancer Campaign Research Fellow, in conjunction with the Chester Beatty Cancer Research Institute, and Tumor Pathologist at The Hospital for Sick Children, and Great Ormond Street, London.
In 1960, he was invited to the United States, where he founded the Laboratories of Carcinogenesis and Toxicology, and The Children's Cancer Research Foundation in Boston. He was also appointed Senior Research Associate in Pathology at Harvard Medical School.
Currently, Dr. Epstein is Professor of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the School of Public Health, University of Illinois Medical Center, Chicago. He is an internationally recognized scientific authority on cancer prevention and on the toxic and carcinogenic effects of environmental pollutants in the air, water, food and the workplace.
Dr. Epstein is the author of some 280 scientific articles and 20 books, including the prize-winning The Politics of Cancer, Hazardous Waste in America, and is co-author, with David Steinman, of The Safe Shoppers Bible, The Breast Prevention Program, The Politics Of Cancer Revisited and the latest, printed in 2005, Cancer-Gate: How To Win The Losing Cancer War.
Dr. Epstein's activities bridging science and public policy include former consultant to the U.S. Senate Committee on Public Works, frequently invited Congressional testimony, and member of Federal Agency Advisory Committees including the Health Advisory Committee of EPA and the Department of Labor Advisory Committee on the Regulation of Occupational Carcinogens. He has been Chairman of the Air Pollution Control Association Committee on Biological Effects of Air Pollutants, President of the Society of Occupational and Environmental Health, Founder and Secretary of the Environmental Mutagen Society and former President of the Rachel Carson Council.
He is also the Chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition, formed in 1993 to focus public attention on the avoidable cancer epidemic and to develop policies and strategies based on grass roots initiatives to reverse the losing war against cancer. The Coalition has become a leading group of independent experts on cancer prevention and public health, together with citizen activists, organized labor, public interest and women's cancer groups. They may be contacted at (312) 996-2297, fax: (312) 996-1374, website: www.preventcancer.com or e-mail: [email protected].
On October 7, 1998, Stockholm, Sweden, Dr. Epstein was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, better known as the "Alternative Nobel Prize" for his contributions to cancer prevention.
On June 10, 2005 (at a ceremony at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, Poland), he was awarded the Albert Schweitzer Golden Grand Medal for Humanitarianism, for International Contributions to Cancer Prevention.
Transcription
The first thing I want to say is for those of you that are unaware of this, this is the thirty third anniversary of the creation of the Cancer Control Society. And I think it's an important event. And I'd like you all to stand up, please, and join me and applaud and applauding Lorraine Rosendahl and her splendid team.
Thank you.
The United States is now fighting two wars, two losing wars, one, the Iraq war, one, the cancer war. Now, while the Iraq war is unwinnable.
The cancer war is winnable, provided there are radical changes in the policies, national policies, generals and strategies. Now we have two sets of generals handling the cancer war in the United States. One generals from the National Cancer Institute, which is a federal institution, it used to be parts of the National Institutes of Health, but it was separated from them in 1971 when President Nixon declared the war against cancer. So now it's a self standing institution which is funded to the tune of your tune of yourself and my five billion dollars tax dollars a year. The second is the American Cancer Society, which is the world's largest charity charity in invert in quotation marks. And between the two of them, we call the two of them the cancer establishment. The problems with the cancer establishment are that they are overwhelmingly fixated on damage control by damage control. I mean, screening, diagnosis, treatment with indifference verging on hostility in some instances to cancer prevention. Quite apart from their indifference and in the past, hostility to alternative therapies which have been shown to have proven use. Now, these problems with the national cancer and Student Cancer. American Cancer Society, their indifference to cancer prevention, it reflects a mindset, a professional mindset, because the leadership comes from surgeons, radiologists, and that's basically their stock in trade. They know nothing about it, about prevention. They're not interested in it. But it's made worse by very major institutional and personal conflicts of interest. So this is the background to the what I'm going to talk to you about on our failed policies and our failed strategies. And I'll try to spend some little time giving you some indication how the Cancer Control Society and others can help try to redress the situation. Now, first, please.
Now, the first the the vertical lines are an indication of the amount of money we've spent every year on cancer for the National Cancer Institute. In 1971, when President Nixon declared the war against cancer, the funding of the National Cancer Institute was one hundred and seventy million dollars. Now it's five billion dollars a year. That's