With all this cancer talk, lets re-examine the toxic world we live in...

In addition to the emotional and spiritual toxicity we read online, watch on the news, and hear daily spewed out from our favorite talk radio programs.. we are surrounded by toxins that are being continually dumped into our enviroment.

A total of > 6 billion pounds of toxins are released into the air we breathe and the water we drink – ultimately entering the food we eat!

Many of these toxins are Endocrine (Hormone) Disrupters, these Xenoestrogens are inarguably linked to Endometriosis and Breast cancer in women, and Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), Prostate cancer, Testicular cancer in men, just to name a few.

A list of these Xenoestrogens include:

Dieldrin (insecticide)
DDT (insecticide)
Endosulfan (insecticide)
Mothoxychlor (insecticide)
Heptachlor (insecticide)
Atrazine (weedkiller)
4-Methylbenzylidine camphor (sunscreen lotion)
Hydroxy-anisole butyrate (food preservative)
Erythrosine, Red Dye No.3
Polychlorinated biphenyls,(PCB)s (lubricants, adhesives, paints)
P-nonylphenol (in PVC products and byproduct from detergents and spermicides)
Parabens (lotions)

Bisphenol-A (food preservative and in plastics) DO NOT HEAT YOUR FOOD IN PLASTIC CONTAINERS!
Phthalates (plastic softener, often used in childrens toys)

Europe has banned phthalates in childrens toys, but the United States has refused to do so!

We live in a toxic outer world, and that toxicity is reflected in an increased risk of cancer within our inner world..

And life expectancy is increasing.

I'm a Liberal, and I'm all for cutting down on toxins - but the facts is the facts.

Since the 1930's, cancer rates have gone up horrifically and have not gone back down to those levels.

Cancer incidence has decreased slightly in the last ten years, primarily due to people stopping smoking.

Life expectancy has increased due to better treatment and early detection.

There is absolutely nothing to indicate that we have made significant progress on cancer prevention, or that we don't need to continue looking into pollutants in the environment and their connection to cancer.

I already posted the links for you. You ignored them, so hell no I'm not going to go dig them up again.

...wish to bring world population back down to no more than 500 million people!

...increase in age in general is an great increase in cancer. Cancer is the result of cellular aging and a break down of maintaining genetic integrity. It's one of the main reason why even just a few generations ago cancer just wasn't as prevalent.

Which isn't to say that background exposure to carcinogens makes it any better, I just hope you don't think everyone's getting cancer *just* from those chemicals.

Aging + chemicals + hereditary cancer genes = not kosher.

the longer we live, the more toxic build up within our bodies, the increased liklihood these toxins can affect that reproduction. We literally do not have the same arm that we did a year ago. Heck, we don't even have the same esophageal lining that we had TWO DAYS ago. The longer we live the better chance that environmental toxins and endocrine disruptors can affect healthy cellular reproduction.

Hereditary cancer genes? Well, something turns those genes on and off. There have been many studies linking endocrine disruptors from environmental toxins to cancer. And you're right, for some it appears to be a turn of the cards.

I agree with you, toxins aren't always the culprit and many other factors exist. The question truly becomes "why". Why with an increase in age does cancer risk increase? Why do 'hereditary cancer genes' get triggered in some persons and not in others? More and more the culprit is often linked to diet and lifestyle as well as chemical toxicity. This is NOT saying that ALL cancer is a result of diet and lifestyle and chemical toxicity.(that is my disclaimer for those ready to flame me for that statement).

The "why" you seek is incredibly complex. Certain genes most certainly can be flipped on and be expressed from environmental cues. An increase in age, as I mentioned before, increases a risk of cancer because the cellular machinery that your cells have to self-destruct (apoptosis being the technical term for programed cell death) or maintain genetic integrity simply break down. Replication, although astonishingly accurate, still does have some errors and those errors do accumulate. The accumulations can certainly become cancerous later in life, though not all people will. It just depends on a lot of different factors.

There's a lot of variables here.

water system after the collective acts of elimination. For example there are female hormones in the urine of women who take the Pill that won't dissipate after water treatment. How about psychiatric drugs? Blood pressure meds?

would be horrified to think we are being exposed to estrogens and xenosestrogens at the levels we are.

possible explanation behind the spate of girls experiencing the onset of "early puberty" at ages nine and ten with menstration and development of breasts prematurely.

"This is the kind of work advanced by Teresa Heinz through her annual Conference on Women’s Health & the Environment and related Heinz Foundation grants.

Teresa had convened this groundbreaking conference for women in Boston in 1996, well before even the CDC published its own National Exposure Report in 2001. As Teresa puts it, “There was a shocking lack of scientific research and policy discussion on the potential environmental causes of rising rates of various types of illness. It was almost as though no one wanted to consider the possibility that we might be poisoning ourselves through our environment.” The conference hosts a panel of distinguished experts on environmental toxins and their relation to various afflictions ranging from cosmetic use to cancer."

http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/?p=70

Singer Sheryl Crow is going to the Hill this week to lobby Congress to stop blocking passage of the BCERA (Breast Cancer & Environmental Research Act). The GOP has been killing the bill in Congress for the last 6 years and they're trying to kill it again in the Senate HELP Committee.