Millions Wrongly Treated for ‘Cancer,’ National Cancer Institute Panel Confirms
A devastating new report commissioned by the National Cancer Institute reveals that our 40-year long ‘War on Cancer’ has been waged against a vastly misunderstood ‘enemy,’ that in many cases represented no threat to human health whatsoever.
If you have been following our advocacy work on cancer, particularly in connection with the dark side of breast cancer awareness month, you know that we have been calling for the complete reclassification of some types of ‘breast cancer’ as benign lesions, e.g. ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), as well as pointing out repeatedly that x-ray based breast screenings are not only highly carcinogenic but are also causing an epidemic of “overdiagnosis” and “overtreatment” in US women, with an estimated 1.3 million cases in the past 30 years alone.
This week, a National Cancer Institute commissioned panel’s report published in JAMA online confirmed that we all – public and professionals alike – should stop calling low-risk lesions like DCIS and high-grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia (HGPIN) ‘cancer.’
There are wide-reaching implications to this recommendation, including:
- Millions of women in this country have been diagnosed with DCIS, and millions of men with HGPIN, and subsequently [mis]treated. Are they now to be retroactively reclassified as ‘victims’ of iatrogenesis, with legal recourse to seek compensation?
- Anyone engaged in a cancer screening will now need to reconsider and weigh both the risks and benefits of such a ‘preventive’ strategy, considering that the likelihood of being diagnosed with a false positive over 10 years is already over 50% for women undergoing annual breast screening.
- The burgeoning pink ribbon-bedecked ‘breast cancer awareness’ industry will be forced to reformulate its message, as it is theoretically culpable for the overdiagnosis and overtreatment of millions of US women by propagating an entirely false concept of ‘cancer.’
As reported by Medscape:
The practice of oncology in the United States is in need of a host of reforms and initiatives to mitigate the problem of overdiagnosis and overtreatment of cancer, according to a working group sanctioned by the National Cancer Institute.
Perhaps most dramatically, the group says that a number of premalignant conditions, including ductal carcinoma in situ and high-grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia, should no longer be called “cancer.”
Instead, the conditions should be labeled something more appropriate, such as indolent lesions of epithelial origin (IDLE), the working group suggests. The Viewpoint report was published online July 29 in JAMA.
Fundamentally, overdiagnosis results from the fact that screen-detected ‘cancers’ are disproportionately slower growing ones, present with few to no symptoms, and would never progress to cause harm if left undiagnosed and untreated.