The Prime Cause & Prevention of Cancer by Warburg
Revised September 26, 2012 to clarify B vitamins.
Source: The Prime Cause and Prevention of Cancer by Dr. Otto Warburg
Lecture delivered to Nobel Laureates on June 30, 1966, Lindau, Lake Constance, Germany
There are prime and secondary causes of diseases. By the prime cause of a disease, I mean one that is found in every case of the disease.
Cancer, above all other diseases, has countless secondary causes. But, even for cancer, there is only one prime cause. The prime cause of cancer is the replacement of the respiration of oxygen (oxidation of sugar) in normal body cells by fermentation of sugar.
All normal body cells meet their energy needs by respiration of oxygen, whereas cancer cells meet their energy needs in great part by fermentation. All normal body cells are thus obligate aerobes [need oxygen], whereas all cancer cells are partial anaerobes [do not need oxygen]. From the standpoint of the physics and chemistry of life this difference between normal and cancer cells is so great that one can scarcely picture a greater difference. Oxygen gas, the donor of energy in plants and animals, is dethroned [removed] in the cancer cells and replaced by the energy yielding reaction of the lowest living forms, namely the fermentation of sugar.
In every case, during the cancer development, the oxygen respiration always falls, fermentation appears, and the highly differentiated cells are transformed into fermenting anaerobes, which have lost all their body functions and retain only the now useless property of growth and replication. Thus, when respiration disappears, life does not disappear, but the meaning of life disappears, and what remains are growing machines that destroy the body in which they grow.
All carcinogens [includes toxins] impair respiration directly or indirectly by deranging capillary [tiny blood vessels] circulation, a statement that is proven by the fact that no cancer cell exists without exhibiting impaired respiration. Of course, respiration cannot be repaired if it is impaired at the same time by a carcinogen [includes toxins].
To prevent cancer it is therefore proposed first to keep the speed of the blood stream so high that the venous blood still contains sufficient oxygen; second, to keep high the concentration of hemoglobin in the blood; third, to add always to the food, even of healthy people, the active groups of the respiratory enzymes [see notes following this article]. If at the same time exogenous [from outside the body] carcinogens are excluded rigorously, then much of the endogenous [inside the body] cancer may be prevented today.
[However, it isn’t as simple as Dr. Warburg advises, since taking respiratory enzymes alone does not correct the underlying "cause" of the cells changing over to fermentation—see Five Primary Causes of Failing Health below.]
These proposals are in no way utopian [ideal]. On the contrary, they may be realized by everybody, everywhere, at any hour. Unlike the prevention of many other diseases, the prevention of cancer requires no government help, and not much money.
Many experts agree that one could prevent about 80% of all cancers in man, if one could keep away the known carcinogens from the normal body cells. But how can the remaining 20%, the so–called spontaneous cancers, be prevented? It is indisputable that all cancer could be prevented if the respiration of body cells were kept intact.
Nobody today can say that one does not know what the prime cause of cancer is. On the contrary, there is no disease whose prime cause is better known, so that today ignorance is no longer an excuse for avoiding measures for prevention. That the prevention of cancer will come there is no doubt. But how long prevention will be avoided depends on how long the "prophets of agnosticism" [people who are unwilling to commit to an opinion about something] will succeed in inhibiting the application of scientific knowledge in the cancer field. In the meantime, millions of men and women must die of cancer unnecessarily.
Five Primary Causes of All Failing Health
- Lack of the correct combination of nutrients all Humans need in order to be healthy—see Food Selection for Humans and Nutrients Required for Human Health and Healing.
- Lack of oxygen at a cellular level.
- Accumulation of toxins, poisons, and waste because of an inability of the body to detoxify like it should.
- Lowered vitality (energy) due to stress, shock, injury, emotional upsets, losses, relationship or financial worries, being unhealthy, etc.
- Poor "Nutritional Status" acquired from parents upon conception, which involves nutrient imbalances and/or deficiencies and toxins that cause weak cells lacking in nutrients, oxygen, and energy.
Note: Dr. Warburg does not provide information about respiratory enzymes, but other’s do, as follows.
Respiratory Vitamins
Some of these are from: www.stopcancer.com.
- Niacin (Vitamin B3); not niacinamide nor any non–flushing kind of niacin—see Niacin (Vitamin B3) and also the note below.
- Vitamin B2 (riboflavin)—see note below.
- Vitamin B5 (pantothenic acid)—see note below.
- Vitamin E
- Hydrogen Peroxide: Vitamin C stimulates the body to produce its own hydrogen peroxide, so oral hydrogen peroxide should never be taken. That is why megadoses of vitamin C are administered by Orthomolecular Physicians orally and intravenously to treat cancer patients. It is safe to take large doses (up to 20,000 mg per day) of vitamin C for one week, but doses higher than 20,000 mg per day taken over longer periods of time should not be stopped suddenly. Doses 20,000 mg per day and higher must always be lowered slowly the same way they were increased since your body cannot handle it.
Note: The B vitamins above are obtained by taking vitamin B complex supplements. If a B complex supplement contains niacinamide or non–flushing niacin buy a separate supplement of "true" niacin (B3), and take it in addition to the vitamin B complex supplement.
Respiratory Vitamins Alone Do Not Cure Cancer
Cancer cannot be cured by trying to change the cells from fermentation to respiration. Cancer can only cured by getting healthy.
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