Prevention key to fighting cancer

YOUR article (June 1) linking mobile phones and cancer is laudable but may serve to confuse rather than enlighten, which probably reflects the reality of the situation as of today.

The fact that the WHO, through IARC, has officially recognised the possibility is extremely important.

The article, by associating phones with coffee in the first sentence immediately serves to downgrade the warning, with possible serious consequences.

“Coffee” is not in fact one of the 266 Group 2b carcinogens listed by IARC, caffeic acid is.

This is not the same as caffeine but it is present in coffee beans as well as in many other plants. But to add further confusion, caffeic acid also acts as an antioxidant and may help to prevent some forms of cancer and some other degenerative conditions.

Life has evolved over millions of years so that cells can combat, the ubiquitous carcinogens in the environment.

But by adding synthetic chemicals — most of the substances on IARC’s groups — in vast quantities over the past 200 years, and more recently vastly increasing our electromagnetic exposure levels by several thousands of orders of magnitude we have transformed the “carcinogenic environment” completely, with the result that we have ever increasing prevalence of most cancers.

We cannot eliminate carcinogens from the environment but what we can and should do is minimise our exposure by reducing or eliminating chemicals, including household chemicals and paints, pesticides and personal use (cosmetics) chemicals as far as possible and by legislative measures to reduce or eliminate chemicals being released into the environment and by reducing exposure to electromagnetic radiation.

The importance of the IARC statement lies in the fact the exposure level is so huge, amounting to 5 billion users world wide, three and a half million users in Ireland.

This creates a potentially serious public health risk which in our straitened financial time we can ill afford, irrespective of the painful social/family consequences.

The most important way to combat the cancer “epidemic” is to initiate effective primary prevention measures, individually and collectively.

Dr Philip Michael

Hon Sec, Irish Doctors Environmental Association

Vice-President (Europe)

International Society of Doctors for the Environment

Millbrook Medical Centre

Bandon

Co Cork