Pardon the clickbait headline, but I honestly could not believe what the AARP published about breast cancer in the cover story in the current issue of AARP The Magazine.
Here is a sampling from one breast-cancer survivor:
This was my own doing, and I take responsibility. When I got my body back into balance, the cancer disappeared.
I have the BRCA2 gene but don’t encourage women to get tested. Genes can be turned on or off. I turned my gene on with my very poor diet.
Our bodies are batteries. We need 70 percent alkaline and 30 percent acid to run optimally. Sugar is the worst, then red meat, dairy, wheat and gluten.
You get the idea: If you have breast cancer, it’s your fault. You got out of balance with your poor diet, and sugar and gluten disrupted your batteries. Or something.
The author of the AARP story, Alanna Nash, got this wisdom from the noted breast-cancer expert and survivor Melissa Etheridge, whom Nash describes as a “music legend.”
But wait–there’s more! It comes from another breast cancer expert, survivor, and music legend–Sheryl Crow:
Women have bodies designed to sustain life, but we don’t allow ourselves to be nurtured. Cancer taught me to put myself first.
The body functions at a higher level cellularly when you’re relaxed. I now do mindful meditation.
These observations appear in a graphic (accompanying a story) under the headline “How They Beat Cancer…Lessons for All of Us.” They amount to a frightening sampler of the myths and much of the nonsense concerning breast cancer. And they are presented without any challenge, criticism, or corrective.
What’s worse, the two music legends don’t even agree. Etheridge says her breast cancer was her fault, but Crow says “You can’t say ‘I did this, and that’s why I got cancer.’ You have to not beat yourself up.” Where Etheridge tells women not to get tested, Crow recommends regular mammograms.
Oncologists, radiologists, and other authorities have spent years trying to determine when mammograms are most useful in screening for breast cancer. It’s comforting to know that Etheridge and Crow think the matter is settled, even if they happen to disagree completely.
What would a reader of the AARP magazine, which goes out to 22 million readers, take away from this article? Much of what these two pop singers say about breast cancer is untrue–or worse, silly–and they don’t even agree on the misinformation they’re dispensing. What’s worse, the Etheridge/Crow guide to breast cancer also appeared in the AARP Bulletin–which means two sets of AARP editors signed off on it.
The AARP is generally a solid source of health information. It sells health insurance. How it could have let this piece creep into print and pixels is a mystery.
And I’m being polite here. Xeni Jardin at boingboing called this a “vomit-inducing, quackery-filled breast cancer piece.” Whew.
File this under “asleep at the editor’s desk.” And if you want to hear more from Etheridge and Crow, turn to iTunes–not the AARP.
-Paul Raeburn
Etheridge’s comments are ridiculous, and also ridiculously confusing. Since BRCA1/2 are tumor suppressor genes, one would want them “on” unless one is carrying a deleterious loss-of-function mutation, and in that case I’m not sure what it would mean to “turn off” the gene–it’s already off, which is where the problem lies.
Never take health advice from celebrities.
Etheridge abandoned all hopes for credibility with one word: gluten. She turned into a farce with the reference to alkaline imbalance.
They would not have found the cancer in my breast if I had not had a mammogram. Even after I saw the tumor I still couldn’t feel it when I did a self exam. It’s irresponsible to suggest that women should not have mammograms.
“When I got my body back into balance, the cancer disappeared.”
I am a breast cancer patient, and I know other breast cancer patients, and I have never heard “getting your body back into balance” as a euphemism for surgery and chemo. I suspect that those are the real reasons her cancer disappeared.
Most celebrities and most of the public believes that if they get breast cancer it is their fault. It’s the end result of the massive propaganda put out by the cancer industry and its allied groups such as the pink ribbon groups and cancer “charities” and the allied mass media: they’ve been “educating” women with the “blame-the-victim” view of breast cancer (you smoked, you drank alcohol, you didn’t exercise, etc) while the major causes of the disease go poorly mentioned or most often totally ignored.
Medical xrays were found to be the main cause of cancer, particularly breast cancer, many years ago (see: The Mammogram Myth by Rolf Hefti). But because public “awareness” of that inculpates the medical industry they’ve been downplaying, denying, or suppressing that fact for a very long time.
Raeburn emphasizes that Etheridge and Crow don’t agree on who’s to fault for breast cancer, “Etheridge tells women not to get tested, Crow recommends regular mammograms.” How’s that opposing advice any different from what the medial orthodoxy tells women where you also have experts and authorities spewing out seriously diverging recommendations about mammography?
Raeburn goes on to boast, “Oncologists, radiologists, and other authorities have spent years trying to determine when mammograms are most useful in screening for breast cancer.” Actually, if you closely look at m ammography you will see that the pro-mammogram view is conducted and sponsored almost all by people with massive vested interests linked to the mammogram industry, such as oncologists, radiologists, surgeons, etc. The entire field is mired in politics and biased “studies” in favor of the procedure (see Mammography Screening: Truth, Lies and Controversy by Peter Gotzsche).
Guess where the real “myths” and “nonsense” is buried?
I agree with Boyce… AARP is a cover for insurance scams. Their magazine is a bunch of filler to create an excuse for a bunch of insurance and hearing aid ads.
I would not rely on that publication for accurate info about anything.
Paul, what ever made you think otherwise?
Healthy local food? Oh like this?
“Toxic Veggies Found in NYC’s Community Gardens”, NY Post
http://nypost.com/2014/11/16/toxic-veggies-found-in-nycs-community-gardens/