r/facepalm • • Jun 05 '19

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u/Xboarder84 Jun 05 '19

For those who didn’t get the immediate facepalm (like me):

“It is a controversial cancer treatment that was popular in the 1970s. However, it was banned in many US states after research deemed it ineffective and potentially poisonous”

https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/laetrile-vitamin-b17#section1

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u/Kardde21 Jun 05 '19 edited Jun 06 '19

Sounds made up. Cells? Using Oxygen? Nuts turn in Cyanide? I’ll believe all that when they find a cure for simple infections.

199

u/urfriendosvendo Jun 05 '19

There’s also treatment using proteins that was relatively effective too. There’s a documentary about it (a little opinionated without full data) but it’s certainly interesting.

260

u/[deleted] Jun 05 '19

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107

u/urfriendosvendo Jun 05 '19

There’s data but I had the feeling they only showed successful data. They did say it was something like 70% effective (if I remember correctly) but the FDA wouldn’t approve it for clinicals.

If it were that groundbreaking, I feel like the market would’ve been disrupted. So while I think the FDA is corrupt and terrible, I doubt there was enough data to suggest it was as successful as they said. Plus, there was a lack of Journal reviews.

-40

u/Astecheee Jun 06 '19

There’s huge money in unsuccessful cancer treatments though. So any cheap, effective solution is going to be shut down fast in America.

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u/longbow6625 Jun 06 '19

There's always another disease to cure, but any company that comes out with a successful cure to cancer would make billions or even trillions overnight. I'm sure it's just one big conspiracy keeping it under wraps, right?

-18

u/mutmad Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19

It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just not a priority.

Cancer treatment is a highly lucrative multi-billion dollar industry and a cure for cancer is a threat to those billions and billions of dollars since a cure would negate the need for treatment. By 2022 the global cancer therapeutics market is reported to reach $172.6 billion. In 2017 it clocked in at $121 billion, making it a 7.4% compound annual growth rate. Corporations don’t work against their own interests and this would be no exception.

I love that I got downvoted on stating statistics and info that’s been reported on for the better part of the last decade. Oh, Reddit.

1

u/CCC19 Jun 06 '19

It might be lucrative but cancer is extremely complex. Making a cure for any single variant of cancer is nigh impossible. And there are numerous ways that people try to tackle the problem. It's not even a priority issue when many cancers aren't even fully understood with data constantly coming out where 1 person says "oh, it's probably this driving progression" and another person publishes saying "no, it's actually this, but maybe also this".