Study says cancer is manmade

Researchers at Manchester's KNH Centre for Biomedical Egyptology Cancer studied mummified remains and literary evidence from ancient Egypt, literary evidence from ancient Greece and medical studies of human and animal remains from earlier periods, going back to the age of the dinosaurs.

According to the study published in Nature Reviews Cancer, caner is the result of diet and pollution in the modern age. Only one case of cancer was found among hundreds of Egyptian mummies, with only few references to the disease in literary evidence.

The unnamed mummy was diagnosed with rectal cancer by Professor Michael Zimmerman, a visiting Professor at the KNH Centre, PhysOrg reported.

The rate of cancer, especially childhood cancer, has greatly risen since the Industrial Revolution, showing that old age is not the main reason behind cancer, scientists say.

“In industrialized societies, cancer is second only to cardiovascular disease as a cause of death. But in ancient times, it was extremely rare,” said Professor Rosalie David of the Faculty of Life Sciences.

“There is nothing in the natural environment that can cause cancer. So it has to be a manmade disease, down to pollution and changes to our diet and lifestyle.”

Scientists also believe that the short life span of the ancients precluded the development of cancer, but people of ancient Egypt and Greece did live long enough to develop diseases such as atherosclerosis, Paget's bone disease and osteoporosis.

The team found first descriptions of cancer operations in the 17th century and the first reports in scientific literature of distinctive tumors in the past 200 years.

Via : presstv