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The review (well one):
The Hidden Story of Cancer by Brian S. Peskin and Amid Habib
Written by Mike Donkers Monday, 11 February 2013 18:12 The Hidden Story of Cancer: Find Out Why Cancer Has Physicians on the Run and How a Simple Plan Based on New Science Can Prevent It
By Brian S. Peskin and Amid Habib
Pinnacle Press
In Brian Peskin’s world it’s all very simple and straightforward: he’s right and virtually everyone else is wrong. Attend one of his lectures or email him personally, as I have done, and that’s pretty much the message you’re going to get. But how right is he actually?
Peskin is very clever at mixing facts and fiction. Sadly, the facts aren’t originally his own―but the fiction is.
Peskin claims he’s "standing on the shoulders of a giant." That giant is none other than German biochemist Otto Warburg, a contemporary of Weston Price. Peskin brings Warburg’s very important, yet largely ignored research on cancer and nutrients to the reader’s attention. For this, he deserves every bit of credit.
For those of you not familiar with Otto Warburg, this brilliant scientist started doing research into the mechanism behind cancer in the 1920s. Warburg discovered and demonstrated that cancer cells are normal cells which become anaerobic cancer cells once they lack as little as 35 percent oxygen. The cells then start fermenting blood sugar (glucose) as a source of fuel, much like the cells of primitive organisms do.
This anaerobic fermentation process is known in medical circles as the “Warburg factor,” but that’s about all the credit they have been willing to extend him. As happens to all great thinkers, Warburg’s findings have been hotly disputed. Yet to date no one has been successful at proving him wrong in clinical trials.
In his book, Peskin demonstrates the fallacy of looking for cancer-causing “viruses” or “oncogenes,” stressing that cancer is not viral, nor is it genetic. Peskin even gets it right when he mentions that the integrity and permeability of the cell membrane, which is largely composed of lipids (fats), is very important for transporting oxygen and other important nutrients into the cell, as well as waste matter out of the cell.
He’s also right on the money when he mentions that the consumption of too many carbs and processed vegetable oils and fats jacks up our blood sugar and weakens and suffocates the cell walls, thus promoting the very factors that Otto Warburg discovered cause cancer. So far, so good.
But where Peskin goes wrong is when he starts adding his own questionable views about how to restore and maintain the integrity of the cell membrane.
According to Peskin, all the reader needs to do is take supplements of high-quality, plant-based “Parent Essential Oils (PEOs),” that is, essential eighteen-carbon omega-3 (alpha-linolenic acid) and eighteen-carbon omega-6 (linoleic acid) fats.
According to Peskin, these “parent oils” are all the human body needs and it will effortlessly make the necessary conversion to the elongated forms of omega-3 (DHA) and omega-6 (arachidonic acid). Countless studies have proven him wrong and shown that the body actually prefers ready-made long-chain fatty acids, but Peskin conveniently looks the other way and says they’re wrong and he’s right.
In fact, according to Peskin, long-chain omega-3 fatty acids are even “toxic.” Here’s the real kicker: DHA-rich fish oils (including cod liver oil) are written off as “poisons.” Never once does he distinguish between highly processed fish oil and low-temperatureproduced cod liver oil. For Peskin, it’s all “poison." Oddly enough, Peskin does distinguish between “adulterated” and “unadulterated” PEOs.
But it gets even weirder. For some reason known only to Peskin, he has taken it upon himself to glorify omega-6 fatty acids and villify omega-3 fatty acids, particularly the elongated variety. Peskin even claims the human body contains very little omega-3, since most of it gets “burned up” by the body.
On what science does he base his information? Peskin cites a body of studies which show that omega-6 is ubiquitous in humans. Although this looks convincing on the surface, such studies are actually based on modern, grain-eating humans. Had Peskin bothered to study populations of hunter-gatherers, subsisting for the most part on wild animals eating a lot of omega-3 rich green plants, he might have arrived at entirely different conclusions about the fatty acid composition of the human body―with a much larger base in evolutionary history, I might add.
It’s now a well-known scientific fact that modern confinement cattle, as well as the humans that eat them, are largely grain-fed, causing a predominance of omega-6 fatty acids in the body, at the expense of the omega-3 fatty acids Peskin has a problem with. Paradoxically, Peskin does advocate the consumption of grass-fed meat.
He produces one study after another about the importance of plant-based essential fatty acids. Yet he fails to recognize that there is a government agenda to turn populations worldwide into semi-vegetarians by basing their food intake on carbohydrates from grains, vegetables and fruit and very little animal fat and cholesterol.
Saturated fat, the fat of choice for all the indigenous populations―gets hardly a mention in Peskin’s book. Only a handful of brave scientists have actually studied saturated fat in great depth and detail, among whom is Mary Enig, someone Peskin is not likely to “chew the fat” with any time soon. Actually, the body needs only very small quantities of "parent" essential fatty acids when the diet is rich in saturated fat.
"Just take the oils," is all he seems to be saying in his book and lectures. Oh, and eat protein. Animal protein, that is. It seems animals are only good as a source of quality protein, but the fats will have to come from plant-based oil supplements.
So tell me, Brian, where exactly did Grock get his oil supplements? A couple of cave blocks away? Where did he get his plant-based essential oils during an Ice Age which lasted 2.5 million years? And did he really only eat lean meat?
By now you’re probably wondering what all of this has to do with “the hidden story of cancer.” According to Peskin, our cell membranes are supposed to be made up of essential fatty acids, the “PEOs” he recommends the reader should supplement with.
In a bizarre twist of logic, Peskin actually manages to view these highly unstable oils as “oxygen magnets.” According to him, the PEOs attract oxygen from the blood, which then ends up in the cell, thus oxygenating the cell and preventing or curing cancer, which is inherently anaerobic.
Yes, unstable fats do attract oxygen, but they turn rancid as a result, because these unstable fats are highly susceptible to oxidation. Which is why, in the human body, they’re always in the presence of highly stable saturated fat to prevent this from happening. Although Peskin does acknowledge this fact, this is only mentioned in passing.
Despite all the scientific “evidence,” which seems to back up Peskin’s claims, he fails to produce even one controlled, double-blind scientific trial that clearly proves the effectiveness of his protocol.
Not only is all of this misleading to cancer patients, it’s also plain wrong. But in Peskin’s world, he’s right and you’re not. He may be “standing on the shoulders of a giant” (Otto Warburg), but a giant Peskin is not.
Had he confined himself to merely writing a book about Otto Warburg, I would no doubt have put my thumb up for this book. But, since Peskin takes Warburg’s well-studied facts and adds his own pseudo-scientific fiction into the mix, my thumb remains firmly down for this book.
This article appeared in Wise Traditions in Food, Farming and the Healing Arts, the quarterly magazine of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Winter 2012.
About the Reviewer
[authorbio:donkers-mike]
The Hidden Story of Cancer by Brian S. Peskin and Amid Habib
Written by Mike Donkers Monday, 11 February 2013 18:12 The Hidden Story of Cancer: Find Out Why Cancer Has Physicians on the Run and How a Simple Plan Based on New Science Can Prevent ItBy Brian S. Peskin and Amid Habib
Pinnacle Press
In Brian Peskin’s world it’s all very simple and straightforward: he’s right and virtually everyone else is wrong. Attend one of his lectures or email him personally, as I have done, and that’s pretty much the message you’re going to get. But how right is he actually?
Peskin is very clever at mixing facts and fiction. Sadly, the facts aren’t originally his own―but the fiction is.
Peskin claims he’s "standing on the shoulders of a giant." That giant is none other than German biochemist Otto Warburg, a contemporary of Weston Price. Peskin brings Warburg’s very important, yet largely ignored research on cancer and nutrients to the reader’s attention. For this, he deserves every bit of credit.
For those of you not familiar with Otto Warburg, this brilliant scientist started doing research into the mechanism behind cancer in the 1920s. Warburg discovered and demonstrated that cancer cells are normal cells which become anaerobic cancer cells once they lack as little as 35 percent oxygen. The cells then start fermenting blood sugar (glucose) as a source of fuel, much like the cells of primitive organisms do.
This anaerobic fermentation process is known in medical circles as the “Warburg factor,” but that’s about all the credit they have been willing to extend him. As happens to all great thinkers, Warburg’s findings have been hotly disputed. Yet to date no one has been successful at proving him wrong in clinical trials.
In his book, Peskin demonstrates the fallacy of looking for cancer-causing “viruses” or “oncogenes,” stressing that cancer is not viral, nor is it genetic. Peskin even gets it right when he mentions that the integrity and permeability of the cell membrane, which is largely composed of lipids (fats), is very important for transporting oxygen and other important nutrients into the cell, as well as waste matter out of the cell.
He’s also right on the money when he mentions that the consumption of too many carbs and processed vegetable oils and fats jacks up our blood sugar and weakens and suffocates the cell walls, thus promoting the very factors that Otto Warburg discovered cause cancer. So far, so good.
But where Peskin goes wrong is when he starts adding his own questionable views about how to restore and maintain the integrity of the cell membrane.
According to Peskin, all the reader needs to do is take supplements of high-quality, plant-based “Parent Essential Oils (PEOs),” that is, essential eighteen-carbon omega-3 (alpha-linolenic acid) and eighteen-carbon omega-6 (linoleic acid) fats.
According to Peskin, these “parent oils” are all the human body needs and it will effortlessly make the necessary conversion to the elongated forms of omega-3 (DHA) and omega-6 (arachidonic acid). Countless studies have proven him wrong and shown that the body actually prefers ready-made long-chain fatty acids, but Peskin conveniently looks the other way and says they’re wrong and he’s right.
In fact, according to Peskin, long-chain omega-3 fatty acids are even “toxic.” Here’s the real kicker: DHA-rich fish oils (including cod liver oil) are written off as “poisons.” Never once does he distinguish between highly processed fish oil and low-temperatureproduced cod liver oil. For Peskin, it’s all “poison." Oddly enough, Peskin does distinguish between “adulterated” and “unadulterated” PEOs.
But it gets even weirder. For some reason known only to Peskin, he has taken it upon himself to glorify omega-6 fatty acids and villify omega-3 fatty acids, particularly the elongated variety. Peskin even claims the human body contains very little omega-3, since most of it gets “burned up” by the body.
On what science does he base his information? Peskin cites a body of studies which show that omega-6 is ubiquitous in humans. Although this looks convincing on the surface, such studies are actually based on modern, grain-eating humans. Had Peskin bothered to study populations of hunter-gatherers, subsisting for the most part on wild animals eating a lot of omega-3 rich green plants, he might have arrived at entirely different conclusions about the fatty acid composition of the human body―with a much larger base in evolutionary history, I might add.
It’s now a well-known scientific fact that modern confinement cattle, as well as the humans that eat them, are largely grain-fed, causing a predominance of omega-6 fatty acids in the body, at the expense of the omega-3 fatty acids Peskin has a problem with. Paradoxically, Peskin does advocate the consumption of grass-fed meat.
He produces one study after another about the importance of plant-based essential fatty acids. Yet he fails to recognize that there is a government agenda to turn populations worldwide into semi-vegetarians by basing their food intake on carbohydrates from grains, vegetables and fruit and very little animal fat and cholesterol.
Saturated fat, the fat of choice for all the indigenous populations―gets hardly a mention in Peskin’s book. Only a handful of brave scientists have actually studied saturated fat in great depth and detail, among whom is Mary Enig, someone Peskin is not likely to “chew the fat” with any time soon. Actually, the body needs only very small quantities of "parent" essential fatty acids when the diet is rich in saturated fat.
"Just take the oils," is all he seems to be saying in his book and lectures. Oh, and eat protein. Animal protein, that is. It seems animals are only good as a source of quality protein, but the fats will have to come from plant-based oil supplements.
So tell me, Brian, where exactly did Grock get his oil supplements? A couple of cave blocks away? Where did he get his plant-based essential oils during an Ice Age which lasted 2.5 million years? And did he really only eat lean meat?
By now you’re probably wondering what all of this has to do with “the hidden story of cancer.” According to Peskin, our cell membranes are supposed to be made up of essential fatty acids, the “PEOs” he recommends the reader should supplement with.
In a bizarre twist of logic, Peskin actually manages to view these highly unstable oils as “oxygen magnets.” According to him, the PEOs attract oxygen from the blood, which then ends up in the cell, thus oxygenating the cell and preventing or curing cancer, which is inherently anaerobic.
Yes, unstable fats do attract oxygen, but they turn rancid as a result, because these unstable fats are highly susceptible to oxidation. Which is why, in the human body, they’re always in the presence of highly stable saturated fat to prevent this from happening. Although Peskin does acknowledge this fact, this is only mentioned in passing.
Despite all the scientific “evidence,” which seems to back up Peskin’s claims, he fails to produce even one controlled, double-blind scientific trial that clearly proves the effectiveness of his protocol.
Not only is all of this misleading to cancer patients, it’s also plain wrong. But in Peskin’s world, he’s right and you’re not. He may be “standing on the shoulders of a giant” (Otto Warburg), but a giant Peskin is not.
Had he confined himself to merely writing a book about Otto Warburg, I would no doubt have put my thumb up for this book. But, since Peskin takes Warburg’s well-studied facts and adds his own pseudo-scientific fiction into the mix, my thumb remains firmly down for this book.
This article appeared in Wise Traditions in Food, Farming and the Healing Arts, the quarterly magazine of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Winter 2012.
About the Reviewer
[authorbio:donkers-mike]
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