For the last few thousand years, humans have been battling cancer (yes, they have indeed found that cancer isn't a "new" thing whatsoever. There are apparently findings of tumorous bones and such from thousands of years BC).
There are some new turn of events in the fight against cancer (breast cancer in this case) when scientists found that there may be a couple of tumorcidal components that inhibit the growth of certain kinds of breast cancer. One of these components is the compound EVOO. Apparently the research doctors at the Catalan Institute of Oncology in Spain say that going out and consuming massive quantities of EVOO is NOT a good resolution (as ironic as that sounds).
One of the types of EVOO can "rapidly split into inactive compounds" when they are consumed. This would prevent them from assisting in handling the cancer; however, they still might help with development of cancer-fighting drugs and such.
Lignan compounds found in EVOO (Lignan compounds are primarily found in plants, heavily found in flax seed) "may represent a different molecular scenario," say Javier A. Menendez, PhD and his fellow scientists. In testing on mice, the scientists have noticed that the tumors in the mice accumulated lignans. This might suggest "that the anti-cancer activity of lignans may be due to their direct local effects on the breast cancer tissues." *WebMD
As far as NatGeo is concerned, there may be some more proof to support these thoughts as it appears that Greeks have a lower record of heart disease and cancer. *National Geographic
That's certainly some exciting news as far as developing some assistance in fighting cancerous tumors. Definitely something we can use as a species that's for sure. If I am recalling my statistics correctly, over half a million (~566k) people die each year to cancer in the US... This is a horrific number if you look at the statistics of when people actually FIND their cancers. The majority of people don't even realize they have cancer until they have reached stage 3 or 4, which means it's already started to spread. They have a near 10-20% chance of survival at that point. We spend so much money trying to kill cancer that it may prove that we have a better chance at just learning how to detect the cancer sooner without invasive procedures and catching the cancer in stage 1 where there is about a 90% survival rate. Sounds pretty dramatic, right? Exactly. Detection is more important than killing. We're just so caught up in saving those of us who already have the disease that we aren't looking to keeping future members of our species from even GETTING to the point where it is really life threatening.
Remember, detection not destruction... That's likely to be the key to our "defeating" cancer.
Take care.
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