SALT AS A CAUSE OF CANCER.
Dr. James Braithwaite, of England, is authority for the following statements regarding the free use of salt as a cause of cancer. These statements are condensed from an article by Dr. Braithwaite, published in the London Lancet of Dec. 7, 1901:— “1. That excess of salt in the diet is one of four factors which originate the disease. This is the essential factor, but it is inoperative without at least one, and probably two, of the others. Excess of salt may arise from individual taste, or from much salt meat, or from too much ordinary meat, which of course involves much salt. The other factors are these:— “2. An overnourished condition of body from more food, and especially more meat, than is required. This condition is rarely met with among outdoor manual workers. “3. An impure condition of body, owing to non-use and non-oxidation of the food which has been taken. The amount may have been moderate or even small. The cells of the body in this condition are loaded with effete material. It obtains in old age in persons who lead indolent, easy, and indoor lives; and locally in organs the active functions of which have ceased. “4. A fourth factor is some irritant or stimulant, such as friction from the stem of a pipe, or irritation from some micro-organism of which no one is actually specific, or ovarian stimulation in the case of the breast. Of these the first must always be present, and probably in some form the fourth, and also in all either the second or the third, but not both of them. These factors being in existence, the disease may be started in, perhaps, epithelial cell, or in a mass of cells which grow individually larger, and change the nature of their protoplasm; for a cancer cell will not stain with congo red, while an epithelial cell takes the stain deeply. The cell becomes a different being, with often more than one nucleus. It is itself the parasite, living and growing at the expense of the tissue around it, and contributing nothing to the common good.” “Nothing can be clearer about cancer than the fact that its incidence is connected with diet; and if our various pieces of knowledge bearing upon diet are compared, it will be found that the only constantly present thing is salt. It does not matter what the rest of the food may be, salt must be present, and in excess, considering the patient's occupation and mode of life. If salt is absent, cancer is absent. Savages, so far as is known, are exempt from cancer, and they get no salt. All domestic animals except the pig are subject to cancer, and salt is given to sheep, to cows, and to horses, but never to pigs. . . .” “Sailors may live for weeks on salt junk and breathe a salt-laden atmosphere, but it does them no great harm because conditions 2 and 3 are absent; that is, they work hard in the open air. Their mortality from cancer is, however, very high; namely, 44.5 per 100,000, contrasting with that of miners (14.5) and iron workers (12.2). The mortality from cancer in London is extremely high in the whole of the district west of a line drawn from Newington Green through London Bridge to Sydenham. This embraces the parts inhabited by the wealthy, who take much meat, and of course, with it a corresponding amount of salt.”