It’s hard to believe, but one of the most reliable, safe, and inexpensive solutions for cancer has not only been marginalized by mainstream oncology, but by the alternative health crowd as well. Some insiders, even those among the well trained medically, decry laetrile or apricot seed effectiveness while fear mongering its supposed toxic elements.
So I need to address the toxic issue right away. The natural source of laetrile or B17 found most substantially in apricot seed kernels is legally available as long as it’s not promoted to cancer patient as food supplement only. That natural substance source is amygdalin. Unfortunately, many falsely believe this poses a serious cyanide poisoning threat.
The amygdalin compound has four molecules. Two are glucose molecules. The other two are cyanide and benzaldyhide. The latter two perform a couple of unusual metabolic activities: they are released by and into cancer cells only otherwise they remain in the amygdalin compound and are passed through.
It’s a very clever arrangement. The cancer cells depend on fermenting sugar (glucose) for their energy instead of oxygen. So the cancer cells attract the amygdalin compounds for their glucose, but are whacked when they metabolize those compounds that free the benzalldyhide and cyanide. The glucose is the sugar bait.
Cancer cells contain an enzyme that is not found in healthy cells, beta-glucosidase. This enzyme “unlocks” the amygdalin compound, releasing the deadly toxins within the cancer cellOnly cancer cells metabolize amygdalin. Healthy normal cells don’t.
Most non-cancerous cells contain another enzyme, rhodanese. The few free cyanide molecules that may conceivably escape are bound to sulfur molecules by rhodanese, creating harmless cyanates that are eliminated in the urine. Safe enough?
Many, many cancer victims have used apricot seeds to cure themselves, consuming 30 and more per day. Here’s an example from “down under” (Australia), quoted from a March 20, 2010 Sydney Morning Herald article by Jill Stark: “Paul Reid should be dead. Diagnosed with a rare, incurable lymphoma, he was given five years, seven tops, by his oncologist.”
His cancer curing protocol consisted of consuming 30 apricot kernels per day. Looks like he survived all that cyanide! The article included a photo of a healthy Reid, smiling with a platter full of fresh organic foods at age 68, 13 years after his prognosis. He did adjust his eating habits by eliminating red meat, processed foods, and sugar.
The Aussie newspaper’s article is here , along with the normal balanced reportage nonsense from mainstream “experts” who kill more than cure. This video is from G. Edward Griffin, investigative journalist who wrote the book World Without Cancer; The Story of Vitamin B17.
More Background on Laetrile’s Demise
Laetrile is used in some Mexican cancer clinics along with B-17 tablets. Sometimes laetrile is injected, but B-17 tablets also deliver laetrile. The discoverer of laetrile, Dr. Ernst Krebs, called laetrile B-17 because it structurally resembles the B vitamin chain, though not specifically any of the B vitamins known. He patented his procedure for extracting laetrile but never could get approval for treating cancer.
There was quite a scandal around B-17 or laetrile at the place where non-pharmaceutical cancer cures get shot down with improper testing or fraudulent reporting, The Memorial Sloane-Kettering (MSK) Cancer Institute in New York City.
Laetrile was banned by the FDA during the early 1970s despite its efficacy. One person who refused to go along with the denial and cover-up was Dr. Ralph Moss, who was hired by MSK as a science writer then promoted to head of public affairs. He was MSK’s PR man. But he eventually refused to lie or spin untruths. In his Moss’s own words:
Twenty years ago [1974 – this interview took place in 1994] I was hired at Memorial Sloane Kettering (MSK) Cancer Center in New York as the science writer, later promoted to assistant director of public affairs. Shortly after I went to work there I went to visit an elderly Japanese scientist, Kanematsu Sugiura, who astonished me when he told me he was working on Laetrile (B17), at the time it was the most controversial thing in cancer … reputed to be a cure for cancer.
We were finding this [laetrile’s efficacy] and yet we in public affairs were told to issue statements to the exact opposite of what we were finding scientifically, and as the years went by I got more wrapped up in this thing and 3 years later I said all this in my own press conference, and was fired the next day, ‘for failing to carry out his most basic job responsibility’ – ie to lie to the public about what goes on in cancer research.
Dr Sugiura, never renounced the results of his own studies [proving laetrile halted cancer], despite the fact they put enormous pressure on him to do so.
When I was at MSK a lot of very weird things started to happen to me, there was this cognitive distance between what I was told, and was writing about treatment, especially chemotherapy, and what I was seeing with my own eyes.
My Objection to FDA’s Ban
Ernst T. Krebs reportedly tested early laetrile safety by injecting himself. This was back in the 1960s. Dr. Krebs died in 1996 at the age of 85.
Apparently were no toxicity reports on the MSK animal studies with leatrile. The lab rats’ conditions were improved from induced cancers by laetrile and they didn’t die from the treatments or develop adverse side effects. So why was laetrile banned? If merely not effective, that’s it, good-by.
The FDA could consider it GRAS (generally regarded as safe) while not approving it for cancer. After all, they have approved drugs that have killed many.
It’s logical to assume laetrile or vitamin B-17 tablets were banned because it worked much better than anything Big Pharma could put together, without side effects, and a lot lower expense. That would put a serious dent into the cancer industry’s high profits.
Did you know that doctors administering chemotherapy in their own clinics and offices pay wholesale prices for expensive chemo and mark it up 50 to 100 percent in addition to their office fees? But you can buy apricot seed soft kernels by the bag for very little. Chemo kills all cells it comes into contact with. That’s what causes many so called deaths from cancer – mainstream medical treatments.
Amygdalin goes after cancer cells only. If your apricot kernel consumption leads to queasiness or anything unusual, take less. And make sure you have curbed sugar intake. Some who aren’t diagnosed with cancer take only a couple a day as a preventative. But you saw the Aussie story above. He took 30 apricot kernels daily with a good organic sans sugar diet to help cure his cancer.
