A recent study of 200 nations (i.e., the world) estimates that although 400,000 children contract cancer every year, almost 50% are never diagnosed or treated. This is based on a statistical model because registry data is spotty. Only 3% of pediatric cases go undiagnosed in Europe and America, thus the numbers elsewhere are often much worse than the global average.
Having lost a young relative to cancer, I know that grief. The condition may sound rare on a planet of seven-plus billion people, but it isn’t. One child in 330 develops cancer before reaching adulthood; quick math confirms the new numbers are in that ballpark. In my county alone, that would be well over 500 young people this year. The American Cancer Society reports that only accidents are more common than cancer as a cause of death among children.
The story gets worse. Seemingly 92% of all new pediatric cases occur in low- and middle-income countries. I.e., the nations that can least afford therapies or prophylactics have the most cases by far. So, I wondered: since we reach out with vitamins and vaccines in some of those places, what do we do to preempt cancer there? Heck, what do we do for it in our own neighborhoods? According to my reading, mainly we offer nutrition counseling.
Would it be economical to send botanical anti-cancer concentrates to those areas? It could avoid the problem of picky eaters. That isn’t a joke. An African former colleague ate very few vegetables; he called them “twigs and leaves”. And how hard would it be to create a good pill for this? No herb is a fix-all, but some commonly cited natural anti-cancer compounds are listed below. Several of these have been in clinical trials.
| Plant Category | Compound |
| Cruciferous vegetables | indole-3-carbinol |
| – Cabbage, etc. | brassinin |
| – Broccoli | sulforane |
| – Asparagus and mustard | sulforaphane |
| – Spinach | natural antioxidant mixtures |
| Tomatoes | lycopene |
| Tomatillos | withanolides |
| Carrots | beta-carotenoids |
| Red grapes; Peanuts | resveratrol |
| Allium vegetables (garlic; onion) | sulfur compounds |
| Soybeans | genistein |
| Green tea | tannins |
| Citrus fruits | vitamin C |
| Pomegranates | ellagic acid |
| Cranberries | myrecitin |
| Ginger | [6]-gingerol |
| Ginseng | ginsenosides |
| Rosemary | carnosol |
| Cloves | eugenol |
| Vanilla | vanillin |
| Aloe | emodin |
The key compounds tend to be antioxidants. Because of that, early researchers guessed that those molecules quench byproducts from the reaction of (human) unsaturated lipids with radicals. This makes sense: even oxygen molecules are radicals. But physiology is seldom simple. The compounds listed above ALSO have roles in signaling pathways.* And for instance, radicals mediate the signaling cascades triggered by green tea. Clearly, antioxidants have nuanced roles. In fact, some of them are actually pro-oxidants under some conditions.
But I digress. Different anti-cancer compounds occupy different niches, so we should combine them. A modern rule for well-rounded diets is to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables to obtain all their color categories (green, yellow, orange, red and purple). Unfortunately, the rule is weak at the molecular level. Anticancer compound resveratrol is found in both grapes and peanuts, among other foods. What color is that? Tannins and vitamin C have the same issue.
Never mind. We’ll make arbitrary selections, like Mom did. Let’s say we pick 6 key ingredients for the cancer-preempting pill. Antioxidants are unstable in air, so we’ll smother them in olive oil. Oh, and the ingredients must be bioavailable, which is tricky. Oral doses of (carotene-like) curcuminoids in turmeric aren’t very bioavailable without help.
But we’d find a way. Now, on to the economics. An example is (carotene-like) lycopene, which contributes to the color of tomatoes. For the moment, ignore the fact that the kids may already receive doses of vitamin A that serve the same function. This paragraph is about cost accounting. First, there’s plenty of raw material: America is awash in tomato sauce. But as with most natural products the lycopene concentration is low (~0.1% in fresh tomatoes). Its current bulk price is ~$6,000/kg, ~$170/oz. Copying the daily intake recommendation (15 mg) from related compound Vitamin A yields $0.09 per pill for lycopene cost. For a total of six comparable ingredients the pill cost would be over 50 cents each, before we factor in the costs of excipients, compounding, coating, packaging, shipping or distribution.
Bottom line, by that route we’d be doing well to keep the pill cost down to a buck per day per child all year long on a non-profit basis. Are the kids worth it? Absolutely. But for the same cost, in many parts of the world we could keep their bellies full with nutritious produce.
The analysis isn’t done yet. Pill costs could be slashed if we use cruder extracts and do production abroad. Yet even if we could give pills away for free, most potential donors and non-profit groups won’t get excited about them unless medical associations endorse this approach. That won’t happen until a consensus arises as to which combinations of cancer-preempting natural products are optimal. Alternatively, a windfall from the Gates Foundation might get things moving.
Otherwise, preemptive extracts will remain the prize of buyers who can afford them.
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*As to signaling pathways triggered by plant foods for cancer prevention, a recent abstract mentions nuclear factor kappa B, cyclooxygenase-2, signal transducer and activator of transcription 3, Akt, mitogen activated protein kinase/extracellular regulated kinase, Bcl-2, caspases, poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase, matrix metalloproteinase 2/9, and cyclin D1.
Food for Thought
Z.J. Ward et al., “Estimating the total incidence of global childhood cancer: a simulation-based analysis,” The Lancet, (February 26, 2019). For a summary and commentary, see https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190226184140.htm.
A.R. Khuda-Bukhsh, S. Das, and S.K. Saha, “Molecular approaches toward targeted cancer prevention with some food plants and their products: inflammatory and other signal pathways,” Nutr. Cancer, 66(2):104-205 (2014). ABSTRACT: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259498052_Molecular_Approaches_Toward_Targeted_Cancer_Prevention_with_Some_Food_Plants_and_Their_Products_Inflammatory_and_Other_Signal_Pathways
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