The Immortal Cell: Why Cancer Research Fails

by Gerald B. Dermer

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• Format: Mass Market Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0895295822
• ISBN13: 9780895295828
• Release Date: January 1995
• Publisher: Avery Publishing Group
• Length: 212 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.0" x 9.0"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 12 and higher

Customer Reviews

A different perspective on cancer research

Read this book along with the widely acclaimed "Dr. Folkman's War" for a balanced perspective on cancer research. Dermer presents some important ideas, clearly articulated and powerfully argued. He asserts that cell lines, cancer cells examined in a laboratory are a poor model for cancer research because of the vast difference between such cultured cells and cancer in a human body. This little-known (and reasonably-priced) book accurately predicted the failure of anti-angiogenesis research and partly explains why laboratory success has not and perhaps will not translate into successful treatment. The book does have its limitations. Dermer apparently wrote this partly to inform the public, partly to level some scores in his profession. He is less successful at presenting another model for research than in explaining the shortcoming of current cellular research. He suggests animal research but fails to review the logical results of that theory. Instead of testing cells in the laboratory, will we experiment on millions of beagles? Ultimately the book is limited because the author fails to throughly explore his own theories. Notwithstanding, some of its limitations, there is a strong case made that much of the billions of dollars in cancer research is misspent, that there are inherent biases in this area, and that legitimate counterviews are ignored and suppressed. Certainly Dermer's ideas are sufficiently well-reasoned that they should have been given a place in a major journal, and indeed his book accurately predict the failure of drugs like Angiostatin such seven years after the book's publication. For the average reader, not only does the book presents a different perspective, it explains many concepts in cancer research in a clear and understandable fashion.

Supremely important but ignored by establishment medicine

As a pathologist, Dr. Dermer has a lifetime of experience with actual human cancer cells. He explains that cancer research fails because the "cell lines" used in research have been changed in the laboratory so that they bear no resemblance to actual human cancer cells. Therefore, good lab results fail on human trials most of the time, as is verified in the medical journals weekly.This should be required reading for every medical researcher. But it would show up the medical brahmins as frauds, and is therefore ignored.The book also contains much other useful health information.I have diligently researched the cancer literature during the past six years, and Dr. Dermer's courageous thesis rings absolutely true. Real progress in curing cancer will never be made on the prevailing orthodox path of research. Chemo and radiation are acknowledged destroyers of the immune system. Gene therapy is no answer, either. Rebuilding the immune system is the only sensible approach.

great book, but too short! also, missing related research

just finished reading it late feb 99, and that is timely due to the vindication of one of his more amazing facts exposed in the book: that a high fiber diet has nothing at all to do with lowering the risk of colon cancer! this has been parroted for years by the mainstream media and medicine, yet here it is in a book written in early 1993!(postscript, p. 179) you may recall the big splash made in early 1999 when a major medical magazine(may have been NEJM or JAMA?) announced that there is NO reduction in colorectal cancer for people on a high-fiber diet. this refers to the INSOLUBLE fibre found in bran, for instance,NOT the soluble fibre found in oats and others that reduces cholesterol by absorbing it in the gut before it can be digested in the tract. yet, there it all is on pages 72-3, describing how this sham science was allowed to mushroom, to the detriment of true, impartial research , by researchers who were blinded by the want of funding by a major cereal company(not named). unfortunately, he only makes passing reference to the NCI changing their target of cancer from treatment to prevention, due to their dismal track record since 1971, when the "war on cancer" was officially kicked off by nixon. tens of billions later, there is only a RISING incidence of almost all cancers,with a 5.4% INCREASE in mortality in 1987 compared to 1973, and only 3 cancers, that together make up only 2% of all cancers(hodgkin's, testicular, and childhood leukemia)can be considered treatable by chemotherapy! he doesn't have a chapter on nutritional therapy, whether for prevention or for increased life expectancy of cancer victims. yet there are volumes of research that show that certain minerals and herbs/vitamins(notably selenium), can cut risk of certain cancers by almost 50%! perhaps he did not wish to comment on this area, as he is a medical researcher whose expertise is in pathology, which is the study of disease, an AFTER-THE-FACT condition. how short-sighted. but he could have made the book longer and more detailed, as it is a smallish tome. it is a damning book, that exposes the real killers of cancer victims as the chemotherapeutic drugs used, most of them derivatives of the deadly mustard gas! no wonder both michael landon and lee remick both quit their chemo before they succumbed! they were being killed quickly. ask yourself also how it is that two more recent famous cancer victims, with all their multi-millions, and so access to the latest and "best" treatments available, succumbed after long and tortuous battles. i refer to jackie onassis and linda mccartney. the NCI actually had the pomposity and audacity to announce that their goal was a 50% reduction in the cancer death rate by 2000. well, here we are in 1999, and things are bleak.

A very informative and compelling book.

A very inforamtive, yet frighting view of our current situation batteling Cancer. I am gald to see someone go against the establishment and inform the public of the truth. The book is well written, with many good points, and although science based, easily understanable.