Approximately 1/3rd of the US population will eventually contract a form of cancer. Research at Harvard School of Public Health concluded: “seaweed has shown consistent anti-tumour activity. In extrapolating these results to the Japanese population, seaweed may be an important factor in explaining the low rates of certain cancers in Japan” (16).

Seagreens® offers a useful nutritional input in cancer prevention, management and recuperation. Several varieties of Kombu (like Seagreens® also a member of the phæophyta or brown seaweed family) are a traditional decoction for cancer in Japan, where scientists have been able to verify its effective treatment of tumours in the laboratory with: “complete regression in more than half the treated group” (17).

The principal cancer-fighting substances are the special polysaccharides in the brown seaweeds, in Seagreens® typically as much or more than 50% of total carbohydrate which itself accounts for more than half the composition of nutrients, especially fucose and fucoidan which has been shown to cause the destruction as well as the inhibition of cancer cells by preventing adhesion to healthy cells and by interruption of the DNA within the cancer cells (29, 30, 37).

The polysaccharides are now known to have anti-cancer, anti-coagulant, antithrombotic, anti-inflammatory, and anti-viral properties. A substantial body of literature covers this subject with special reference to brain tumour (37), breast cancer (31, 32), intestinal cancer (39), leukaemia (36, 38), lung cancer (29, 33, 34, 35, 36), throat cancer (43), and research into the mode of action (40, 41, 42, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52). Korean research also highlighted the role of sulphated fucoidan in the polysaccharides (92).

A 2003 study in Japan which followed the dietary habits of 40,000 men and women found that the risk of stomach cancer in men with a low-salt intake of 4g to 6g daily was 1 in 1,000 per year, but double in men consuming 12g to 15g per day. The risk for women on a low-salt diet was 1 in 2,000 per year but on a high level diet increased to 1 in 1,300 (93).

Researchers discovered that when stroke-prone rats were overfed salt, only those also fed seaweed powder did not have strokes; indicating that the seaweed was a protective antidote to the excess sodium consumption (27). Seagreens® are highly alkalising - some 75 times more so than apples - and an alkaline system has a greater defence against cancer. ‘A Cancer Therapy’ by Max Gerson M.D. makes useful reference to the subject.

In the nutritional response to chemo- and radiotherapy, the special seaweed polysaccharides in Seagreens® come to prominence. They have been shown to “reduce absorption of strontium, barium, tin, cadmium, manganese, zinc, and mercury’ (114). In the 1960s Japanese scientists showed that radioactive strontium in the gut is converted to an insoluble salt which is excreted.

Nature published a report showing that wrack seaweed inhibits the body’s absorption of radioactive strontium and cadmium by up to 7/8ths the dose received. It also removed Strontium 90 already absorbed through the gut wall and deposited in body tissues and bone.

In radiotherapy, offered to approximately 50% of cancer patients often in conjunction with surgery and/or chemotherapy, normal cells as well as cancer cells will be attacked, for example hair cells, stomach lining cells, blood cells, as well as healthy tissue adjacent to the site of the tumour. Intra operative radiation therapy (IORT) in which a source of radiation is implanted directly into the body close to the tumour site, also damages other cells, however well targeted.

Seagreens® is an ideal nutritional foundation for all cancer therapies. At a high daily intake prior to and throughout treatment as well as in recuperation, the Seagreens® Food Capsules and Seagreens® Food Granules may give significant support to immunity and recovery, noted by practitioners and consumers alike.

Seagreens® also provide the entire range of antioxidants in an easily assimilable, natural form and balance. This is in stark contrast to the case of high-strength formulated antioxidant and vitamin supplements which are the subject of controversy, although there is no hard evidence that they are causative in cancer, including prostate cancer as has been claimed (129).

Seagreens® have already been included in the daily diet in food and drink for prolonged periods up to 6 months at strengths of up to 7 grams of the Food Granules (or 14 Food Capsules) per day with no side effects and with marked improvements in the general health of patients.

Seagreens® have a particular contribution to make in nutritional protocols in conjunction with alternative or complementary cancer management and in the prevention of cancer, not least because a natural dietary solution can be maintained over a lengthy period.

See also Cholesterol

See also Detoxification

See also Salt Replacement