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Chapter 18
Role of Allergy in the Healing Process of Cancer


A Cancer Therapy
Results of Fifty Cases
The Cure of Advanced Cancer by Diet Therapy
A Summary of thirty years of clinical experimentation
Max Gerson, M.D.
Original e-book
18  Role of Allergy in the Healing Process of Cancer

     IT SEEMS certain that the healing power in cancer has to be introduced by an allergic reaction. To understand this healing power, one must have a brief explanation of the problem of allergy itself. Dr. von Pirquet had explained allergy as a change in tissue reactions. This means a hypersensitivity developed in the body caused by an infection or after injection of a protein (allergen). Anergy is the contrary; it refers to a diminished or lack of reaction against an antigen. H. H. Dale expressed the allergic reaction and consequent function as follows: "A change in the dispersity of protoplasma colloids occurs if the praecipitin fixed in the cell protoplasma encounters the antigen onto which it has a specific affinity. A change in the dispersity of the protoplasma colloids sets in, which induces an enzymatic dissolution and the production of histamine-like substance or histamine itself."131 The reacting organs at the allergic attack are particularly the unstriped muscles and the capillary endothel, both of which stay under the regulation of the automatic nervous system and endocrine apparatus.132

     When the tumor masses are in process of dissolution, there is a greater amount of highly active protein-intermediary substances such as histamine, histidine, etc., which can activate different pathological reactions all over the body. These counteract the healing power. To neutralize and eliminate them is the task of the therapy.

     Small quantities of indole, skatole and phenol are absorbed into the bloodstream, undergo detoxication in the liver by conjugation with sulphuric acid and potassium or with glycuronic acid.

     What really happens in the body in allergic reactions or stronger in anaphylactic shocks is that normal enzymatic processes are reduced.133 This idea is based on the following findings: Abderhalden and Wertheimer found reduced amount of tissue, gas-exchange and less oxidation; Loehr found diminished digestion of aromatic proteins; Hashimoto and Pick found pathological proteolytic processes particularly in the liver cells. Since these reactions occur in different organs and tissues, A. F. Coca calls them "species specific shockorgans" or "shocktissues."

     The kind of allergen stimulant does not determine the type of reaction (variant) as every patient has his own and his individual type of reaction with which he responds to each stimulation therapy. These are mostly gradual differences. (p. 103, my Tuberculosis book)

     It is nowhere clearly explained why normal allergies are suppressed when tuberculosis is active and why they reappear when the tuberculosis process improves. Normal allergic or even anaphylactic reactions appear when the poisons have obtained a kind of peak and the body is able to neutralize, digest and eliminate them. Pneumonia healed in former times after the body had produced a detoxication crisis with abundant perspiration, diarrhea and sometimes vomiting. Then healing set in. The visible syndromes are the accompanying bodily signs of that kind of detoxication or cleansing reaction - with local and general symptoms which can also be regarded as the start of a healing process. The therapy has to imitate the detoxication. After that elimination, patients with asthma, migraine or gout feel greatly relieved.

     As for nutrition, it is necessary to keep away all substances from the sick body which can produce allergic and other biologically stronger reactions such as caused by fats, animal proteins, vitamins (except vitamin C and niacin) and hormones, because they counteract the normal allergic healing reaction which is so necessary in the beginning to kill the tumor tissue.

     This perception shows four consequences clearly:

  1. The strongest detoxication (not only mechanically by enemas) is in cancer the conditio sine qua non for the start of the healing. A poisoned body is anergic and cannot react to the favorable side. The detoxified body can.
  2. The maintenance of the detoxication is absolutely necessary and the greatest therapeutical help for the liver.
  3. The liver, the main transformation and elimination organ, must be able to induce the procedure, to maintain it, even if it has to undergo some proteolytic processes, which particularly hit the liver cells, according to E. F. Pick.134
  4. The healing is limited or even impossible in cases where and when the liver is no longer able to render and maintain this vital service of constant detoxication and temporary allergic reaction to the body.

     J. Jensen stated, "It must be emphasized that the whole subject of allergy is vast and complex and that it still has many problems which are as yet unsolved."135 The confusion becomes even greater when we see the majority of the cancer authors push the allergy problem aside as unessential or do not mention it at all.

     A. F. Coca reported that "all of 297 persons with malignant growths of the breast presented symptoms of idioblaptic allergy; two persons accidentally included in the group were found to be free from idioblaptic constitution and both of these had had non-malignant growths of the breast."136

     In his chapter on "Diagnosis of Allergy", Jensen concluded, "The answer depends upon their definition of allergy."137 Every author makes his own definition.

     The allergy problem is touched upon here only to make the healing of cancer understandable. To eliminate confusion, I suggest the following:

     An allergic reaction may be thought to be a diminished enzymatic reaction (Lichtwitz), an allergic inflammation to be an increased enzymatic reaction (von Bergmann). Both are enzymatic by nature and both are caused by the function of the same apparatus, (capillary endothel - or reticulo-endothelial system - small arteries, visceral nervous system and enzymes activated and supported by the liver). Therefore, the name "allergy" is justified in describing these different reaction complexes. In reality, the degree only is different as well as the place of response. Biologically, it can be regarded as an unspecific, healing-inducing inflammation. It is a structural response to an immune process beyond the limits of physiological function. Whether or not the body can accomplish the healing process remains still questionable. Further development during the treatment will show if the body can be restored sufficiently to accomplish it.

     The task of the therapy is to prevent all impeding infectious or poisonous reactions (including those caused by drug allergies and allergies to food when not digested to the end products). These will hinder the allergic healing inflammation.


Footnotes:

131 See Bulletin, Johns Hopkins Hospital, 31, 1310, 1920.
132 See Arthur F. Coca, Familial Nonreaginic Food Allergy, 2nd edition, 1945, Charles C. Thomas, Springfield, Illinois.
133 Lichtwitz, Klin. Chemie, 1930, p. 16.
134 Arch. f. exper. Path. 70, 89, 1914.
135 J. Jensen, Modern Concepts in Medicine, C. V. Mosby, 1953, p. 367.
136 Arthur F. Coca, Familial Nonreaginic Food Allergy, p. 185.
137 Jensen, Modern Concepts in Medicine, p. 363.