The Nature of Cancer
by Ernst Krebs, Jr.
As I look back through the years I can recall that it is as true today as
it was eleven years ago that Laetrile,Vitamin B17, is the first and last
final hope in the therapy of cancer in man and animals. The reason for this
is that Laetrile is a vitamin. It is the 17th of the B vitamins.
We here a great deal about its use in terminal cancer, but the time to start
with vitamin B17 is now before the disease become clinical. The time to
start is the same with any matter of adequate nutrition and that is right
now. You may start now by commencing to eat the seeds of all common fruits
that you eat. The apricot and peach seed contain almost 2 percent of vitamin
B17 by weight. The apple seed, although very small, is equally rich in Vitamin
B17. So are the seeds of prunes, plums, cherries, and nectarines. The only
common fruit on the hemisphere that lacks nitrilosidic seeds, are the citrus
fruits. This lack has come about by artificial cultivation by breeding and
hybridization, since the seeds of citrus fruits on the African continent
still contain Vitamin B17.
Two more rich sources of Vitamin B17 are the simple cereal millet and buckwheat.
Macadamia nuts, although expensive and exotic, are very rich in Vitamin
B17 and so are bamboo shoots, mung beans, lima beans, butter beans and certain
strains of garden peas. But for convenience, the simple source for your
Vitamin B17 are the seeds of the common fruit.
We know something about the prophylactic dose of Vitamin B17. For example,
we know the Hunzas represent a population that has been cancer free for
over 900 years of its existence. This population has a natural diet, which
supplies on the average between 50 to 75 milligrams of Vitamin B17 a day.
Hunzaland is a land that has sometimes been described as the "place
where apricot is king." The Hunzakuts eat the fresh apricots for the
three months they are in season and the remainder of the year they eat dried
apricots. They never eat a dried apricot without enclosing the seed between
them. This supplies them with better than average of 50 to 75 milligrams
of Vitamin B17 a day.
There are many of us in the Western World who don't ingest this amount of
Vitamin B17 in the course of an entire year. As a result we're in the midst
of a fulminating deficiency of Vitamin B17 or nitriloside, the anti-neoplastic
vitamin. Its absence from our diets accounts for the fact that cancer on
our population has reached such a pandemisity as to account for its occurrence
in one in every three American families. The occurrence is probably much
greater than that because it is very late in its development when the cancer
is detected.. Many who develop cancer are killed by accident or intercurrent
diseases before the malignant process has become sufficiently advanced to
cause them to have it diagnosed.
Cancer is a chronic, metabolic disease...that is obvious. It isn't an infectious
disease, which is caused by bacteria of viruses. It is a disease that is
metabolic in origin. A metabolic disease is a disease that is linked with
our utilization of food. Most metabolic diseases have as their basis specific
vitamins and minerals.
Let me give you a categorical or axiomatic truth to take with you. One that
is totally uncontradictable, scientifically, historically and in every other
way. This is that no chronic or metabolic disease in the history of medicines
has ever been prevented or cured, except by factors normal to the diet or
normal to the animal economy. There have been many erstwhile fatal devastating
diseases that now have become virtually unknown. They have been prevented
and cured by ingesting the dietary factors and thereby preventing the deficiencies,
which accounted for these diseases.
The one in which you are probably most familiar is Scurvy. A fatal disease
that killed mankind by the thousands. A disease that would sometimes wipe
out an entire Polar expedition or accounted for about 50 percent mortality
among the Crusaders. A disease that is totally
prevented and totally cured by Vitamin C or ascorbic acid a factor normal
to an adequate diet. As you know so well from your school days that Great
Britain acquired the dominion of the seas, by empirically discovering that
by adding lime or other citrus juices to the provisions of the British mariners
the curse of scurvy from the British sea power was removed. Therefore, Britain
competitively gained the ascendancy on the seas. Prior to the incorporation
of Vitamin C into their diets it wasn't uncommon for three-fourths of the
crew to become seriously ill by the end of a voyage and then those who didn't
die would mysteriously recover after hitting shore because they would have
access to fresh fruits and vegetables rich in Vitamin C.
Then we have Pernicious Anemia, which had a mortality rate of 98 or 99 percent.
And no medical modality under the sun could touch it. Arsenic and its salts,
strychnine, iron and hundreds of other remedies were tried, but to no avail
until the researchers Drs. Murphy,Shipple and Minot commenced their classical
studies on the relationship of Pernicious Anemia to dietary deficiency.
While working at the University of California they discovered a very simple
remedy for preventing and curing this disease. They simply said to their
patients, "go down to your butcher shop and get a quarter pound of
fresh liver. Grind it up and take a tablespoon everyday and take the quarter
pound and cook it very lightly and just singe the surface and use this as
a ration for three days." And when the patients followed this advice
without exception, those with Pernicious Anemia made complete recoveries.
Despite this these men were censored by the Medical Establishment at the
time and were criticized for engaging in what was alleged to be Medical
Quackery.
The argument was how can respectable doctors advise people with a disease
that has a 99 percent mortality rate to ignore all of the established drugs
of medical science and go down to the butcher shop and buy some raw liver
and take this and expect this to cure a disease that nothing else had cured.
Well, raw liver did cure the disease and raw liver did prevent it.
As the chemistry of raw liver was studied it was discovered that the factors
responsible were Vitamin B12 and Folic Acid. So Vitamin B12 and Folic Acid
are now a part of our normal dietary experience.
So in 1974, the uninformed, the unimaginative and some of the illiterate
are concerned with what to them is a preposterous idea that by eating seed
of fruit you can prevent a disease that carries a mortality rate almost
as high as that once carried by pernicious Anemia. But scientific truth
isn't dependent upon credibility or lack of it. The scientific reality either
is or isn't. And this is the scientific reality that the seeds of all common
fruits (except citrus)contain Vitamin B17, an anti cancer vitamin. If we
ingest proper quantities for these vitamin either in the pure form or through
ingesting the nitrilosidic foods we will be able to prevent this decease
just as surely as we are able to prevent Scurvy by the use of vitamin C
or Pernicious Anemia by the use of vitamin B12.
There was another disease that is a metabolic or chronic nature and this
is Pellagra. At one time it was so endemic in certain parts of the world,
particularly the American southwest, that there were entire hospitals given
to the treatment of Pellagrans.
The great Sir William Osler in his "Principles and Practices of Medicine"
written at the turn of this century, said of Pellagra, "I was at Lenoir,
North Carolina during one winter and this winter I visited the Lenoir home
for the colored insane and there 75 percent of the inmates died from the
disease. It ran rampant through this institution and convinced me beyond
any doubt that pellagra is a virus that is infectious."
And then came the fine works of the United States Public Health Service
Surgeon, Dr. Goldberger, who showed conclusively that the occurrence of
Pellagra was related with a deficiency of fresh green material in the diet..
So Dr. Goldberger approached this problem first by the use of Brewer's Yeast,
which would completely prevent and cure pellagra. Further studies then showed
that the factor in Brewer's yeast that was most determinate of this effect
was niacin, Vitamin B3.
So another fatal chronic metabolic disease found total resolution and cure
through factors normal to the normal diet or the animal economy. We know
that cancer is no exception to this great generalization and to date has
known no exception. That is that every chronic of metabolic disease that
will ever be controlled by man, must be controlled by means that are a part
of the biological experience of the organism. Chronic and metabolic diseases
can never be controlled, prevented or cured by factors foreign to the biological
experience of the organism.
Let's make it clear by what we mean by biological experience to the organism.We
refer to the experience the of the organism has had over the million years
of its evolution. The organism was exposed to water, air, carbohydrates,
fats, amino acids and various salts and these factors
became integrated with the evolving organism. And the evolving organism
became integrated with these factors. And these factors with the evolving
organism were incorporated into the beautiful machinery of "life."
And the vital mechanism of life runs just like the parts of a
fine Swiss watch only infinitely more complex.
Dr. Thomas of the Sloan Kettering Institute in a recent article in Science
said, "I'm thankful that my liver works without my knowledge. I do
not have the brains to commence to do one millionth of what my liver does.
These things are automatic . So I swallow the food and this infinitely complex
machinery takes care of itself. "We could spend years telling you about
this magnificent machinery and we still wouldn't touch the surface of this
infinite ocean. We do know that there is nothing that we can do to improve
upon it. We do know that in the history of
medicine there never had been found anything foreign to the indwelling requirements
of this machinery that will do the living organism any good. And we can
go further to say there has never in the history of medicine been found
anything foreign to the indwelling machinery of this
infinitely complex system that will not harm the organism. There isn't such
a thing as a factor foreign to the biological experience that is not harmful
to the organism.
There is nothing we can add to our air water and food to improve it. The
most we can do is to look at some of our devitalized food and hopefully
attempt to replace that which was capriciously removed from it in the process
of food refining, manipulation or cooking. There is absolutely nothing that
we can add to that food to improve it. These things are basic.
There isn't any chemical or drug that medical science could suggest that
would make us healthier or better adjusted or wiser or give us hope for
a longer life. There isn't a single drug or molecule in nature that can
unless that molecule exists in normal food. And this probably explains one
of the reasons why there is so much resistance to Laetrile, B17.
The application of this science brings us face to face with a lot of things
we do not like to face. We have become over- civilized. We are inclined
in out delusory thinking to feel that here and there there must be a magic
out. That there must be a simple way, a short cut, that somehow or other
medical science or some other man-made forces beyond our comprehension will
do for us those things we must do for ourselves. And it is slowly dawning
on us, perhaps too slowly that this thinking is fraudulent; that it is unsound.
It isn't in the field of cancer alone where we see this form of charlatanism
or quackery. We see it in the area of the human mind. The futile attempts
to spare man from the realities that surround him. Above all to spare him
from the fact that he is accountable to himself and to
his God and that there is no short cut in this accountability.
It's real at the physical level. And when we are eating less than adequate
food, we know better, And when we continue we are engaged in sin, this is
the basis for practically all of our physical and mental and spiritual difficulties.
We had better be realistic about it. We have
them because we don't do the right things. And when we fail in view of our
knowledge now to take Vitamin B17 this is a sin against our physical nature.
And when we develop cancer we will receive the results of this transgression
in the old fashion Biblical sense that the "wages of sin
are death."
If you are not getting Vitamin B17 in your food the best way to get it is
in the pure form. If you have cancer, the most important single consideration
is to get the maximum amount of Vitamin B17 into your body in the shortest
period of time. This is secondary to the medical skill involved in administering
it, which is relatively minimal. Then very often there are many supportive
measures that are taken in the management of the cancer patient such as
the use of materials to build up the blood, to raise or lower the blood
pressure or to relieve the pain.
Pancreatic enzymes and vegetable enzymes are part of the supportive theory.
You have the papaya melons as the source of the enzyme Papain and pineapple
as a source of the enzyme Bromelain. The demasking effect of these enzymes
against the pericellular layer of the malignant cell is something very concrete
in the immunology of cancer. Now I prefer, rather than advising the use
of bromelain or papaya tablets that the individual seeking these enzymes
get them directly from the fresh ripe pineapple and papaya fruit. As much
as half a pineapple a day should be ingested.
This is the way to go. You have nothing to lose by eating fresh pineapple
and papaya melons. Nothing to lose by eating millet, the seeds of all the
common fruits and whole fresh foods.
Dietary deficiencies arrive primarily from eating less than whole food.
This is why the Federal and State governments have made mandatory the artificial
enrichment of white flour. Look at any loaf of white bread or white flour
that has been enriched by the addition of crystalline Vitamin B1, Vitamin
B2, niacin, iron and all the rest. What a commentary on the stupidity of
our civilization that we put good food through a process that defects it
of its essential nutrients and then enforced by the Government mandate requirements
that say that we must restore to
this food some of the things that have been processed out. One of the most
critical factors is removed and that is wheat germ, which contains the Vitamin
E and the poly- unsaturated fatty acids. it would not be necessary to take
it in supplementation if our foods were not
manipulated in a way to remove this.
Now something about supplementation's in addition to the Vitamin B17. We
can't think in terms of just one vitamin. We get an adequate diet by eating
as wide a variety of whole natural foods as possible and as close to their
growing period as we can possibly obtain them.
There are laetrile therapists who recommend two or three grams of ascorbic
acid or Vitamin C in conjunction with the Laetrile program. This is a very
moderate recommendation and we can all take up to seven or eight grams of
Vitamin C without any problems. This is about the same
amount as the higher primates such as the gorilla on a pound to pound basis
ingest between five to six grams of Vitamin C a day in their normal habitat.
Incidentally, the gorilla in its natural habitat eats about 100 to 125 milligrams
of Vitamin B17 a day, too. Like the population of Hunzaland, these gorillas
are free of cancer, so are bears in their normal habitat. out in the wilds
they don't develop cancer.
In the San Diego Zoo there was a cage of about ten bears and out of the
ten, seven of them developed cancer. To some this was a sign that some mysterious
bear cancer virus was loose. but, it wasn't that at all. In the wild state
the bears are omnivores and they eat a lot of wild
nitrilosidic berries. Almost all wild fruits are nitrilosidic.
Keep in mind how far we have drifted from the dietary requirements of the
machinery that we now possess. When we evolved and came to our maturity
as organisms about 8,000 or 9,000 years ago the world witnessed the advent
of agriculture and horticulture came a little later. The
millions of years prior to that time we ate the cherries, apricots, apples,
prunes and the rest of the fruits. They had Vitamin B17 not only within
the seeds, but in the flesh, too. Today only wild fruit contain the Vitamin
B17, but in the process of hybridization it has been removed.
The fruit that we eat today is the product of years of manipulation and
cultivation for lushness and abundance and so forth, so the meat to that
fruit is free of Vitamin B17. To meet our indwelling needs of Vitamin B17
we must either eat the fruit seed in reasonable quantity or begin supplementing
our diet with Vitamin B17 tablets. We can't of course, do that at present,
but we hope to see before very long Vitamin B17 available so that we can
prevent cancer in the same way we prevent scurvy.
Several new books are coming out on Laetrile. Both are written by non-medical
men - World Without Cancer by Edward Griffin and Vitamin B17: Forbidden
Weapon Against Cancer by Mike Culbert. We are all laymen in the field of
cancer. There are more laymen in the Laetrile movement who know more about
cancer than some of our most prestigious experts in
our most prestigious institutions. These laymen know enough about it to
keep alive and not die from it. So you're a pretty rotten expert if you
know so little about it as to succumb from it or have your family succumb
from it.
We have many case histories of people that have been helped by Laetrile.
Both Alicia Buttons and Mary Henderson were terminal with oral pharyngeal
cancer that has a mortality rate of 98-99 percent even in early diagnosis.
Both made remarkable recoveries with Laetrile under the
guidance of Dr. Hans Nieper in Germany.
You know we have been meeting ten or eleven years and you've been hearing
this story. Each time after the meeting you had 360 days to go home and
read newspapers, American Cancer Society Boiler Plate and so forth. In those
ten years they haven't told you anything against Laetrile that makes any
sense. You can be pretty sure they don't have anything against Laetrile
because these people are very uninhibited and the area in which they are
most uninhibited is in the area of simple lying.
Cooking doesn't destroy the Vitamin B17. Almost every food that we eat is
better eaten raw. And when we cook a fruit we destroy the enzymes and wherever
we have Vitamin B17 we have the accompanying enzyme B-glucosidase naturally.
B-glucosidase is destroyed by heat, but Vitamin b17 is not destroyed by
heat.
The enzyme rhodanese is a normally occurring enzyme that converts cyanide
to the non-toxic compound neocyanate and we evolved with the Rhodes because
the Vitamin B17 containing cyanide originally was so large a part of our
diet. So far as we know there is no development of rhodanese deficiencies.
We must be very realistic that there is absolutely nothing we can do to
alter this infinitely complex machinery of the cell and of life. All that
we can do is to supply those components that are missing and then hope for
the best. It's like being on the freeway with a Cadillac in
which the hood is locked and you run out of gas. Now all your knowledge
of mechanics are going to be of no avail just pour gas in to the tank and
step on the starter and hope for the best that the gas gets sucked into
the motor. When the machinery of the cell begins to falter or fail you put
in those factors normal to the operation of that machinery. Since we have
no choice we allow the universe to take its course. We don't go on the presumption
that we can successfully tamper with that infinite machinery.
Laetrile is legal in Mexico, but I don't know the exact situation in Canada
at the moment. You may get it without a prescription in Mexico.Eat the seeds
and you can get an adequacy of Vitamin B17.
Pollutants harm the liver and the liver is a great detoxifying organ of
the body. If the liver is detoxifying an excess of estrogen, for example,
and capacity of the liver is impaired by pollutants, the estrogen level
then may reach a concentration sufficient to induce cancer. If we are eating
apples that have been sprayed with arsenic and we eat enough of these apples,
the arsenic may produce a hepatic chirrosis that again will impair the capacity
of the liver to detoxify certain carcinogens and thereby contribute to the
development of cancer. If we are receiving a very high concentrating of
Vitamin B17 this will offset the possibility of developing cancer, but these
pollutants still can kill us through producing chirrosis of the liver and
destroying other vital cells.
The Vitamin C on the market is organic and contrary to what is sometimes
believe is not synthetic. The Vitamin C that is produced in this country
is produced by fermentation involving the growth of the mold Streptomycetes.
So it is a biosynthetic process. This is the cheapest
and most efficient way to do it, although this is not a "complex."
I would say that 15 seeds every other day would provide an adequacy and
give quite a margin.
There are societies that have not become too corrupted by the sophistications
of modern technology. These people are capable of biting through the pit.
We have even seen small dogs break the pit and eat the seeds. Squirrels,
chipmunks, bears, higher primates such as monkeys ordinarily do it. Curators
of zoos tell us when monkeys and apes are thrown fresh apricots, peaches
and plums, in time, if they are thrown enough of them, they cease eating
the sweet sugary fruit and they begin hoarding the pits. they manage to
break open those pits. Primates will take them in hand and hammer them against
a piece of concrete. Eating these seeds is universal among the nomads and
among the higher animals.
You may keep the seeds indefinitely if you keep them thermatically sealed
under refrigeration. If you don't keep them under refrigeration the Vitamin
B17 won't deteriorate, but the unsaturated fatty acids will turn rancid
and become carcinogenic.
Sickle Cell anemia crises is the result of a fulminating deficiency of Vitamin
B17 and it occurs in Americans of African origin, who upon leaving the African
continent become removed from a dietary source of vitamin B17. Sickle Cell
crisis is a Vitamin B17 deficiency disease in the same way that Pernicious
Anemia is a Vitamin B12, Folic Acid deficiency disease.
The Romans found that here and there almond trees appeared which had almonds
that were completely sweet and no longer had any trace of bitterness. That
bitterness is due to the presence of Vitamin B17. So they proceeded to destroy
all of the almond trees that had any trace of bitterness and propagated
those almond trees that just yielded the sweet kernels. so those almonds
that have come to us in the Western World are very rich in the enzyme B-glucosidase,
but deficient in Vitamin B17. On the other hand the eastern part of the
world, such as the Ukraine, Soviet Union and Red China, have predominately
the original bitter almond, very rich in Vitamin B17.
It is good to cook most beans. The cooking doesn't destroy the Vitamin B17
content. Although beans eaten raw in small quantities are quite acceptable
as food.
I should add that it is a good idea to grind apricot kernels up in a nut
grinder. One teaspoon of the material is equivalent to seven of eight seeds.
Take two teaspoonfuls and lace a fruit salad or oatmeal or whatever you
are eating. You can incorporate it into muffins or use it a
hundred different ways. You can take it straight or you can eat it and then
follow it with a little honey because of the persisting bitterness.
Broad beans and Visa gava beans were among the staples in the diet of the
Roman legions. The legionnaires not only ate broad beans. but they fed them
to their horses. This made for a very vigorous infantry in calvary. Visa
gava are also known as Italian beans or flat beans.
In all of the exigencies of our evolution and natural selection, the presence
of radiation in
such horrible concentrations as in nuclear radiation was never anticipated.
The organism may be beset with such onslaught and there are no mechanisms
including Vitamin B17 to medicate the deadly effects of such excess radiation.
This is one of the most horrible assaults on living tissues. The most horrible
assaults that living tissue can sustain, because it destroys not only the
individual of one generation, but it may cripple, if not extinguish the
immortal germ plasm, on which the continuity of the species itself relies.
by Jane Kinderlehrer
How would you like to live in a land where cancer has not yet been
invented? A land where an optometrist discovers to his amazement that everyone
has perfect 20-20 vision? A land where cardiologists cannot find a single
trace of coronary heart disease? How would you like to live in a land where
no one ever gets ulcers, appendicitis or gout? A land where men of 80 and
90 father children, and there's nothing unusual about men and women enjoying
vigorous life at the age of 100 or 120?
First, you have to answer a few more questions before setting out for a
place called Hunza, a tiny country hidden in the mountain passes of northwest
Pakistan.
Are you willing to live 20,000 feet up in the mountains, almost completely
out of touch with the rest of the world? Are you ready to go outside in
every kind of weather to tend you small mountainside garden, while keeping
you ears open for an impending avalanche? Are you prepared to give up not
only every luxury of civilization, but even reading and writing?
But if you want the benefits of the pure air that whips by the icy cathedrals
of the Himalaya Mountains, the pure water that trickles down from glaciers
formed at 25,000 feet, and the mental and spiritual peace that comes from
living in a land where there is no crime, taxes, social striving or generation
gaps, no banks or stores-in fact,-no money- where are you going to find
it outside of Hunza?
But don't give up! Not yet, because there is still one more question to
be answered. That is: are you prepared to eat the kind of food the Hunzas
eat? If you are, then you can rightfully expect to give yourself at lease
some measure of the super health and resistance to degenerative disease
which the Hunzakuts have enjoyed for 2,000 years.
What kind of exotic, ill-tasting grub do these Hunza people eat, you are
wondering. Strange as it may sound, virtually everything the Hunzakuts eat
is delectable to the western palate, and is readily available in the United
States-at least if you shopping horizons do not begin and end at
the supermarket.
Not only is the Hunza diet not exotic, but there's really nothing terribly
mysterious about its health-promoting qualities, Everything we know about
food and health, gathered both from clinical studies and the observation
of scientists who have traveled throughout the world observing dietary practices
and their relationship to health, tells us that it is to be expected that
the Hunza diet will go a long way towards improving the total health of
anyone, anywhere. The Hunza story is only one of the more dramatic examples
of the miraculous health produced by a diet of fresh, natural unprocessed
and unadulterated food.
Maybe you're wondering: are the Hunzas really all that healthy? That was
the question on the mind of cardiologists Dr. Paul D. White and Dr. Edward
G. Toomey, who made the difficult trip up the mountain paths to Hunza, toting
along with them a portable, battery-operated
electrocardiograph. In the American Heart Journal for December, 1964, the
doctors say they used the equipment to study 25 Hunza men, who were, "on
fairly good evidence, between 90 and 110 years old." Blood pressure
and cholesterol levels were also tested. They reported that not one of these
men showed a single sign of coronary heart disease, high blood pressure
or high cholesterol.
An optometrist, Dr. Allen E. Banik, also made the journey to Hunza to see
for himself if the people were as healthy as they were reputed to be, and
published his report in Hunza Land (Whitehorn Publishing Co., 1960). "It
wasn't long before I discovered that everything that I had
read about perpetual life and health in this tiny country is true, "Dr.
Banik declared. "I examined the eyes of some of Hunza's oldest citizens
and found them to be perfect."
Beyond more freedom from disease, many observers have been startled by the
positive side of Hunza health. Dr. Banik, for example, relates that "many
Hunza people are so strong that in the winter they exercise by breaking
holes in the ice-covered streams and take a swim down under the ice."
Other intrepid visitors who have been there report their amazement at seeing
men 80,90,and 100 years old repairing the always- crumbling rocky roads,and
lifting large stones and boulders to repair the retaining walls around their
terrace gardens. The oldsters think nothing of playing a competitive game
of volleyball in the hot sun against men 50
years their junior, and even take part in wild games of polo that are so
violent they would make an ice hockey fan shudder.
The energy and endurance of the Hunzakuts can probably be credited as much
to what they don't eat as what they do eat. First of all, they don't eat
a great deal of anything. The United States Department of Agriculture estimates
that the average daily food intake for Americans
of all ages amounts to 3,300 calories, with 100 grams of protein, 157 grams
of fat and 380 grams of carbohydrates, In contrast, studies by Pakistani
doctors show that adult males of Hunza consume a little more than 1.900
calories daily, with only 50 grams of protein, 36 grams of fat, and 354
grams of carbohydrates. Both the protein and fat are largely of vegetable
origin (Dr. Alexander Leaf, National Geographic, January, 1973).
That amounts to just half the protein , one-third the fat, but about the
same amount of carbohydrates that we Americans eat. Of course, the carbohydrate
that the Hunzakuts eat is undefined or complex carbohydrate found in fruits,
vegetables and grains, while we Americans largely eat our carbohydrates
in the form of nutritionless white sugar
and refined flour.
Needless to say, the Hunzakuts eat no processed food. Everything is as fresh
as it can possibly be, and in its original unsalted state. The only "processing"
consists of drying some fresh fruits in the the sun, and making butter and
cheese out of milk. No chemicals or artificial fertilizers are used in their
gardens. In fact, it is against the law of Hunza to spray gardens with pesticides.
Renee Taylor, in her book Hunza health secrets( Prentice-Hall 1964) says
that the Mir,or ruler of
Hunza, was recently instructed by Pakistani authorities to spray the orchards
of Hunza with pesticide, to protect them from an expected invasion of insects.
But the Hunzas would have none of it. They refused to use the toxic pesticide,
and instead sprayed their trees with a
mixture of water and ashes, which adequately protected the trees without
poisoning the fruit and the entire environment. In a word, the Hunzas eat
as they live -organically.
Of all their organically-grown food, perhaps their favorite, and one of
their dietary mainstays, is the apricot. apricot orchards are seen everywhere
in Hunza, and a family economic stability is measured by the number of trees
they have under cultivation.
They eat their apricots fresh in season, and dry a great deal more in the
sun for eating throughout the long cold winter. They puree the dried apricots
and mix them with snow to make ice cream. Like their apricot jam, this ice
cream needs no sugar because the apricots are so sweet naturally.
But that is only the beginning. The hunzas cut the pits from the fruits,
crack them, and remove the almond-like nuts. The women hand grind these
kernels with stone mortars, then squeeze the meal between a hand stone and
a flat rock to express the oil. The oil is used in cooking, for
fuel,as a salad dressing on fresh garden greens, and even as a facial lotion
( Renee Taylor says Hunza women have beautiful complexions).
Do these kernels have important protective powers which in some way play
an important role in the extraordinary health and longevity of the Hunza
people? The evidence suggest they very well might.
Cancer and arthritis are both rare among the Taos (New Mexico) Pueblo Indians.
Their traditional beverages is made from the group kernels of cherries,
peaches and apricots. Robert G. Houston told PREVENTION that he enjoyed
this beverage when he was in New Mexico gathering material for a book dealing
blender shakes based on an Indian recipe. Into a glass of milk or juice,
he mixed a tablespoon of honey with freshly ground apricot kernels(1/4 of
an ounce or two dozen kernels) which had been roasted for 10 minutes at
300. It is vitally
important to roast the kernels first. Houston points out, "in order
to insure safety when you are using the pits in such quantities." roasting
destroys enzymes which could upset your stomach if you eat too many at on
time. In any event the drink was so delicious that Houston kept having it
daily. On the third day of drinking this concoction, Houston says that a
funny thing happened. Two little benign skin growths on his arm , which
formerly were pink had turned brown. The next day, he noticed that the growths
were black and shriveled. On the seventh morning, the smaller more recent
growths had vanished completely and the larger one. about the size of a
grain of rice, had simply fallen off.
Houston says that two of his friends have since tried the apricot shakes
and report similar elimination of benign skin growths in one or two weeks.
What is there in apricot that could produce this remarkable effect? some
foods, especially the kernels of certain fruits and grains, contain elements
known as the nitrilosides(also known as amygdalin or vitamin B 17) says
Dr. Ernst T. Krebs, Jr., biochemist and co-discoverer of Laetrile, a controversial
cancer treatment( Laetrile is the proprietary name for one nitriloside).Nitrilosides,
says Dr. Krebs, are non-toxic and water-soluble.