prostate cancer

Misinformation Piggybacks on Joe Biden’s Cancer Diagnosis

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Fri, 30 May 2025 16:59:22 +0000

This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.

“Just the facts, ma’am” is a catchphrase attributed to detective Joe Friday in the classic television police drama Dragnet. If all science communicators took that message to heart, we would not be exposed to the diarrhea of misinformation that plagues our lives today.

That, though, brings up the question of what is meant by “fact.”

2019 Year in Review

Ada McVean B.Sc. — Tue, 31 Dec 2019 16:29:54 +0000

Scroll to the bottom for links to the articles.

Prostate Cancer and the Problem With PSA Testing

Christopher Labos MD, MSc — Fri, 01 Nov 2019 14:00:00 +0000

This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.

Prostate Cancer and Diet

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Tue, 25 Jun 2013 02:34:18 +0000

Fried foods and simple sugars are out, olive oil, peanut butter and avocados are in. And this time I'm not talking about lowering your cholesterol. I'm talking about increasing the chance of survival from prostate cancer. It isn’t a rare disease, one in six men over their lifetime are affected, although most will die with the disease not because of it. There is a genetic component but what about diet? Two questions arise. Can diet increase the risk of prostate cancer, and if the disease does present can any specific diet improve the odds for survival?

Walk Gingerly Before Declaring Ginger a Cancer Cure

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Thu, 06 Mar 2014 14:24:23 +0000

It is not at all unusual to find plant extracts that will kill cancer cells in vitro. There are hundreds of phytochemicals that will do this. Neither is it unusual to find an effect in mice that have implanted tumours. But this is a long way away from demonstrating a viable cancer treatment in humans. In comparison to the number of plant compounds that have shown anti-cancer activity in the lab, the number that have made it through human clinical trials to be adopted into practice have been extremely few.