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Did Natural Cancer Treatments Save My Life?

2023-12-08 · letter vlog · Hank · 6:39 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Health · mode: Personal essay · tags: heavy topic, self promotion, fundraising ask

Hank notes that three of the four chemo drugs that cured his Hodgkin lymphoma (vinblastine, doxorubicin, bleomycin) come from nature and were carefully tested, answers people who urged a 'natural route' instead of chemo by arguing that 'natural cancer treatment' means treatments unproven, ineffective or harmful, and says most cancer deaths happen where people lack chemo, radiation, surgery and screening; he plugs his cancer socks before the Christmas shipping deadline.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Hank's cancer and why chemo was never in question

  • ★★ Hank tells John that he got cancer, by far the worst thing that has ever happened to his body; untreated, he would be on his way to dying. (playful) — 00:00:00 · cancer
  • ★★ Hank says Hodgkin lymphoma was one of the first cancers shown to respond well to both chemotherapy and radiation, so chemo was never in question. — 00:00:16 · Hodgkin lymphoma, chemotherapy

00:00:29 — Three of his four chemo drugs come from nature (periwinkle, soil microbes) and were tested exhaustively

  • ★★ Hank says he was fully on board with chemo, which definitely extended his life. — 00:00:29 · chemotherapy
  • ★★★ Hank says three of the four chemo drugs he was on are natural: they come from nature. — 00:00:37 · chemotherapy
  • ★★ Hank says vinblastine comes from the Madagascar periwinkle, a flower known to Madagascar's indigenous people, in which scientists found anti-cancer properties. — 00:00:43
  • ★★ Hank says adriamycin, also called doxorubicin, was found in soil microbes at the base of an Italian castle. — 00:00:56
  • ★★ Hank says the third, bleomycin, was found in a soil microbe called Streptomyces verticillus. — 00:01:02
  • ★★ Hank says soil microbes have been known for centuries to fight bacteria: people packed wounds with certain soils to prevent infection without knowing why. — 00:01:06
  • ★★ Hank explains that many bacteria make antibiotics to compete with other bacteria, and many antibiotics are also good chemotherapies because they disrupt cells' ability to replicate. — 00:01:15 · chemotherapy
  • ★ Hank says Streptomyces verticillus was never used in traditional medicine, as far as is known. (hedged) — 00:01:25
  • ★★★ Hank stresses that these drugs have been tested not only for effectiveness but for dosing, target cancers, danger, side effects, sex and age differences, cancer stage, safe duration and how to minimize complications. — 00:01:35 · chemotherapy
  • ★★ Hank says chemo side effects include not just vomiting but long-term damage such as lung scarring, cardiac effects or secondary cancer. — 00:01:58 · chemotherapy
  • ★★★ Hank says cancers are high-impact, sneaky diseases needing high-impact treatment, and the slow, tedious work of medical research made his treatment far less awful than 10 years ago. — 00:02:09 · cancer

00:02:39 — People urging a more natural route and making content about his choices

  • ★★ Hank says that while publicly living with cancer he received almost universally good vibes: people were amazing. — 00:02:39
  • ★★ Hank says some people told him he would do better and be healthier taking a more natural route, meaning not doing chemotherapy. — 00:02:48 · chemotherapy
  • ★★ Hank says others moved his words into their social media feeds and, less politely, made content saying his decisions were bad and people with cancer should do otherwise. — 00:03:00 · social media
  • ★★ Hank says he knows the right thing is not to let his anger at those people show in how he talks about them, and he is trying. — 00:03:17
  • ★★ Hank asks what critics mean by more natural treatment, when most of his cancer treatments came from nature. — 00:03:27

00:03:37 — Complementary care is fine; what 'natural cancer treatment' really means; cancer deaths in poorer countries

  • ★★ Hank favours Epsom salt baths and acupuncture during chemo: if your doctor says they won't harm and you feel they help, do them. — 00:03:37 · chemotherapy
  • ★ Hank took Epsom salt baths; he doesn't know if they helped, but they let him take a long bath and feel he was doing something for himself. — 00:03:48
  • ★★ Hank took fish oil, vitamin D and magnesium; he thinks the magnesium especially helped, as his muscle cramps cleared up. (hedged) — 00:03:58
  • ★★ Hank says supplements known not to hurt and thought to help are fine: as long as you talk to your doctor and see no negative consequences, do it. — 00:04:06
  • ★★★ Hank says some things may have some positive effect, but nothing works like actual cancer treatment, so skipping it for natural treatment makes him ask what 'natural' means. — 00:04:14
  • ★★★ Hank says 'natural cancer treatment' only ever means something not known to work, known not to work, or known to do more harm than good; otherwise it would include his three natural chemo compounds. — 00:04:25
  • ★★★ Hank says most cancer cases on Earth, and an even greater majority of cancer deaths, occur outside high-income countries. — 00:04:47 · cancer, Earth, global health
  • ★★★ Hank says those people don't die for lack of coffee enemas, cannabis oil or apricot pits, but for lack of chemotherapy, radiation, surgery and screening. — 00:04:55 · chemotherapy

00:05:11 — The cancer socks he designed during chemo

  • ★★ Hank says people who talk about natural cancer treatment and avoiding chemo never think about this. — 00:05:11
  • ★★ Hank recalls designing socks while feeling like garbage on chemo, one of the only creative things he could do; friends picked their top eight. — 00:05:15 · Hank's Cancer Socks
  • ★★ Hank says the socks share one colour scheme so they can be mixed and matched, and 100% of the profit goes to increasing access to cancer treatment. — 00:05:28 · Hank's Cancer Socks

00:05:40 — Lucky to live when and where treatment exists; others still live in the past

  • ★★★ Hank says cancer treatment often sucks, yet he feels lucky to be alive in this time and place where he can access it. — 00:05:40
  • ★★ Hank says 10 years ago his treatment would have been worse, 30 years before that horrible and probably disabling for life, and 30 years before that nonexistent. (hedged) — 00:05:49 · Hodgkin lymphoma
  • ★★★ Hank says some people on Earth today live the reality of the US 80 years ago, and we don't have to live in a world like that. — 00:05:59 · health equity, United States, Earth

00:06:09 — Christmas shipping deadline, sold-out notifications, warehouse visit, sign-off

  • ★★★ Hank says the socks will be available for a long time, but today is the last day for standard shipping guaranteed by Christmas Eve, so buy gifts now. — 00:06:09 · Hank's Cancer Socks
  • ★★ Hank says the same Christmas Eve shipping deadline applies to everything at good.store and dftba.com for US buyers; for international orders all bets are off. — 00:06:23 · Good Store, DFTBA Records, United States
  • ★★ Hank suggests that viewers whose style or size has sold out sign up for a notification. — 00:06:28
  • ★ Hank says he went to the warehouse this week (week of 4 December 2023), made boxes and packed orders, and had a good time. — 00:06:32

In the description and comments

  • ★★ The description says Hank is so happy to be cancer free, at the moment anyway, because chemotherapy exploded the cancer cells. (hedged) — video description · chemotherapy
  • ★ The description says Hank gets to have curly hair now, at least for a little while; in a comment he says it was not curly before. — video description
  • ★★ In a comment Hank says his treatment was partly discovered through traditional medicine, and studying what worked in the past or works for indigenous groups is worthwhile. — creator comment
  • ★★ In a comment Hank says he doesn't feel bad about his anger but wants to be strategic: critics seeing him angry would not make his message easier to hear. — creator comment
  • ★★ In a comment Hank says nothing is worse than knowing you might die and then being told it might be because you're doing the wrong thing. — creator comment
  • ★★ In a comment Hank says nature does make such powerful, awful medicines all the time: it is the largest and most powerful chemical factory in the known universe. — creator comment

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: alternative medicine · appeal to nature · cancer · chemotherapy · Hank's Cancer Socks

Also: Projects: DFTBA Records · Good Store

Concepts: acupuncture · Antibiotic · apricot kernel · bleomycin · cannabis · Catharanthus roseus · coffee enema · dietary supplement · doxorubicin · fish oil · global health · health equity · Hodgkin lymphoma · magnesium · magnesium sulfate · preventive healthcare · Radiation therapy · social media · Streptomyces verticillus · surgery · traditional medicine · vinblastine · vitamin D

Places: Earth · Italy · Madagascar · United States

Events: Christmas Eve

Also centred on appeal to nature: Why Can't I Take My Meds?

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