Splicetoday

Pop Culture
Jul 28, 2008, 07:12AM

Isn't Anything Bad For You Anymore?

We were pumped when they told us coffee reduced the risk of diabetes. Same with red wine and heart attacks. But tobacco? Something like 90% of all the propoganda we've ever seen in our life told us that addictive substance eviscerated our lungs and made babies cry. Well apparently it actually helps cure cancer. Unfortunately they haven't figured out how to make it healthy in cigarette form yet, but we're sure science will figure something out.

Tobacco is well-known as a leading cause of cancer, but according to a study by Stanford researchers, it may one day become widely used to cure it.

The study, published Monday in a National Academy of Science journal, concludes that tobacco plants may be engineered cheaply and quickly to grow safe antibodies, which can potentially be used to battle cancer.

Approximately 18,000 Americans are diagnosed annually with B-cell lymphoma, which is a slow-growing, incurable type of cancer that is usually left untreated in its early stages. These plant-grown vaccines could provide a more aggressive treatment for this cancer.

Cancer patients are not the only ones that stand to benefit from the study.

“There are lots of diseases for which proteins are needed,” Levy said. “This vaccine production technology, if proven effective, can also be used for hormone injections, enzyme replacement and to produce monoclonal antibodies.”

“I find it ironic that tobacco is now part of an instrument that could potentially make treatments for cancer,” Levy said, “because people usually think of tobacco as a cause of cancer.”

Just don’t expect a tobacco-aided cancer cure to come in smoke-able form.

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