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About Burzynski: PART I

The first in the series, "Burzynski, the Movie," is an internationally award-winning documentary originally released in 2010 (with an Extended Edition released in 2011) that tells the true story of a medical doctor and Ph.D biochemist named Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski who won the largest, and possibly the most convoluted and intriguing legal battle against the Food & Drug Administration in American history.

His victorious battles with the United States government were centered around Dr. Burzynski's gene-targeted cancer medicines he discovered in the 1970's called Antineoplastons, which have currently completed Phase II FDA-supervised clinical trials in 2009 and has been given permission by the FDA to begin the final phase of FDA testing–randomized controlled clinical trials. .

When Antineoplastons are approved, it will mark the first time in history a single scientist, not a pharmaceutical company, will hold the exclusive patent and distribution rights on a paradigm-shifting medical breakthrough.

Read the complete synopsis

About Burzynski: PART II

In the compelling follow-up to the first internationally award-winning documentary, “Burzynski: Cancer is Serious Business, Part II” explores the current status of Antineoplastons' clinical testing sanctioned by the United States Food & Drug Administration—and features a modern story of the struggling journeys of cancer patients being treated today at the Burzynski Clinic in Houston, Texas.

For most patients undergoing Burzynski's treatment, their advanced cancer itself runs secondary to the constant barrage of skepticism coming not only from their local oncologists, but also from friends and family who feel their loved ones are making suspect treatment decisions—even though mainstream oncology has already left many for dead.

As the story unfolds, it reveals a real-time change of hearts and minds from many of these doctors and families and with candid interviews with board-certified oncologists, surgeons and neurosurgeons.

Read the complete synopsis

Fact Check The Main Documentary | Sourced Transcript

 

From Our Blog

 

1992 JAMA article and rebuttal

Click on the blue text within the article to view the sources used.

Today, the health care industry accounts for over 17% of our GDP. Which means, the more unhealthy our population, the more healthy our economy. One of the ways to maintain this profitable momentum is to manipulate the scientific literature.

Tampering with scientific truth within the peer-reviewed scientific literature is not a new problem in our society, in fact it has become the norm the past few decades. Whether it be ghostwriters writing fake favorable journal articles for medicines that the industry knows doesn’t work or to their hide deadly side effects (remember Vioxx Dodgball?: read Dr. David Graham’s testimony; CNN dodgeball article), the reason for doing this is to preserve the profitable gain within the industry. Even when these institutions are caught in the act and are forced to pay fines and settlements for these actions, this establishment always comes out ahead financially. Tampering with the truth within the scientific literature is a staple ingredient of economics 101. It’s a proven method of increasing profits. Since cancer treatment takes in $90 billion annually, that’s a big piece of a pie they need to preserve.

This type of underhanded strategy can also take the form of medical school professors themselves who are hired by the pharmaceutical industry to advertise their drugs to their medical students. One of countless examples was exposed by medical students at Harvard in 2009.

These tactics serve not only to exaggerate drug effectiveness or cover up dangers of drugs on the market, but can also be used to trick the medical professional or layman researching new competing treatments—such as Antineoplastons—into coming up with a conclusion that may not be the scientific truth.

Former Editor-In-Chief for the New England Journal of Medicine recently stated, “It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. [link to article]

There are two major peer-reviewed articles in medical literature that are often cited by the unsuspecting medical professional as “proof” that there is no evidence that Antineoplaston treatment is an effective treatment against cancer.

Sadly, both of these articles betray the laws of the very scientific method the scientists writing them were taught to respect. The first is covered in the documentary—the National Cancer Institute-sponsored clinical trials published in 1999; and the second is an article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association entitled “Antineoplastons: An Unproven Therapy”. published in 1992.

At the time of the publication of JAMA’s “Antineoplastons: An Unproven Therapy” Dr. Burzynski was facing a barrage of federal grand juries at the federal level, as well as numerous court appearances at the state level trying to remove his medical license. All of which ended in no finding of fault on Burzynski’s behalf. In 1995, Burzynski was indicted in the 5th federal grand jury. Once of the players in this indictment was the insurance company Aetna, which has a long history of battling Burzynski. Even to this day, Aetna calls Burzynski’s treatment “auto-urine therapy” or, urinating into a cup and drinking it.

In the usual tactic as many in the past and present have utilized, one of the scientists and paid consultants participating in litigation against Burzynski (Zol Consultants) named Saul Green, PhD wrote an elaborate but sloppy propaganda hit piece in an attempt to discredit Burzynski’s discovery and treatment in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1992. Mr. Green, who is now deceased, is also the co-author of the infamous “Quackwatch” who’s other co-founder Stephen Barrett has endured and lost lawsuits for slander and lying.

Another scientist employed by the United States government at this time who has hired to independently study the toxicity and efficacy of Antineoplastons took it upon himself to write his own rebuttal to what he found as a slew of “misrepresentations”, “scare-tactics”, “half-truths”, “ignoring of clinical data”, and the usual findings while investigating other dishonest attempts at manipulating scientific data.

SOURCE: You can read the original JAMA article, with Dr. Burzynski’s “letter to the editor” rebuttal as well as the independent rebuttal in a complete PDF by clicking here.

MORE:

SOURCE: Read a 1992 letter from the Antineoplaston Study Group at Kurume University in Japan documenting their communication with Saul Green.

SOURCE: Read a 1992 letter from the Vice President and Director of Research for Mutual Benefit Life Insurance, Robert Maver, to the Editor of JAMA—who addresses JAMA’s severe flaws in the article.

SOURCE: Read a 1992 letter from Edwin Bransome Jr. MD of the Medical College in Georgia to the Editor of JAMA, addressing the misleading nature of this article.

SOURCE: Read a 1992 letter from Paul Scharff, MD to the Editor of JAMA, addressing the misleading nature of this article.

SOURCE, Mr. Green’s Resume: Saul Green, PhD is not even a medical doctor – click here for his resume and proof of employment at Zol Consultants.

January 2015 Interview with Dr. Burzynski

Watch the first interview in over 2 years of Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski. He gives a brief update on what has been happening since January 2013.

Burzynski: Phase II Clinical Trials Complete, Peer-Reviewed and Published

Since Burzynski defeated the Food and Drug Administration in the 1990s, they were obligated to open up FDA-authorized clinical trials treating patients with Antineoplastons. Since many of his patients at the time suffered from inoperable brain cancer, most of his Antineoplaston clinical data was in this realm, thus justifying a series of Phase II clinical trials to treat a myriad of different brain cancers. Without the obstruction of FDA red tape, The Burzynski Clinic would gladly treat anyone with most all cancer types if they were allowed to. Many of the Phase II clinical trials are now complete, and published in the peer-reviewed literature. Read the Whole Story

Understanding the “anti-Burzynski” Skeptic bloggers | Astroturf Campaign

This article is in our “FAQ” section, but we felt it was important enough to place in it’s own post. First, watch this TEDx lecture:

“What frightens the establishment about Antineoplastons, has nothing to do with some guy in Texas who invented them—based on some peptide-based extract. It’s about their loss of control and authority over a highly profitable share of the market that they’ve controlled since The War On Cancer was enacted.”

Eric Merola Director: Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business Film Serious

The goal is to inject as much noise as possible to keep the public from deciphering the true signal.

The technical definition for these activities, is called “Astroturfing”. [click here for the definition].

The most recent example of Astroturfing in the news was exposed in an August 9, 2015 New York Times article titled “Coca-Cola Funds Scientists Who Shift Blame for Obesity Away From Bad Diets”. The article explains how Coca-Cola (in response to a 25% decrease in sales the last two decades due to a decline in health for consumers) created a non-profit called “Global Energy Balance Network” and has placed millions of dollars into this non-profit for the goal of spreading positive pro-Coca-Cola propaganda trying to debunk the obesity and Type 2 diabetes health hazards from consuming Coca-Cola. The rhetoric is all the same, claiming “science-based” data, when in reality the data is the farthest from “science-based” at all.

Creating a fake grassroots organization to push an agenda of protecting an organization’s bottom line has proven to be one of the most effective forms of propaganda in our modern times. The average joe doesn’t know the difference between a propaganda campaign and a legitimate scientific study.

Another example of a past famous Astroturf campaign, is when health advocates began winning legislation to raise taxes and increase regulation of smoking in the USA—Phillip Morris, Burson-Marrsteller, and other tobacco interests created the “National Smokers Alliance” (NSA) in 1993. The NSA and other tobacco interests initiated an aggressive public relations campaign from 1994-1999 in an effort to exaggerate the appearance of grassroots support for smoker’s rights.

The anti-Burzynski/Antineoplastons group who ironically call themselves “The Skeptics” work the same way. Some are paid by third party interest groups, that appear to be unrelated to the industry itself, in an effort to destroy or at least stall the progress of Antineoplastons. (They aren’t exclusively against Antineoplastons, they go after anything that isn’t invented, packaged, and sold by the pharmaceutical industry). The rest operate under tight dogmatic “groupthink” behaviors, and blindly follow the paid ones, having no real idea of what they are writing and publishing due their weak intellectual vulnerability to desperately want to be accepted by the larger “paid” group. It’s a very intelligent and effective way to go about spreading disinformation in a world where many naive and vulnerable people want to not believe these activities occur, so they seek a google search to reinforce their core belief system—regardless if what they find relates to the truth or not. Just how right-wing groups prefer right-wing publications, left-wing groups prefer left-wing publications, and so on.

*If you read any of these “Anti-Burzynski” blogs you will notice their rhetoric is based on rabid hateful contention, resorting to character attacks and ad hominem attacks, while completely avoiding the facts themselves. Those who believe the unsubstantiated statements written in their blogs are their target audience. These very same people are the so-called “editors” who gate-keep the “Burzynski” Wikipedia page, then write their own blogs as “sources” to the very same unsubstantiated statements placed within the Wikipedia page.

There is little hope of changing the minds of these groupthink individuals, because they are not “science-based” individuals searching for the truth, and we wouldn’t recommend wasting your time with them trying to convince them of the proven facts before them. Groupthinkers have been a big part of the human culture since the beginning of time.

Because it is difficult to decipher who is an Astroturf Group and who is a well-meaning journalist, sometimes they are able to influence vulnerable members of the mainstream press. These same bloggers recently manipulated Liz Szabo of USA TODAY (in Nov. 2013) and worked together to create one of the most unsubstantiated and biased articles on Burzynski to date.

What are they so afraid of?

You will notice they do not attack other similar documentary projects the same way they attack this one. The reason being, most other so-called “alternative cancer therapies” do not stand a chance of actually reaching FDA approval and changing the paradigm of cancer therapy like “Antineoplastons” do. It’s a genuine threat that scares them to the core.

The reality is, if Antineoplastons were placed on the market for any type of cancer—anyone would be able to gain access to it under the FDA’s “Off label” clause. This would be permanently and detrimentally damaging to the cancer industry, as most any cancer patient who has experienced a failed surgery, or has an inoperable cancer would inevitably choose Antineoplastons over conventional toxic therapy, simply for quality of life issues. Also, since the patents on Antineoplastons have been around for a long time, they would only hold a 7-year exclusive patent upon reaching market before becoming a generic drug (like most antibiotics). Even if a member of PhRMA were to purchase Antineoplastons for distribution, it would destroy their company along with all other competing companies, upon the medicines reaching “generic status”.

The industry also profits greatly from all the anti-inflammatory medications, anti-nausea medications, anti-depressants, and more that are given as a standard to many cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy and radiation. The issue of Antineoplastons is merely a market issue, not a scientific one. Creating an aggressive Astroturf campaign is one of the final stages of defense when an industry is trying to preserve a monopolistic advantage over the market.

A little bit of advice:

Overall, you need to be able to think for yourself. Question everything, including us and this film. Feel free to verify all sources used for this film for yourself via the Sourced Transcript [link]. You will notice the Astroturf campaign related to the “anti-Burzynski bloggers” refuse to do that, they instead engage in ad hominem attacks to avoid the truth presented in this project. These Astroturf bloggers have an agenda, and are not open to any rational discourse whatsoever.

Our society is increasingly built on wars of information and disinformation. The fact that most people will basically believe anything they are told without bothering to find out if what they are told is true or not—makes them for vulnerable prey, especially when they are dying of cancer. The writers of the “anti-Burzynski” bloggers know this—and take full advantage of this. That is the entire goal of an Astroturf campaign.

Next time you read an article from ironically titled blogs like “Science Based Medicine” or “Science Blogs” take the time to actually “fact-check” what they are writing, and you will begin to see their house of cards for what it is.

In September, 2013 – Popular Science has stated they will be no longer allowing comments due to a small “fraction minority [which] wields enough power to skew a reader’s perception of a story.”