"There are prime and secondary causes of disease. For example, the prime cause of the plague is the plague bacillus, but the secondary causes of the plague are filth, rats, and the fleas that transfer the plague bacillus from rats to man. By a prime cause of a disease I mean one that is found in every case of the disease.

Cancer, above all other diseases, has countless secondary causes. Almost anything can cause cancer. But, even for cancer,there is only one prime cause. Summarized in a few words, the prime cause of cancer is the replacement of the respiration of oxygen in normal body cells by a fermentation of sugar.

All normal body cells meet their energy needs by respiration of oxygen, whereas cancer cells meet their energy needs in great part by fermentation. All normal body cells are thus obligate aerobes, whereas all cancer cells are partial anaerobes. From the standpoint of the physics and chemistry of life, this difference between normal and cancer cells is so great that one can scarcely picture a greater difference.

• Oxygen gas, the donor of energy in plants and animals is dethroned in the cancer cells and replaced by an energy yielding reaction of the lowest living forms; namely, a fermentation of glucose.
• As emphasized, it is the first precondition of the proposed treatment that all growing body cells be saturated with oxygen.
• It is the second precondition that exogenous carcinogens be kept away, at least during the treatment.

All carcinogens impair respiration directly or indirectly by deranging capillary circulation, a statement that is proved by the fact that no cancer cell exists, the respiration of which is not impaired. Of course, respiration cannot be repaired if it is impaired at the same time by carcinogens."