Feb
Has cancer been around since the 1200s and before that or is it a somewhat new disease?
Answer:
The oldest description of human cancer was found in an Egyptian papyri written between 3000-1500 BC. It referred to tumors of the breast. The oldest specimen of a human cancer was found in the remains of a female skull dating back to the Bronze Age (1900-1600 BC).The mummified skeletal remains of Peruvian Incas, dating back 2400 years ago, contained lesions suggestive of malignant melanoma. And cancer was found in fossilized bones and manuscripts of ancient Egypt. Cancer is not a disease of our modern industrialized age, as some may have believed at one time.
One of the earliest human cancers found in the remains of mummies was a bone cancer suggestive of osteosarcoma. Louis Leakey found the oldest possible hominid malignant tumor in 1932 from the remains of either a Homo erectus or an Australopithecus. This tumor was suggestive of a Burkitt’s lymphoma (although that nomenclature was certainly not in use then). Diseases that we know to be rare cancers today have had a long history.
Hippocrates is credited with being the first to recognize the difference between benign and malignant tumors. His writings describe cancers of many body sites. The swollen blood vessels around the malignant tumors so reminded him of crab claws, he called the disease karkinos (the Greek name for crab). In English this term translates to carcinos or carcinoma.
Answer:
likely forever… it's just a cell that grows abnormally and keeps going
Answer:
since man put a title on it you mean? or a name for it? i believe it has been known since wwII with all the additives and think about tobacco how long has been here? since man/woman has been here is as long as cancer has been here it just didnt have that name CANCER.
Answer:
Cancer is a natural biological process. If we get old enough without dying from something else, everybody would get cancer eventually. This fact leads me to think that it's been around as long as humanity itself. But, it's hard to say when we identified it as being what it is.
Answer:
cancer was probably around for as long as humans have lived beause it is abnormal growth of cells.