More salacious gossip from the mainstream rumour mill on Gu Kailai, the wife of former Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai, now a key suspect in the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood. more ›

In the last five years, many patients have come up to me to ask: I don't smoke, don't drink, and I pay great attention to my diet. Why am I getting liver cancer, stomach cancer, or intestinal cancer? My house is very clean, why is my child getting leukemia? I can't help but think: If we're living in an environment where the air is polluted, the water is poisonous, the food is toxic and even the furniture is tainted, you'll fall ill no matter how health your habits are. more ›

Food safety regulators in Shenzhen, Guangdong, say they've found carcinogenic mildew in peanuts and cooking oil more ›

How do you damage the reputation of one of the nation's top universities and its affiliates? Why, by letting stupid interns change the name of your institution's cancer patients to make fun of their terminal illness, of course! The family of a patient at Fudan University's Cancer Center is furious with the institution after receiving a hospital bill that refers to their loved one as "drop dead Zhang." more ›

Did you know? Each time you wipe your face (or your ass) here in China, there's a good chance you're giving yourself cancer? Here's the latest edition in our "Everything Causes Cancer" series, via Want China Times: more ›

A small village in eastern Shandong once famed as a "longevity town" is now a "cancer town" after villagers began dying one after the other from cancer in the last three years. The cancer is believed to have been caused by the inhalation of illegally dumped toxic chemicals: more ›

Lipton, the most prominent brand to be named by China's top quality watchdog among the 19 tea labels found to contain excessive rare earth content yesterday, has scrambled to action, recalling and destroying one batch of its product from supermarket shelves: more ›

China's quality watchdog, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, says that 19 products, including Lipton Tieguanyin (pictured on the right) have been found to contain excessive levels of potentially harmful rare-earth minerals in a random check of 58 oolong products from Shanghai, Beijing, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Fujian and Guangdong. Five of these brands are manufactured by Shanghai-based companies and they are: Mingfeng, Jiaranlu, Zhengxiangyuan, Cuiming and Shenxin. more ›

For those of you who still think you're safe outside Beijing, researchers reported yesterday that downtown Shanghai's fog vapor harbors cancer-causing chemicals. Researchers at Fudan University found our fog to contain carcinogenic polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) at levels ranging 0.03 micrograms to 6.67 micrograms per liter. more ›

Think the RMB25 cut-wash-blow at your local salon is a bargain? Think again. Chinese news reports are now saying that a lot of the shampoo used in hair salons around China are just cheap blends of thickener, fragrance, shampoo powder and water costing between 0.4-1.2 yuan per kilo. In some of the more extreme cases, experts have found the shampoo to contain mercury, sulfur or benzene. This could either damage your hair, cause you to go bald, or even give you cancer. more ›

During a spot check by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ), six different types of bottled water were discovered to contain elevated amounts of the chemical compound bromate, a byproduct of the water sterilization process which, in excess, could lead to cancer. Among the water producers that are feeding you cancer water are Harbin Pharmaceutical Group and Jingyou Honghu Mineral Products Co Ltd. According to stuff we've read, excessive consumption of bromate may result in symptoms such as "nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and abdominal pain" as well as other scary stuff. 18 other brands of bottled/barelled water failed to meet general quality standards, as AQSIQ found high levels of not only bacteria (something we've worried about before) but free chlorine and strontium as well. A total of 220 different bottled/barreled water from 211 companies in Beijing, Tianjin, and Hebei Province were tested during the spot check. more ›

Won't somebody think of the children?! A Shanghai Daily investigation has apparently revealed that some tableware sold at local stores and supermarkets - including things usually used to feed our poor, innocent babes - are made from a material that could call cancer. The name of the material is the appropriately gross sounding "urea resin." more ›

You'd better think twice before laying those spankin' new ceramic tiles on your kitchen floor. According to Shanghai Daily, the Shanghai Environmental Protection Industry Association, which has been offering free indoor radon radiation tests since April, announced yesterday that more than 80 percent of those buildings showed excessive radiation, especially from granite, ceramic tiles and "sanitary fittings" such as toilets, bathtubs and basins. more ›

Jing'an caught fire again on Sunday, but thankfully this time's flames weren't lethal. From Xinhua: "The fire broke out on the top of the 12-storey No. 1578 building, located near the Shanghai City Air Terminal in the bustling Nanjing West Road, at about 1:20 p.m. Sunday, belching out thick brownish smoke. The fire was put out by 1: 30 p.m., fire-fighting officials said." more ›

We interrupt our regular programming to bring you this very important public service announcement from our friends at Next Media Animation. Consider yourselves warned, people: Oral sex increases the risk of cancer, both for men and women! And because the human papilloma virus doesn't discriminate, it will hit you whether you're gay, straight, black or white. It doesn't just end there -- knob-polishing and muff-munching both give you a higher risk of throat cancer than smoking! Good Lord... that's all we need to hear to start picking up that pack of Double Happiness from the local Lawson's again! more ›

As China ups its marketing as a destination for medical tourism, more and more foreigners are expected to arrive in the People's Republic for all sorts of treatments and operations, and we're not talking about just acupuncture or foot reflexology here. more ›

After initial research done by the Shanghai Children's Hospital and Shanghai Environmental Protection Industry Association in a study last year, the answer is: well, yeah maybe. In a study of 30 children with leukemia, it was discovered that 15 came from homes with furniture or decor with excessive formaldehyde discharge. more ›

The recent flurry of things in China that experts say cause cancer (cooking oil, food containers, paper napkins...) is enough to send us into cancerous pit-stewing panic, seeing that we're eating egg friend cancer off a cancer plate. But hark, lo, what is that? Chinese scientists have found something that may actually reverse a type of cancer, and that shining hope is in the form of... arsenic. more ›

The list of things that experts tell us cause cancer in China is growing forever longer and even more ridiculous. Last month’s killer: cooking oil. This month killer: the napkin! more ›

So not only is the cooking oil not safe, apparently your take out containers could end up causing cancer as well. Dong Jinshi, VP of the Hong Kong-based International Food Packaging Association, says that about half of disposable dishware in China is unsafe. Those who think you're safe by being in a city - it ain't so: 30% of disposable dishware here have carcinogens such as ceresin wax, which could cause cancer. I don't know if this news makes me never want to eat out again... or just resigned to the fact that, just by living here, I will undoubtedly contract cancer at some point in time. more ›

Looks like, just on the heels of the melamine taint, the next food scare could be in cooking oil: it seems that the State Food and Drug Administration is now stepping up inspections of all food service providers because one-tenth of Chinese cooking oil could be illegally made and cause cancer. The culprit is recycled kitchen or restaurant waste oil, which contains a highly toxic, carcinogenic substance called "aflatoxin" and at least some chefs have been so disgusted by the practice they've put their rants online (translated here if you want to be grossed out). Most of this oil is being sold in less-developed areas, so if you're on a trip out of Shanghai... beware. more ›

Tomorrow is World Cancer Day and the outlook on cancer in Shanghai isn't shiny - according to local medical experts, there has been a 10-fold increase in the number of children in Shanghai hospitalized for cancer in the past decade. The disease is responsible for 10% of local children's deaths and has risen to be the second leading cause of death for grade school kids, after accidents. We couldn't find much more info, but experts have said the rise is linked to unhealthy diets, second-hand smoking and exposure to toxic chemicals. more ›

Not that we needed another reason to love Chinese mushrooms, but it seems like researchers have figured out that a certain type can shrink cancer tumors by as much as 75%! The Maitake mushroom (or 舞茸蘑菇 wu rong muo gu in Chinese), which is also found in Japanese cooking, managed to help combat bladder and prostate cancer in a study by the British Journal of Urology. Besides cancer, mushrooms also seem to help reduce the risk of heart disease and could be the key to weight loss. That's something worth chewing over. more ›

Ever wonder what happens to your old electronics? 60 Minutes aired a story on the dirty underbelly of electronics "recycling" in the States, and it turns out that a significant amount of American "e-waste" ends up in Chinese landfills. As if China didn't produce enough garbage of its own, computers, cell phones, household electronics, and pretty much anything with petty salvageable parts find their way to Chinese junkyards, and are burned, ripped apart and corroded for valuable metals. more ›

We saw a curious little blurb on Shanghai Daily this morning calling all expat children to head over to the Shanghai Discovery Children’s Museum (上海儿童博物) on May 30 to meet kids with leukemia. Our interest piqued, we gave them a call. more ›

Here's something to brighten up your day: Cancer statistics. According to the Shanghai Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 350 people in every 100,000 in the city have cancer. Cancer constituted the cause of death for 30% of local death cases and has killed 219 out of every 100,000 residents. Males were more likely to be diagnosed with cancer than females. Source: Shanghai Daily more ›

You know how at real Chinese restaurants all over town, the waiters always look at you funny when you ask for a glass of ice water because locals normally drink tea water about the temperature of the surface of the sun? Well you can laugh in their smug "Oh these foreigners and their addiction to cold drinks" faces - because now there's studies saying that hot tea, tea over the temperature of 70C, has been linked to oesophageal cancer! more ›

Caijing Magazine shares some startling statistics on cancer in China, where smoking, poor diet, water pollution and environmental problems have caused the nation's cancer death rate to rise 80 percent in the past 30 years. The statistics come from an exhaustive survey conducted by the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Science and Technology. According to the survey, cancer is now accountable for 25 percent of all urban deaths and 21 percent of all rural deaths. Although the rising cancer death rate has long been attributed to an aging population, this recent survey still found that the nation's lung cancer death rate rose 261 percent after adjusting statistics for age. more ›

France24 uncovers a heavily-polluted town called Xiditou 300km southeast of Beijing, where lead levels in the water are 300 times the recommended safe amounts. This is one of dozens of "cancer villages" around China, and a whopping 10% of the population have died so far. Even that stray dog towards the end of clip looks so sick. Yikes. more ›

1. university students who might be studying medicine and could use the cash, 2. people who want to further the cause of medicine (and who might be sick themselves, and thus have a stake in it), and 3. people who are in it just for the money. more ›