Budwig

Dr. Johanna Budwig's protocol for cancer

Comments & memorable quotes

As many (in fact, probably all) doctors, naturopaths or researchers who found a way to successfully address cancer outside the beaten paths of the conventional cancer treatment field, Dr. Budwig and her work have been attacked and silenced by vested medical, industrial and pharmaceutical interests throughout her life (compare History of Alternative Cancer Treatment).

A very balanced comment by Vincent Gammill of the non-profit "Center for the Study of Natural Oncology" reads:

"Budwig's observations were correct, but her conclusions require clarification. Flax oil or FSO/CC [cottage cheese] is not in and of itself an anticancer diet. It simply helps correct (perhaps even overcorrects) an omega-3 deficiency in our diet. This can affect many pathways ranging from prostaglandins to cellular immune function."

But perhaps it doesn’t even matter how the "Budwig diet" is called (which, as detailed elsewhere, involves an entire "protocol" comprising healthy diet, sunlight, stress management, etc., when properly implemented). As the German saying goes, "Wer heilt, hat recht." (The one who heals is right). And Dr. Budwig’s protocol has, at least when applied under her direct tutelage, a respectable track record of (sometimes near-miraculous-seeming) healings.

A more deplorable (and quite subjective) comment on the Budwig diet has been furnished by Dr. Andrew Weil, a well-known US doctor with an alternative bend. His "case in point" serves to illustrate how many help-seeking people can be kept in ignorance by the words of "authorities" they so implicitly trust.

Dr. Weil’s website carries an article on Dr. Budwig where he notes "All of this sounds fanciful to me." and concludes "I certainly would not rely on a combination of flaxseed oil and cottage cheese as a treatment for any form of cancer."

As various members of a Budwig forum commented:

"My question is this, how do these so called brilliant doctors watch thousands of people die, due to withholding valuable lifesaving information such as the flaxoil/cottage cheese... sleep at night?"

"My feeling is this, sometimes mainstream medical doctor's have just enough alternative healing knowledge, to be VERY dangerous. It's better if they make no statements at all, until they decide who and what they are going to stand for. Too many innocent people will hear a doctor say a few words about natural, alternative methods, and then believe everything that doctor says. It's just very deceptive and misleading if you yourself are not educated. When I think about how many years it's taken me to get where I'm at, I shudder to think about the chaos going on inside the heads of people just starting out in their journey of searching out alternative protocols."

"It's been going on since the 1930s--since Morris Fishbein representing the AMA destroyed Royal Rife and all his records. You can read it (and weep) in a book called The Cancer Cure that Worked by Barry Lynes [currently out of print]. Had Rife been able to share his discovery with the world, cancer would have long ago ceased to be. The few people, like Richard Schulze the herbalist, who have cured so many by natural means and refused to play the game, have been put out of commission and many wind up in jail."

"Self delusion as a result of worshipping money and status. Gross lack of research as a result of relying on tainted studies or the lack of studies to allow continued worship of money. Simple evil."

"No doubt he has done a lot of good, but when anyone answers to two kings, it makes me highly suspicious of anything they do and say. Another one, Dr. Rosenfeld, is not as stupid as he appears. He lies thru his teeth to stay in the good graces of the powers that be. Anytime anyone tells a half truth, or leaves out part of the truth to create a false illusion, which Rosined does every time he is on TV, I am forced to put him on the list not to be trusted. At times, I think Dr. Weil does the same thing. So how can any of us trust their beliefs and statements?"

"I have not read a lot of Andrew Weil's stuff, but I can certainly see that he has become a wealthy fellow with a 'cult' following! That is one reason I have not read a lot of his stuff!

By the way, he says, about Dr. Budwig's 7 nominations for the [alternative] Nobel Prize, that ‘anyone can get nominated.’ How about if this year, I nominate you and you nominate me for the [alternative] Nobel Prize? Deal? LOL! Weil almost makes it sound like Budwig greased some palms for those nominations just to be able to tout her FO/CC regimen! LOL!" (by Elliot Yudenfriend)

"I respect a doctor who can say 'I don't know.' I don't respect one who denigrates without knowing and further presumes the scientific results to be 'fanciful'."

Memorable Quotes on Dr. Budwig's work

In addition to the quotes already featured above, here are a number of statements by Dr. Budwig herself and some more comments by several physicians and researchers.

"This diet is far and away the most successful anti-cancer diet in the world".
Dr. Dan C. Roehm M.D. FACP (oncologist & former cardiologist)

"I suggest that all those who find it necessary to add other protocols or to add supplements to it have not even given the Budwig Protocol half a chance. They just don't look beyond the flaxoil/cottage cheese part. There is much more to it than that. It is a scientifically well thought out, all natural approach to health, that has a tremendous rate of success and track record... and it costs next to nothing.

I think that if it were very expensive and much money could be made on it, it would be much more popular because it would be pushed by business. But as it stands, it doesn't lend itself to it. So you have to take it at practically no cost or go for some other high priced methods."
Wilhelm H.

"I only wish that all my patients had a PhD in Biochemistry and Quantum Physics to enable them to see how with such consummate skill this diet was put together. It is a wonder."
Dr. Dan C. Roehm M.D. FACP (oncologist & former cardiologist)

"It is amazing how quickly the tumor, for instance with colon cancer, is being eliminated. Even with an old patient of 84 years who was scheduled for an operation because of his colon threatening to become blocked, I was able to achieve the complete elimination of the tumor and the patient’s restoration to health within a few days.
These are not isolated cases, in fact 99% of the sick that come to see me to use the biological method of cancer therapy, are cancer patients who have had operations and radiation sessions, or who were diagnosed as being too far advanced for an operation to be of any help. Even in these cases health can be restored, usually within a few months, I would say in 90% of cases."
Dr. Budwig in "Der Tod des Tumors, Band II" (The Death of the Tumor, Vol. II) transcribing an interview broadcast by the Süddeutscher Rundfunk Stuttgart (South German Radio Station) on 11 Sep 1967, translated by Wilhelm H.
[Compare I have followed the Budwig protocol for a long time but don’t see a positive effect concerning the cancer I want to heal, Does the Budwig protocol heal ANY condition of disease within ANY human/animal body? and Which complementary treatments did Dr. Budwig allow, endorse or recommend? for advice for those who don’t seem to respond.]

"Of all the nutritional theories that I have investigated, Dr. Johanna Budwig’s is definitely number one ... Nowhere in the world have I found not even remotely such fantastic cases as with Dr. Budwig. It’s phenomenal."
Lothar Hirneise, eminent German cancer researcher and author of Chemotherapy Heals Cancer and The Earth Is Flat

"Over 50% of Dr. Budwig's patients were doctors or relatives of doctors who knew why in such a serious disease they would rely on the experiences of this brilliant physicist, chemist and pharmacologist rather than follow the prevailing opinion which says that tumors must be destroyed through chemotherapy and radiation."
From the back cover of Dr. Budwig's last book: Cancer — The Problem and the Solution

"And what do I actually do? I give cancer patients simple, natural foods. That is all. I take sick people out of the hospital, when it is said there that they do not have more than an hour or two left to live, that the scientifically attested diagnosis is at hand and that the patient is completely moribund. In most cases I can help even these patients quickly and conclusively."
Dr. Johanna Budwig in her book Flax Oil as a True Aid

"The food we eat is not mankind's only determining factor. The body, soul, mind and spirit all have their functions and roles to play, their areas of influence. But the harm done by eating the wrong kind of food fats has repercussions in all realms of life, including healthy mental and spiritual functioning.
In our world, however, the choice of healthy food is one of the elementary aspects of our lives which we should organize as such. It is far more important than many people in the Western world are willing to admit. It is not those who acknowledge this fact who are materialistic in their way of thinking, but those who are not willing to forego something, in order to achieve a far greater goal."
Dr. Johanna Budwig in "Flax Oil as a True Aid"

"I would not think of using the allopathic treatment. I don't think it was bravery on my part to reject it. For me it would have been stupidity to consider it after having seen what it did to so many I knew. My best friend died in my arms shortly after choosing chemo and radiation. I know of so many others who had different cancers and used the traditional treatments and died.
This is my opinion. I believe 150% in what I am choosing to not do and to do. I think that is very important. To give in to any protocol because of the strong opinions of others is a mistake. Research is crucial on the part of the one with the diagnosis."
Rhoda Freed replying to "Is anyone here using flaxoil/cottage cheese as a first line anti-cancer treatment i.e. have you had the guts to reject chemo/radiation? I think anyone who rejects the traditional ‘approved’ treatments must be very brave."

And to add here my very personal opinion of Dr. Budwig’s diet and protocol (if I may ;-): it clearly has been a life-saver for some people with serious and less serious ill-health. Due to its implementation of what many schools of natural health would define as a nutritious and balanced diet, its affordability and relative ease of implementation (combined with the amazing success rates stated by Dr. Budwig), it seems a sensible basic healing approach to consider trying.

In the long term, it might not be optimal for all healthy persons considering the continual inclusion of animal protein in the diet, especially considering the conditions under which most of earth’s dairy is currently produced (see Why Use Organic Dairy in the Budwig Diet).

More important in my eyes, however is the following: I believe that for true and permanent healing to be achieved, one often needs to consider and work at healing all known aspects and levels of human existence, which particularly include the emotional, mental, spiritual as well as the environmental ones, with the first three subsumable under the term energetic factors.

In fact, I very much agree with eminent alternative and conventional cancer treatment researcher Lothar Hirneise who concurs with a number of other thinkers and healing approaches including traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in stipulating that energetic blockages in the widest sense frequently or invariably provide the basis for disease to develop (likely exceptions in my eyes are ionizing radiation damage and similar noxious impacts assaulting the body’s integrity).

Such blockages in energy flow would consequently need to be addressed and removed to allow life energies which form the basis of healthy functioning to flow normally again. See Budwig protocol & life energies blockages: (on the question why the cancer always/sometimes will come back when the Budwig diet is abandoned) and Energetics, particularly the outstanding DIY healing tool of EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique). I most highly recommend combining the Budwig protocol with EFT and related energetic approaches such as Qigong to optimise one’s cancer "healing curve".

Last but far from least, greatest importance has to be assigned to the effects of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) which continue to increasingly pollute our environment, making protective measures paramount both for health maintenance and healing.

For more Dr Budwig quotes, read excerpts from her book FlaxOil As A True Aid.

Related section

For the most comprehensive coverage world-wide of the oil-protein diet & protocol developed by Dr. Budwig, see

Budwig Diet incl. excerpts from her books Flax Oil As A True Aid and Cancer — The Problem and the Solution.