"Next to heart disease, more people in this country die from cancer than from any other illness. For this reason fear of cancer has reached terrifying proportions. Some doctors try not to mention the word, but veil the reality in talk of "malignancy" or "unusual growth." Some women who find lumps in their breasts refuse to consult a physician and harbour the fear of cancer until, like a psychological malignancy, it takes its toll in sapped vitality and loss of peace of mind. Men who suspect they might have cancer sometimes in mistaken self-pity gradually withdraw from other people, denying life itself. What is lost through fear of cancer, totally without proof of cancer, in productive, joyous living is hard to estimate, but the fear of the disease sometimes does more actual harm than the disease itself."
Good Reading Rack Service, 1955
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