What I found quite interesting about this quack product is how its main active ingredient, "zinc chloride", is actually linked with the history and evolution the medical procedure I had done to cure my Basal Cell Carcinoma. A few months back, I had undergone a procedure called "Mohs Micrographic Surgery", which was performed by a brilliant dermatologist at Lister Hospital in London in order to remove a basal cell carcinoma lesion from my forehead.

I'm fully cured of it now, but that was not to be unexpected, as this procedure has a proven 99 per cent cure rate). In investigating the history of Mohs Surgery, I found that it was originally called "Chemosurgery". Dr Frederick Mohs (who created this procedure) utilised zinc chloride paste in order to remove the cancerous tissue from the skin (hence the name "chemosurgery"). The main reason for using zinc chloride was that it would cause the skin onto which it was applied to to scab over and fall off, as well as to "fix" that tissue in order for it to be examined later. The reason this treatment was so effective was that the doctor would then analyse the removed tissue under the microscope to see if any more cancer remained, and if so, would go back to the particular area of the skin where the cancer remained and remove that also. This process of removal via the application of zinc chloride and microscopic examination would be repeated until it was determined that no more cancer remained via microscopic examination of the excised tissue. So it's not the "salve" that magically targets and kills the cancer cells, it's the doctor's meticulous examination of the removed tissue that ensures that they have removed the entire tumour. Basically, the zinc has no more magical properties than a good scalpel does, with the benefit of "fixing" or preserving the tissue in order to allow the pathologists time to examine it.

In modern times, this procedure has since evolved to the frozen "fresh tissue" process, where instead of using Zinc Chloride to remove the tissue, a scalpel is used to cut it out instead, and the excised sample is then frozen, sliced and prepared under microscope slides ready to be examined. Incidentally, the reason that Mohs replaced the scalpel with Zinc Chloride was in order to avoid the intense burning pain and scarring caused by the zinc. This "alternative medicine" seems like someone literally stripped out the good science from an effective procedure, and left only the most destructive part of it. So for anyone out there with basal cell carcinoma...I would recommend the Mohs procedure. Assuming you find a good Doctor that is well qualified to carry this procedure out, Mohs Micrographic Surgery is probably the most effective treatment you could ever hope for for this and other types of skin cancers!