Vale, Alan Cantwell, MD, 1932-2021

by Mary W Maxwell, LLB

Sad news. Alan Cantwell, MD, passed away this year. In fact, the first day of this year -- January 1, 2021, but I have only just found out. He was born in 1932, so was 88. He was the son of a doctor, and graduated from Cornell.

I last visited Alan in Los Angeles in 2019 when I was en route to Australia. He was in good form, always happy to hear about Gumshoe News and its editor Dee McLachlan who welcomed his articles.

In 2005, I reviewed Cantwell's book "Queer Blood" for Online Journal, and was surprised that he contacted me to say how pleased he was. Later, he sent me his book "Four Women against Cancer." No doubt that helped me get onto the road that resulted in my book "Consider the Lilies: A Review of 18 Cures for Cancer and Their Legal Status" (2013).

From there I got various leads from him, such as to Dr Lawrence Broxmeyer and Dr Gerald Domingue on pleomorphism, and Dr Erik Enby of Sweden on blood. (When Alan did not reply to my recent article about Erik Enby at RumorMillNews.com, I figured he might be ill.)

A long-suffering researcher -- Cantwell found no takers for his bacteria-in-cancer theory. He had a great sense of humor and was generous with moral support. He learned about the dark side of AIDS (I mean the genocidal side) when he was invited to the home of a friend where Robert Strecker, MD was giving "a little talk."

Because he was employed by Kaiser Permanente, as a dermatologist, Alan tried not to go overboard with his dissidence. On the other hand, he was uncompromising in his beliefs about some of the closed doors in medicine, and worried about anti-gay prejudice.

Dr Cantwell was legally married to Frank Sinatra (nephew of Old Blue Eyes), and they lived in West Hollywood. His departure must be a great loss.

Vale, Alan. I thank you for 15 years of collegiality. I hope you'll be able to find somebody "up there" to converse with about pleomorphism!

Interview with Dr Cantwell in 2016 is linked below.