Virago 24/7

Legacy In The Lab

• Lyanette Talley

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We unpack how Mirko Beljanski’s environmental view of cancer led to selective plant extracts that target destabilized DNA, and how a SWAT raid in France sparked Sylvie Beljansky’s decades-long effort to prove, publish, and preserve this research. We share new findings on cancer stem cells, synergy with chemotherapy, and practical ways patients can access support safely and legally.

• Mirko’s insight into DNA destabilization as a cancer hallmark
• Targeting cancer stem cells to reduce relapse risk
• The Mitterrand story, lab raid, and human rights case
• Rebuilding research in the U.S. through academic partnerships
• How to access products, coaching, and published studies
• Book proceeds funding ongoing integrative oncology research

If people are interested in learning more about this story, about the products, about the research, if they want to support the research and the natural approach to cancer, Sylvie’s book is the best way to start “Winning the War on Cancer, The Epic Journey Towards a Natural Cure.”


https://www.maisonbeljanski.com/products/health-coach-services

https://www.maisonbeljanski.com/products/winning-the-war-on-cancer (No promo code needed)

https://www.beljanski.org/the-beljanski-approach-to-cancer-free-ebook/



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Everyday growth, everyday healing with everyday warriors!

Music by Deli Rowe: "Space to Move"
Logo by Kaylin Talley


SPEAKER_02:

Sylvie Beljonski watched her father, the scientist Mirko Veljansky, devote his life to researching natural healing solutions, only to face immense resistance for his discoveries. Instead of allowing his legacy to be silenced, Sylvie stepped forward and became the keeper of his mission. Through the Vejansky Foundation and her powerful book, Winning the War on Cancer, she is helping thousands of people discover accessible and natural options for wellness and healing. This conversation is about science, yes, but also about perseverance, truth, and the strength it takes to continue a legacy. Let's welcome Sylvie Beljansky. Hi, I am your host, Leonette Talley, and you are listening to Virago 24-7. Virago is Latin for female warrior, and 24-7 is for all day, every day. Virago 24-7 is a weekly podcast that brings diverse women together to talk about life and our experiences in this world. We share our views on self-love, mental health, marriage, children, friendships, and really anything that needs to be talked about. Here you will find everyday growth, everyday healing with everyday warriors. Um, her name is Sylvie Beljansky, and uh I just want to welcome her.

SPEAKER_00:

Hello, Sylvie. Hello, thank you for having me, Lionette.

SPEAKER_02:

I'm so excited to have you here. Um, you have so many things that we're gonna talk about. You have your hands in a lot of um organizations and stores and and all of that. So welcome and yeah, just tell us about yourself. Um how did you get started with? I know you're the author of Winning the Uh War on Cancer.

SPEAKER_00:

Indeed, um the book Winning the War on Cancer, the epic journey towards a natural cure. Um and uh that that's uh now has become, I mean, a bookseller has uh has received uh um a lot of prizes. Uh it's an easy, easy-to-read story that reads like a novel. At the end of the book, people have learned a lot about uh some plant extracts able to fight cancer cells, about integrative medicine, about what uh the governments can do to uh researchers when they don't like the results of the research. Uh so it's an eye-opening for a lot of people and at the same time a book which is pretty entertaining to read. I wanted to read it like people to read it for the story, also, not just for the information.

SPEAKER_02:

So I know it started with your your father. So let's go back to him and then how you got into um continuing his work.

SPEAKER_00:

Reluctantly at the beginning, and now I am so grateful that uh this opportunity was given to me actually to change my life and to make it uh more more uh meaningful and uh give put me in position to help people in ways that I would have never dreamed about. But indeed, everything started with my my father, he was a PhD in molecular biology. Uh he uh was in the 70s, 80s, one of the first scientists to look at the environment as a cause to cancer. Uh, the famous double elix was uh discovered by Watson and Quick in the late uh 50s, early 60s, that became the big thing. And all the scientists at the time thought that uh only genetic genetic approach could solve all the disease, including cancer. And my father said uh if it was only genetic, the number of cancer would stay pretty stable. But we see the number of cancer is increasing. Therefore, there must be also something else. And uh he looked at the environment uh to understand how environmental toxins affect our DNA. And he made the observation that there is a fundamental difference between cancer cells and healthy cells. And you see this difference whether you look at uh plants, animals, humans. Every time you have a healthy cell, the two strands of the DNA are nicely interwoven. It is the famous double helix. And the two strands of the DNA are well kept together with hydrogen bonds. But when you have a cancerous cell, the hydrogen bonds have broken, and the two strands are not well kept together, and they have some big loops. And that's when there is an increased rate of synthesis of the DNA, meaning the cell multiply much faster than you see those tumors that you do not see with healthy cells. So my father tested, he screened, I mean, and that was something really new back in the 80s, a number of molecules to see what would induce this increased rate of synthesis of the DNA. And then he used his test to look for compounds, natural compounds, that would do the opposite, that would specifically recognize those cancerous cells and selectively, and so that's a very important word, selectively prevent the duplication of the DNA, destroy those cancer cells. And selectively means that then you have products that are going to recognize cancer cells wherever they are located. What they recognize is a differentiated uh DNA, okay, wherever it is. So you stop thinking in terms of ovarian, pancreatic, prostate, brain cancer. It doesn't matter anymore. What matters is do you have cells with a destabilized DNA or not. And then the selectivity also means no toxicity, no side effect for healthy cells, because uh because what you can see under the microscope, it's absolutely fascinating because those plant extracts I'm speaking about, and the the name is Paopera and Rovolfia vomitoria, they both happen to be naturally fluorescent. So under the microscope, you can see how the fluorescence, the halo of fluorescence, which means the plant extracts, is are able to stay around healthy cells. But they penetrate, they really invade cancerous cells. And then they induce apoptosis, which is the death of cancer cells, but selectively with no toxicity to healthy cells. So if you do not have any uh cancerous cell or precancerous cell, the product is not going to penetrate any cell, and you are going to naturally eliminate the product in a matter of hours without side effects. So my father published all those results back in the 80s, 90s, and he got the interest of a lot of French doctors who were very excited because it was kind of a universal approach to fight all cancers without any toxicity. So um he got very, very successful. And in the early 90s, um one of those doctors called my father and said, Well, I'm being asked to help François Mitterrand, who was a French president of the French Republic uh in the early 90s. It was the beginning of the second term of François Mitterrand, and he was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. And the surgeon had come to the French White House and said his cancer has spread everywhere, he's not going to be able to finish his second term. Terms were seven years at the time. And uh we are going to put him under morphine, we are going to prepare the country for early elections. But Mitterrand had a mistress who knew about one of those good doctors got good results uh with prostate cancer, and that's how Mitterrand started to take uh the Beljansky products. And against all odds, uh to the amazement uh and dismay of the political class uh who have the opposition, political opposition, the president started to get better and better. And uh he finished his second term. I mean, that lasted years, and it was very visible to the public because I mean he he was a president. There was no social media and all those things at the time, but still he was appeared back on TV, he was giving press conferences and things that uh a lot of people thought he would not be able to do. So uh everything was okay as long as Mitterrand was alive. When finally Mitterrand passed away in a matter of months, the French army uh sent uh a SWAT team to my father's laboratory to destroy his laboratory, to destroy him, to destroy his research, to destroy any information. I was at the time, I was um uh I did not I mean five, I come from five uh generations of scientists. So I thought, I mean, I we are going to break the curse here. I'm never going to be involved with health. Uh, this is not for me. I grew up seeing all those people coming at home uh crying because I'd been diagnosed with cancer and then coming back with flour chocolates. I said, I don't want to be invaded when I grow up. I want, I want, I will do something else. And I went to law school. So I was working in the New York law firm as a foreign legal associate when I on in October 996, when um I was a little bit homesick, and I decided to call my father at the laboratory. And uh it was ringing, ringing, ringing. So I thought it was pretty strange. And I called my my my mom uh in Paris at home, and I have a voice saying, excuse me, who is this? I said, uh mom. And then the voice says, Oh, you cannot speak to your mom, she's under arrest. So what? And my first reaction was, I'm a lawyer, I want to speak to my client. Wow, wow, okay. And that's how I learned that both of my parents had been arrested, that the SWAT team had come to the laboratory with machine uh guns, dogs, and that they they had an helicopter uh circling over the laboratory, and that both of my parents were arrested. The doctors working with them were arrested, the pharmacists were working with them, whereas the damning 50 people were arrested. There was a laundry uh list of charges, and um that really did not make sense. Absolutely from day one. As a lawyer, I knew it did not make sense, and this was not about uh bringing a man to justice, it was about destroying evidence. And uh I, you know, that my sense of justice was like uh I'm never going to allow that to happen. I I kind of know I'm going to fight that. So I first started with fighting, I mean, diving into uh my my parents' legal defense, and the more I was uh looking at this legal file, the more fishy it looked. And then when I started to organize a defense and ask uh uh for for for dates and for expertise and a trial date and counter expertise and so on, it was no, no, no. Delay, deny, delay, deny, delay, deny. And we were absolutely going nowhere. And my father uh became extremely sick. We believe he was um poisoned during the time of um of this uh raid against the laboratory. Two months later he was diagnosed with advanced myeloid leukemia, and uh for a man in his 70s that was absolutely fatal. So uh then my my focus shifted a little bit. Uh I took the case to the European Court of Human Rights because I wanted my father to have a day in court. They were refusing to give him a day in court. I mean, you cannot let somebody rot in house arrest without ever giving him his day in court. And actually, we won an unanimous decision at the European Court of Human Rights because the French government would rather lose the case than explain what they did and why they did it. Wow.

SPEAKER_02:

How long did this whole process take? Like how long was the innocent?

SPEAKER_00:

It took four years. They were also uh stalling as much as they could, postponing, uh asking for delays. It took me four years, but I won an unanimous case. And then I quickly realized uh my father had passed in the meantime, and a lot of people came to my father's funerals telling me, you know, without your father, I would not be here, I would not have been able to walk my daughter down the aisle, I would not have been able to play with my grandchildren. And I felt the most important was not so much a legal win, it was about carrying on with this scientific legacy, continuing to make the products available to the people who need it and want those products. And uh also I was very affected by the way uh my father's name was um slandered in the French papers. Uh I mean it was Hocus Pocus, my father was kind of described as a crook. And uh I felt very, very, very bad about that. It was, and I decided to start the Here, the Belgianski Foundation as a uh 501 uh organization, and start some um uh uh partnerships with academic institutions and confirm my father's work. And at first, that's what we we did. We worked at uh Columbia University on prostate cancer, Kansas University Medical Center on ovarian and pancreatic cancer, and uh and then so we had the confirmation that indeed those plant extracts were able to work on different kinds of cancer cells, different stages of cancer, no toxicity on healthy cells, the synergy of action with different kinds of uh chemotherapies, which is very important because people don't want to sometimes to have to choose between conventional treatment and uh and integrative medicine. Uh but then we were able to go beyond that. And at the time of my father, nobody was speaking of cancer stem cells. Cancer stem cells are those cells within the tumor which are embryonic, and they are, let's say, tumorose cancer cells. Uh they they are undifferentiated, they are the babies, the next generation. And it happens that they resist chemotherapies. So when you go to have chemotherapy, the doctor is saying, Oh, you are doing well, you are um uh uh responding to the treatment, the tumor, the tumor is shrinking. But in fact, they are destroying the uh adult and least aggressive cells. The embryonic ones, undifferentiated ones, they are able to resist, they are able to stay in the body for a long time, and maybe one day something will trigger those cells and they will start a new tumor, and that's cancer relapse. So we know that about one out of five cancer do relapse, and uh five out of five people who have had cancer live in fear that the cancer relapse. So having a solution, a natural non-toxic solution for cancer stem cells, seemed like uh the grass, the goal, the that a lot of scientists around the world are looking for that, for that solution. And um, we tried our little plant extracts, and they both work. We have had some research done on already on ovarian and pancreatic cancer uh stem cells, and that has been published already. Uh, the research was done at Kansas University Medical Center. The publications are available like all the other publications uh that stem from the research of funded by the Beljanski Foundation. Everything is on Beljanski.org. Everybody can look at those publications, print, download them, print them, share them with their doctor, ask if that would be a good idea. And uh we recently um uh funded research on breast cancer stem cells. Breast cancer is the first killer when it comes to cancer for for women. So uh having something that we could offer to women from to use from day one of diagnosis, because you don't want to let that to fester those cancer stem cells. You want to destroy them for from day one. And we had just completed the research in vitro and in vivo on mice grafted with very aggressive breast cancer stem cells. And it's amazing. I mean, we see the mice not treated with the Pauperandra volfia vomitoria. They develop metastasis, a lot of metastasis. And then the mice treated with those plant extracts, zero metastasis. So the publication is not out yet. It will come soon, hopefully, and will be added to our collections, uh collection of uh of publications on the beljanski.org. And we are uh already uh trying to find a new research project on prostate cancer stem cells, because of, of course, men have the same problem of uh of cancer relapsing, and we think that those plant extracts will work just as well on prostate cancer stem cells, but of course, we have to do the research.

SPEAKER_02:

Wonderful. So um Shiny, this is Shiny, um Sylvie. She she is joining us. She's joining us. So with the supplements, are you I was reading that you're not saying don't do chemo, you're saying that this complements it. Are they pills? Are they like how does that work?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. So uh it is very, very it was very, very important already at the time of my father, and uh that's something that has been repeated uh by the Belzniki Foundation is to show the synergy of action between those plant extracts and uh chemotherapies. And I say when I say chemotherapies, it's because it was done at the time uh I mean, the synergy was demonstrated already at the time of my father with uh the chemotherapy which were very common at the time, like 5FU or cyclophospamide. And now we have done the research uh again with gem citabine and carboplatin, which are the the premium chemotherapies for ovarian and pancreatic cancer. Uh so yes, what we see is that those uh chemotherapy works by itself. Uh those plant extracts work also by themselves, but when you put them together, you reach like uh an inhibition of up to 85 to 95 of cancerous cells without uh without any added toxicity. And that has been documented on ovarian and pancreatic cancer stems uh cancer cells in vitro and in vivo.

SPEAKER_01:

Um pardon me for my uh my delay, but I've been listening to you from the second I I dropped in. Um it's fascinating work you have done, and it's incredible what you've done for your father. I have a question. What what is the specific criteria that a patient must meet to have this? Is or is there a criteria?

SPEAKER_00:

I mean, uh everybody can take those supplements. Uh, Pau Pereira uh is a plant coming from the Amazon rainforest. It was traditionally used uh in South America to fight malaria because it has also some uh antiviral uh benefit. And um what my father is the first one to have uh seen the benefit for for can for cancer, but the plant extracts has been available uh now for uh 50 years. And uh because it's also as an antiviral benefit, if everybody can can can take it, I've seen as you feel some some beginning of flu or or whatever. Um there have been also some uh testimonials saying that it works very well uh for uh people with uh uh HPV, um papioma virus, uh herpes. Uh there was at the time of my father back in the 80s, of course, the big thing was uh the Ez virus, and uh at the beginning of the pandemic, my father was approached with a number uh by a number of people who had been recently diagnosed, and uh there was no drug uh to which had been already developed at the time. So they benefited greatly uh from the the Paupera extract. And my father was able to have a clinical trial in a French hospital for uh patients we had been followed for one full year uh with the AIDS virus and taking Paopera. And you could see that their uh immunity was improving instead of declining, which is what is expected when a patient has uh the ADS virus and is not doing any, not taking any treatment. And the the Ravolfia vomitoria, uh Ravolfia uh is coming uh historically from from India, it's a very well-known plant in uh Ayurvedic medicine. Uh, what my father discovered about the Ravolfia vomitoria is that uh there is a component of this of this extract which which may be toxic and actually induce cancer, and that's the alkaloid reserpine within the Ravolfia extract. So he went at great lengths to uh develop a filtration system that allows to remove the reserpine and the Ravolfia vomitoria extract that he is using and we continue to use, uh, is devoid of reserpine, is and the the the alkaloid that uh is a biomarker for this uh extract is uh uh alstonin. And alstonin acts very much like uh flavoperin, which is a biomarker of Paopera, and both have this uh large spectrum anti-cancer uh effect. And uh Paupera has also the antiviral benefit of olfia is more about uh regulating the hormones. It has been very helpful for uh women uh undergoing menopause, also uh people with having um infertility issue, uh, if there is no mechanical uh problem, of course. I mean the best the good approach is to remove the toxicity uh in the body as much as you can, a good detox, and then Rovolfia vomitoria for the uh father to be and for the mother to be. And uh the results are amazing. And I have been speaking with a number of uh of doctors who have uh confirmed that to me. My father actually had a wall uh uh covered with pictures of babies that he called the Rovolfia babies, and uh and uh I wish that was would we could more do more research about that, but we cannot do everything.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you so much. So Shiny and I can take your supplements, is what you're saying.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yes, the supplements, the supplements are available. There is also uh ginkgo extract, which is completely different from the gold, uh from the green ginkgo that everybody knows. It's made only of golden leaves. And uh those uh those leaves uh when they turn yellow in the fall, this is uh the change of color is a result of the change of chemistry. So what you extract is different from the commercial green ginkgo extract that you find everywhere. And this golden ginkgo extract uh helps with skin fibrosis that can reduce from radiation and uh also uh helps uh inhibit angiogenine. Angiogenine is the enzymes that cancer cells uh develop to create new blood vessels. And they need all those blood vessels to uh feed themselves in order to grow, to spread and create those big tumors, but also to spread to other organs. So by inhibiting rangiogenine, we are starving cancer cells and preventing them from spread. Uh, so that's a very also um useful um extract that can be uh benefiting to everybody uh suffering with cancer, and especially those uh going under radiotherapy because of uh it helps avoid the the burns. It helps actually regulate the enzymes of the liver, and the liver creates a collagen, and that's how uh this product can help uh limit the side effects of the burns resulting from radiation.

SPEAKER_02:

So, I mean, from my point of view, this sounds amazing and it's wonderful, and and your dad's work seemed like it's you know, he wanted to help people. I don't understand why that was a crime. So the why? What's the why?

SPEAKER_00:

If it was really a crime, they would they would have I mean uh defended the case at the European Court of Human Rights. But you are absolutely right, it's not a crime, and that's why they came zit nothing, they had nothing to say. Uh it was a political offense. Uh it was a political offense to offer something natural that worked better than what conventional doctors had to offer. It was a political offense to uh the opposition party who came to power after that, and have felt that because of those little plant extracts, they had stayed in the opposition for several years and uh had not been able to uh take over sooner because the president did not die and there was no early election. Uh so there was some uh pharmaceutical companies and some uh government officials uh who colluded actually uh to uh to make sure that uh those plot extracts would not uh would not continue to see the light of the day in France. Uh that what they did not foresee is that uh I would decide to stay in the states and uh carry on with this legacy. And that has been 30 years. I could not be more proud of what the Beljanski Foundation has achieved and uh and the beautiful results. I mean, my joy is to in my life is to be able to present those results, and uh that's why I'm so grateful to be here with you today.

SPEAKER_02:

And I know you get you have um uh Maison Beljansky in New York City. Is that still there?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, so Maison Beljansky, uh I mean you cannot do research out of Sine. Of course, obviously, you need to have uh to have products to do the research. Uh and uh Maison Beljansky is uh a little store, it's a tea room uh in in Manhattan, and uh we are making uh all the products uh available. The website is maisonbeljansky.com. Uh and uh we also offer health coaching, group coaching, and individual health coaching sessions. Uh if people have questions and don't know how to take the products, which one to take, and so on. We we are we are here to help.

SPEAKER_02:

That's wonderful. And I know you have a podcast as well, um the Belgiansky cancer talk show.

SPEAKER_00:

The Beljansky Cancer Talk Show, absolutely. Uh and uh we we are uh now uh podcasting uh every other week, maybe this increase a little bit in the in the coming months. And uh we uh also host a conference uh on a regular basis, the Beljansky Integrative Cancer Conference, that uh brings together for three days a lot of experts in the world of integrative medicine. I do believe in sharing information, I do believe in community. So uh we we it's going to be in June in San Diego at the last weekend of June. Uh this year it's going to be our third Belgian ski integrative cancer conference, and uh there will be the best experts in cancer and beyond in supporting the immune system that are uh coming together and uh and give lectures. So I think it's a great opportunity for everybody concerned with cancer to come, to listen to all those doctors, to see if there is something uh that uh is I mean resonates more with you, and you want to stay in touch with this doctor and become one of his patients.

SPEAKER_01:

I um I I think I'm just I was in awe of everything that you were explaining because you know um, you know, from everything you're saying, you have legal you have legal background, medical background.

SPEAKER_00:

Um, I don't have a medical background. I am not a doctor. Uh I just learned a lot uh along the way when I was uh when I was confronted with the urge of making sure that this knowledge would not disappear. First, I had to make the learn as much as I could, as quickly as I could. Maybe my legal background uh helped me helped me there, and then make the products available here. Uh do the filing with the FDA. Those products have been have been filed with the FDA back in 1996, 97 as new dietary ingredients, so to make them legally available here in the States and that uh uh make sure that what happened in France would not repeat here. Uh and I have to say that uh I'm very grateful with uh with um for everything here in this country for America, which have given me the opportunity to pursue my dream, uh to create a company, to uh create this foundation, to continue the research, uh, and to continue to help people. And uh I could not be more uh more proud to be American of my country and uh to to have this uh this opportunity to um to to to carry on with this legacy. I had I stayed in France, that would not have been possible.

SPEAKER_02:

I'm sure your father is so proud of you, so so proud. Was your mom able to live long enough to see you continue his work?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, yes, I got my mom a green card, and she came with me uh and stayed in New York for the past 20 years of her life, and I was able to take care of her. And uh until like uh two weeks before she passed, she was coming every day to the office and she was making a point to help answer the phone, to be continue to be useful and to reassure people. Of course, she was doing that for French people because her English was not good enough, but uh she she continued to make herself useful and to help with everywhere she could to carry on with this legacy. And she was really she helped, she taught me a lot. My parents have been working together for for many years. She was my mom was the one who uh explained to me at the beginning the science in really uh simple words, and the first conference I I had to give, she gave me my father's slides and she explained them to me. Yeah. No, I I pre- I was gonna say, was she a doctor or she just learned from your your um my my mom was also a scientist and she was working along with my father for the I mean they just they shared the laboratory and they published together for something like 30 30 years. That's wonderful.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I was gonna say the same because you the way you explained the mechanism of action and and everything, I understood it completely was great. Thank you so much. Yeah, that's good for our listeners because you know, uh understanding like breaking it down in a simple way of understanding. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely, absolutely. But maybe because you know, I don't have the scientific background myself, I had to get it into lemon words, and then I pass it into lemon words. That's wonderful.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I thank you, Sylvie. Is there anything else you would like to share with us? This has been so awesome.

SPEAKER_00:

Again, if people are interested in learning more about this story, about the products, about the research about the products, if they want to support the research uh and the natural approach to cancer, my book is the best way to start winning the war on cancer, the epic journey towards the natural cure. And uh I have uh given my author's proceeds uh to the Beljansky Foundation. So every time a book is purchased, it helps support uh cancer research. Uh I would love to be able also to send you so you can make uh available to your audience uh some uh uh free ebooks and then maybe a a free uh chapter of the book so people can sample it and see. Yeah, I will definitely share all of that.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, that's wonderful. Yeah, that's wonderful. Thank you, Sylvie. Yeah, I will share all the links, all the websites. She, you know, there's many, many ways to to find out about Sylvie and and and her um work. So I will definitely share all of that. Thank you so much. Thank you, Sylvie, so much. This has been a pleasure, and I really, really appreciate all the knowledge and wisdom that you you gave us today. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you. Bye-bye. I'll leave you all with this. Legacies are not the result of wishful thinking. They are the result of determined doing. The legacy you leave is the life that you lead. We live our lives daily. We leave our legacy daily. The people you see, the decisions you make, and the actions you take, they are what tell your story. Thank you so much for listening to Virago247. If you haven't done so already, go ahead and hit that subscribe button and please give us five star ratings. Also, don't forget to follow us on Instagram at Virago24 underscore seven and on Facebook at Virago. 24 slash 7 and just connect with us and share your story. We'd love to hear from you.

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Lyanette Talley

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