The future: I just saw it.

Today is Thursday 19th February 2009. I've just read an article in The New York Review of Books 'Drug Companies & Doctors': An Exchange dated 26th February 2009. I don't even possess a Flux Capacitor!

The above article was linked from Drug Companies & Doctors: A Story of Corruption which I found on The International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics (THINCS).

"Because drug companies insist as a condition of providing funding that they be intimately involved in all aspects of the research they sponsor, they can easily introduce bias in order to make their drugs look better and safer than they are. Before the 1980s, they generally gave faculty investigators total responsibility for the conduct of the work, but now company employees or their agents often design the studies, perform the analysis, write the papers, and decide whether and in what form to publish the results. Sometimes the medical faculty who serve as investigators are little more than hired hands, supplying patients and collecting data according to instructions from the company.

In view of this control and the conflicts of interest that permeate the enterprise, it is not surprising that industry-sponsored trials published in medical journals consistently favor sponsors' drugs—largely because negative results are not published, positive results are repeatedly published in slightly different forms, and a positive spin is put on even negative results. A review of seventy-four clinical trials of antidepressants, for example, found that thirty-seven of thirty-eight positive studies were published. But of the thirty-six negative studies, thirty-three were either not published or published in a form that conveyed a positive outcome. It is not unusual for a published paper to shift the focus from the drug's intended effect to a secondary effect that seems more favorable."

Oh dear!

A slight hitch.

On Friday 13th February, my mum collapsed and had to go to hospital. She's stable but completely incoherent at the moment, due to a combination of a) having a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) and b) discontinuing her anti-dementia medication last week in the (mistaken) belief that it was giving her hallucinations.

It's hard to believe just how rapidly mental function in an old person can decline due to a UTI, but mum had a Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) score of 26 out of 30 on Monday 12th January. It would have been 0 last Friday.

Normal Blogging will be resumed when mum's infection has been treated and she is back on her medication. I will be getting mum to use D-mannose in her juice in future, as this is effective against E. coli and Klebsiella.

Continued on A slight hitch, Part 2.

Cancer.

By request, I'm writing about cancer. I didn't know this, but cancer is now the No.1 killer of men in the UK. I previously thought that coronary heart disease was the No.1 killer.

Cancer is such a huge subject that, rather than oversimplify it, I'll put a link to Wikipedia. Warning: Pictures of tumours.

Vitamins get a mention, particularly Vitamin D, but EFAs aren't mentioned. This is odd, as typing "Omega-3 Cancer" into PubMed yields 612 human studies going back to 1984. Here are some of them:-

Some effects of the essential fatty acids linoleic acid and alpha-linolenic acid and of their metabolites gamma-linolenic acid, arachidonic acid, eicosapentaenoic acid, docosahexaenoic acid, and of prostaglandins A1 and E1 on the proliferation of human osteogenic sarcoma cells in culture.

Selective killing of human cancer cells by polyunsaturated fatty acids.

Chronic arachidonic acid eicosanoid imbalance: a common feature in coronary artery disease, hypercholesterolemia, cancer and other important diseases. Significance of desaturase enzyme inhibition and of the arachidonic acid desaturase-independent pathway.

n-3 fatty acids and cancer.

Fish consumption and breast cancer risk: an ecological study.

Effect of docosahexaenoic acid on rate of differentiation of HL-60 human leukemia.

N-3 and N-6 fatty acids in breast adipose tissue and relative risk of breast cancer in a case-control study in Tours, France.

Opposing effects of dietary n-3 and n-6 fatty acids on mammary carcinogenesis: The Singapore Chinese Health Study.

Induction of apoptosis in human pancreatic cancer cells by docosahexaenoic acid.

Dietary intakes of omega-6 and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and the risk of breast cancer.

Nutritional knowledge of primary health care physicians in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

13.12.09: Some newer studies:-

A systemic review of the roles of n-3 fatty acids in health and disease.

Anticancer actions of omega-3 fatty acids--current state and future perspectives.

The effect of omega-3 FAs on tumour angiogenesis and their therapeutic potential.

Therapeutic potential of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids in disease.

Fish oil enhances the antiproliferative effect of 1alpha,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3 on liver cancer cells.


EDIT: I've been reading about a substance called methylglyoxal, a glycolysis inhibitor. As many types of malignant cancer cells rely on the glycolysis pathway for energy, methylglyoxal looks like a promising anti-cancer agent.

See In vivo assessment of toxicity and pharmacokinetics of methylglyoxal. Augmentation of the curative effect of methylglyoxal on cancer-bearing mice by ascorbic acid and creatine,

A brief critical overview of the biological effects of methylglyoxal and further evaluation of a methylglyoxal-based anticancer formulation in treating cancer patients,

Selective inhibition of mitochondrial respiration and glycolysis in human leukaemic leucocytes by methylglyoxal and

Critical evaluation of toxic versus beneficial effects of methylglyoxal.

It looks like the Indians are ahead of everyone else on this stuff.
Well, well, well. Controversy!

"Methylglyoxal is a regular chemical, not cleared for human use. It is made without conforming to sound manufacturing practices and widely respected codes of good laboratory practices followed throughout the world." O, RLY? See below.

"The IACS' main supplier of Methylglyoxal is an American warehouse corporation, Sigma Medical Company, which sells it for research purposes at $1 to 2 per gramme and specifically states that none of its chemicals is meant for medical use." If everyone stuck to the "rules", humankind would never make any progress.

The principal scientist involved is Professor Manju Ray, a biochemist, not a pharmacologist or cancer specialist." Biochemists know how cells work, so I would say that's a plus point, not a minus point. It's also argumentum ad-hominem.

"The "secret" of the "miracle" lies in the anti-tumour effect of Methylglyoxal - a property shared by hundreds of toxic chemicals. Methylglyoxal, it is claimed, inhibits electron flows in cancerous cells and blocks a crucial step necessary for the production of ATP, the cellular energy "currency". Methylglyoxal isn't anywhere near as toxic as standard chemotherapy drugs. Someone needs to learn some basic biochemistry!

"A critical ingredient, a control group with which the treated patients are compared, is absent from the study." It's unethical to have one group denied a treatment that might save their lives. The Lyon Diet-Heart trial was discontinued because the control group had a much higher mortality than the treated group.

"The researchers treated 24 patients, mostly in highly advanced stages of cancer, with oral administration of Methylglyoxal, with Vitamin C, over eight to 10 weeks. They claim that after treatment, 11 were in "excellent physical condition" and five were in a condition that "can be considered stable". "The rest either opted out of treatment or died during the course of study." This is disturbing enough." You left out the creatine and 0 out of 24 would almost certainly have survived without treatment.

"The study does not show how, through what process, the "cure" occurs." That's not the purpose of the study.

"What is equally astonishing is that the drug should be used in clinical trials on human beings in the first place. Such trials are permissible only after the pharmaco-kinetics (the way and the speed with which the body will handle the drug) is properly understood, and trials on experimental animals have been carried out. In this case, the first criterion was not fulfilled. And there is no mention of animal trials." An animal trial had been done. See the 1st study above.

Supplements: Who needs 'em?

According to Health Professionals, nobody. Apparently, we get all of the vitamins, minerals & other nutrients that we need from a "Healthy Balanced Diet" (whatever that is!).

According to me, just about everybody. Due to modern farming methods, food ain't what it used to be. Dammit, even nostalgia ain't what it used to be! Due to changes in lifestyle:-

a) Most people are more sedentary than they used to be. This means that they require less food than they used to in order to not get fat. Less food, coupled with less nutrients in the food = dietary deficiencies.

b) Most people don't get as much sun on their skin as they used to, as they now work, play & live mostly indoors and when they do go outside, they are encouraged to Slip Slop Slap (slip on a shirt, slop on sunscreen and slap on a hat). This results in hypovitaminosis D, as only an Eskimo's diet contains enough dietary Vitamin D. The RDA of 200/400/600iu/day (depending on age) is woefully inadequate and totally out of touch with modern research.

c) Most people don't eat much oily fish. Also, animal & vegetable produce now contains more omega-6 & less omega-3 than it used to. This results in an imbalance.

d) Diets low in vegetable & fruits lack Potassium & Magnesium.

e) Diets low in fermented products lack Vitamin K2.

Because of the above, I supplement with:-
300mg/day of Magnesium as Citrate/Amino Acid Chelate, or 600mg/day as Oxide.
5,000iu/day of Vitamin D3.
15mg/week of Vitamin K2.
I also use Losalt, which provides 2 parts Potassium to 1 part Sodium.

Research shows.....

....that people who eat a low-fat breakfast like Special K are more likely to be slimmer than those who don't.

So states the Special K advert. I wonder whether the researchers used a control group who ate a high-fat breakfast? Somehow, I doubt it. I eat a high-fat breakfast, if you look at the Blog post immediately below this one and I am slimmer than when I didn't eat breakfast. Skipping breakfast causes low blood glucose, which encourages over-eating later-on. Therefore, people who eat breakfast are more likely to be slimmer than those who don't.

That's the problem with "Research". It usually shows what people want it to show. By omitting control groups, such research is utterly worthless. While I'm on a mini-rant, "Clinically proven" is another phrase often bandied about in advertisements. I have news for you. Clinical studies can only disprove something. The best that a clinical study can do is provide evidence that something is beneficial to some or most of the people in the study only. It cannot be extrapolated to the rest of the population.

Food Porn.

It's the only porn you're going to get on this Blog!

I was looking at Richard Nikoley's Blog at http://freetheanimal.com/ and I couldn't help but notice all of the pictures of yummy food on it. When I mention to people that I am on an "Atkins-style" diet, they usually say "Oh, so all you eat is bacon & eggs and those expensive low-carb bars, right?" I have yet to buy a low-carb bar.

This post should give you an idea of what I eat. Some of my meals contain Burgen soya & linseed bread and even sweetcorn. These foods are relatively high in starchy carbohydrate, but my body can tolerate them thanks to Vitamin D.

The first picture is what I often (but not always, as variety is important) have in the morning. It's basically coffee with extra oomph provided by a 60cc scoop of powdered linseeds (in the storage jar) and a 60cc scoop of unflavoured whey protein (a milk protein). Vanilla flavouring, brown sugar & Splenda improve the flavour of this concoction, which has the consistency of wallpaper paste!


I do eat bacon & eggs but not for breakfast. I usually have it for lunch, accompanied by chopped onions & mushrooms microwaved with Losalt, Lee & Perrins & Extra-Virgin Olive oil. A big squirt of tomato ketchup gives me my third portion of vegetables! The whole lot sits on top of a slice of Burgen toast.


For afternoon tea, I may have something salmony. Here's a simple smoked salmon sarnie made with ~100g of smoked salmon and a couple of slices of raw onion.


I have a friend who hates the skin & bones in tinned salmon. As this is where a lot of the omega-3 fat & minerals are, I tried an experiment to see if I could disguise them. I blended a 213g tin of wild red salmon with a couple of dollops of Hellman's Real Mayonnaise & a little "juice" from a tin of sweetcorn. I then mixed sweetcorn with the salmon mayonnaise. I dumped a load of the salmon & sweetcorn mayonnaise mix onto a slice of Burgen buttered with Anchor. A little sliced tomato & cucumber completed the ensemble.


Sometimes. I just dump everything on a plate!


For supper, I usually microwave something meaty with something vegetably. Here are some Somerfield "Best Ever" Pork & Chorizo sausages microwaved with chopped onions & mushrooms in a Lea & Perrins-based gravy.


Here's an Aldi quarter-pounder beefburger with microwaved chopped onions, mushrooms & English mustard.


Here's an Aldi chicken jambonette in a sun-dried tomato, balsamic & sweet basil sauce microwaved with peas & mixed veg. The sauce went everywhere!


Here's an Aldi lamb shank in a mint & red wine-flavoured sauce. The shank was in a bag, so the sauce didn't go everywhere when I microwaved it on the plate alongside the peas & mixed veg. The vegetables look a little strange as I microwaved them as they were with a little Losalt (and no added water), but they tasted just fine. Not adding any water means that there is no loss of minerals.


And finally, here's an Aldi pork shank in sweet & sour sauce cooked as per the lamb shank. Aldi have a lot of different varieties of chicken jambonettes, lamb & pork shanks and I will be trying them out as they are very reasonably priced.


So, can I spend the rest of my life on this sort of diet? Oh, yes yes yes yes yes!

The Firefox a.k.a. Red Panda.

My browser is named after this little fella (or girl, I can't tell!).



I left Red Pandas out of my previous Blog post as they are not Bears (Ursidae), but are in a family of their own (Ailuridae).

Like Giant Pandas, Red Pandas have a false thumb which helps them to grip bamboo shoots & leaves. They also spend most of their lives eating, pooing (as they also can't digest cellulose) and sleeping!



That's how I used to spend a lot of my life when I ate a high-carb diet. Since I've been eating more salmon, I've been more active than usual. It's not yet 8am and I'm on-line, typing this.