One Drug to Shrink All Tumors

[Tusan_Homichi]

http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/03/one-drug-to-shrink-all-tumors.html?ref=hp

A single drug can shrink or cure human breast, ovary, colon, bladder, brain, liver, and prostate tumors that have been transplanted into mice, researchers have found. The treatment, an antibody that blocks a "do not eat" signal normally displayed on tumor cells, coaxes the immune system to destroy the cancer cells.

That's pretty major.

 

[SaltwaterServr]

Its an interesting second step.

Like the article mentions, the environment around a tumor in a human is a complicated system. Take it a step further, and a stressed human body is a far more complicated environment.

Thanks for the article though. Intriguing. Going to have to read the full journal article when I can get my hands on it in a few days. Sometimes the devil is in the details of the full peer-reviewed version rather than the editorial summary.

 

[Tusan_Homichi]

Here's a video of some guys from Stanford talking about it:

http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2012/...-eliminates-human-tumors-in-mice-at-stanford/

 

[joseephuss]

Until that drug turns bad and then Frodo has to throw it into Mt. Doom.

 

[Future]

I'm not sure if this is the same drug...but I read an article not too long ago about one that did the same thing and was completely effective on rats. Essentially, it wasn't in production yet because it was already existing so there was no company that could patent or trademark it...so they wouldn't make billions like they would with their own specific product.

 

[SaltwaterServr]

I'm not sure if this is the same drug...but I read an article not too long ago about one that did the same thing and was completely effective on rats. Essentially, it wasn't in production yet because it was already existing so there was no company that could patent or trademark it...so they wouldn't make billions like they would with their own specific product.

Tag an acetyl salicylic acid group to an available inactive site of the molecule. Voila, patent that critter. Just joking.

The way you could patent it though would be to immerse it in a multi-layered selectively soluble gel (or other organic polymer) matrix. Patent the polymer, go from there. Theoretically, of course.

 

[notherbob]

I'm not sure if this is the same drug...but I read an article not too long ago about one that did the same thing and was completely effective on rats. Essentially, it wasn't in production yet because it was already existing so there was no company that could patent or trademark it...so they wouldn't make billions like they would with their own specific product.

I agree with this. Pharmaceutical companies really want to maximize their profits from treating illness not cure illness since that would be financially counterproductive. Cures are not sought, only more expensive ways of prolonging treatment, preferrably ones which induce side effects so onerous that they require additional expensive treatments. Kind of makes me wonder who is really behind these practices and what their motives are.

 

[notherbob]

While we're on the subject of cancer, in early January a friend of mine from so cal called me a told me his girl friend had developed a ping pong ball size tumor in her breast and wondered if garlic could help. I told him about two ideas I had, in addition to eating garlic to help build up her immune system. They put my ideas into practice and when she went back to her dr. for a followup six weeks later, her tumor had shrunk by 95%. Her dr. was amazed. I wasn't as I had expected it.

I don't know whether her tumor was malignant or not nor do I know whether it went away on its own and the treatments had no effect or what but I guess I'll find out if others decide to try the treatments. It didn't cost them anything because he used garlic he grew himself and I don't charge any money because I'm not a doctor. It's my way of trying to give back to the world for allowing me to live unmolested in peace and freedom out in the middle of nowhere. Life is good.

The treatments are what I call enlightened folk and herbal medicine based on understanding the chemical/physiological issues involved. I'm still learning as much as my hectic schedule permits. I have to work for a living. Even if I were a doctor I would not be permitted to use these techniques because they involve unconventional applications of common garlic, which is not approved for medical use by the FDA due to the strong influence by big pharma's concern for their profits. Garlic is nature's underground pharmacy but you have to know how to use it; there's a lot more to it than just eating it.

If anyone is interested in it I will be happy to discuss the techniques but I don't wish to bore people who have no interest in it as most people abhor the smell of garlic no matter how effective it is. Creative usage of garlic can cure MRSA, MDR-TB, IBS, prevent heart attacks and strokes since it won't let blood clots form and apparently, inhibit or kill tumors, but it still has that odor during and for a while after use. People have told me they would rather die than smell like garlic and I think some of them got their wish. It's their choice, I'm not going to force myself or my ideas on anyone.

Common grocery store garlic from China has been irradiated and it won't work because it doesn't form allicin when crushed, only natural non-irradiated garlic works.

Sorry for the long post.

One of these days, I gotta write a book but it would probably be banned.

 

[Wimbo]

I agree with this. Pharmaceutical companies really want to maximize their profits from treating illness not cure illness since that would be financially counterproductive. Cures are not sought, only more expensive ways of prolonging treatment, preferrably ones which induce side effects so onerous that they require additional expensive treatments. Kind of makes me wonder who is really behind these practices and what their motives are.

While I don't disagree with you that Pharma companies are trying to maximize profits, I can't totally agree with your post. There have been a number of diseases that have been cured in the past century (well, if the vaccine is taken): Diphtheria, Chicken-pox, Malaria, Measles, whooping cough, Polio, Tetanus, and Smallpox...to name a few.

 

[Hoofbite]

Tag an acetyl salicylic acid group to an available inactive site of the molecule. Voila, patent that critter. Just joking.

The way you could patent it though would be to immerse it in a multi-layered selectively soluble gel (or other organic polymer) matrix. Patent the polymer, go from there. Theoretically, of course.

Pretty much. If a drug company had a boomer in the pipeline, they'd find a way to make it work.

The 7 (oops, just realized I quoted the amount of time a drug is actually protected while on the market. Basic patent is 20 years but it takes so damn long to get a drug to market that they have little of that left). year patent protection might as well be longer because they basically just alter one small thing, throw some initials at the end of the brand name and spit it back out.

Hell, sometimes they just take two drugs and throw them together and sell it as a new brand name drug at a price that is insanely higher than the combined cost of the individual drugs.

Drug companies stop at nothing to get a drug to market. Not saying they're good or bad either way but the return on the one success makes up for the thousands and thousands of failures.

 

[Hoofbite]

I agree with this. Pharmaceutical companies really want to maximize their profits from treating illness not cure illness since that would be financially counterproductive. Cures are not sought, only more expensive ways of prolonging treatment, preferrably ones which induce side effects so onerous that they require additional expensive treatments. Kind of makes me wonder who is really behind these practices and what their motives are.

I gotta say I disagree with this.

 

[notherbob]

While I don't disagree with you that Pharma companies are trying to maximize profits, I can't totally agree with your post. There have been a number of diseases that have been cured in the past century (well, if the vaccine is taken): Diphtheria, Chicken-pox, Malaria, Measles, whooping cough, Polio, Tetanus, and Smallpox...to name a few.

Yeah, I agree, I sometimes get a little carried away because of my dissatisfaction with some of the things they do in comparison to what they are capable of. The Salk Polio vaccine seems to me to be the most recent laudible accomplishment and that was over 50 years ago.

It seems to me there has been a significant change in direction since then and the revolving door gives them what I see as an unholy influence over the FDA. They have greater resources now than ever but only seem to come up with more expensive treatments with more side-effects than cures.

Maybe it's just me.

 

[The30YardSlant]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, it's fun to talk about "curing" cancer but the reality is that a drug or set of drugs that could virtually wipe out any kind of tumor would literally be the worst thing man has ever invented. Worse than biological warfare, worse than the hydrogen bomb and even worse than twitter.

If we reduce the current annual worldwide death rate due to cancer by just HALF, mankind would be driven to worldwide starvation and over-expansion inside of 50 years. Curing cancer would be signing our death certificate as a species.