B17 vitamin

lightandwind

Momine, not here to try to prove or disprove anything. I was just highlighting that you had previously stated your negative opinion of these things, and labeled them "snake oil" as if it were fact. Calling these holistic approaches a condemning name doesn't do anything to disprove them.  In doing that you are condemning the holistic choices of those here on the complimentary and holistic forum, who may choose some of those things, based on their own research. But whatever...I just don't understand why some of you feel you have to come to the holistic and alt threads to steer people away from doing and believing what they are going to do and believe anyway. Each person is responsible for themselves, yes? Maybe it would be nice if everyone just focused on their own treatment choices instead of working so hard at condemning others' choices.

Momine

Light, the OP asked about B17, which is potentially fatal as well as useless. It definitely qualifies as "snake oil." Then there was a follow-up question about why it was touted as a cure. I tried to answer.

lightandwind

Next thing you know they will outlaw apricot seeds and apples because the seeds "can be potentially fatal." All kinds of medicines can also be fatal. I completely agree that it be would be wise for everyone to  focus on the safety of their own treatment as there are safety considerations, precautions, warnings, and side effects with all medications, as well as with holistic treatments. 

I can't speak for anyone else that uses holistic treatments, but I don't need all the reminders about ensuring that what I put in my body is safe when I am supporting my immune system and overall health. I saw my bloodwork when I was taking Femara. I felt the pain in my body, and I witnessed my body fall apart, my abilities deteriorate. It did not support my immune system and overall health. Safety is why I chose alternatives.    

There is a lot of conflicting info on laetrile, but it seems to have at least some scientific backing and there are a ton of anecdotal stories out there, so if it has helped to save someone's life, I sure wouldn't feel right about calling it snake oil.

Pub Med gives a history of laetirile for cancer

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH003285...

Even Web Md acknowledges anticancer effects

http://www.webmd.com/cancer/tc/ncicdr0000062976-la...

 http://www.apricotsfromgod.info/journal.htm

Momine

From your first link:

"Laetrile has shown little anticancer activity in animal studies and no anticancer activity in human clinical trials."

WebMD:

"None of the solid tumors or leukemias investigated responded to amygdalin at any dose tested."

If you want to believe that it is useful in cancer, you are free to do so. 

lightandwind

Momine, as I said there is a lot of conflicting data, I'm just sharing info, not trying to prove anything or change your beliefs about it. If you want to believe it is snake oil, feel free to do so. But for me, just calling it snake oil without acknowledging all sides of the story, (especially when so many people have reportedly benefited from it), seems short sighted and hasty.

Here is more info.  

http://health.centreforce.com/health/Is_Laetrile_U...

http://www.b17.com.au/index.php/medical-research-w...

"There have been various animal studies that suggest an anti-cancer effect from Laetrile"

http://www.worldwithoutcancer.org.uk/laetrile-and-...

http://www.worldwithoutcancer.org.uk/b17-in-metabo...

http://www.worldwithoutcancer.org.uk/studies-resea...

http://www.worldwithoutcancer.org.uk/protocols/

https://beyondthecurtain.wordpress.com/2010/02/22/...

"Although spokespersons for orthodox
medicine continue to deny that there have been any animal study data in
favor of laetrile, this is contradicted by a number of studies,
including—but not limited to—those at Sloan-Kettering.”

http://www.cancerdefeated.com/newsletters/Laetrile...

Rose Pelton, R. Ph. and Lee Overholser, Ph.D- "orthodox medicine has instituted a full-fledged campaign to:

• Downplay case histories of patients who've benefited from Laetrile treatments
• Exaggerate reports of side effects and toxicity
• Ruin the reputation of doctors who successfully treated patients with Laetrile
• Strong-arm government officials to ensure
  Laetrile does not receive exemption from the jurisdiction of the Food
  and Drug Administration (FDA"

Momine

It is not a belief.

Lily55

the magazine produced by Canceractive is put into waiting rooms at world renowned cancer hospitals, I doubt Oncologists would allow this if it was just snake oil 

Momine

Lily, in my opinion, that is a mistake. What is the name of the magazine, if you remember?

ETA: Found it. It is called Icon Magazine. The owner of both magazine and site is a bereaved father who has gone into supplement sales.

As already said, many of these sites, including canceractive, have useful info. But most of them also include anything and everything, as long as it is "natural," with no real discernment of any kind. Lastly, many of the people writing these sites, Mike Adams is particularly egregious in this regard, are woefully ignorant of basic physiology, science, medicine etc.

lightandwind

Momine, 

"It is not a belief" (?).

Is that what you would you tell Mary below- tell her that she is just "fantasizing?" mercy.

Mary Donaldson had

bilateral breast cancer five years ago and then had a double mastectomy and

chemo. Now the cancer has come back in her bones with eight tumors showing

up on the scans. She had one round of chemo in August of 98 and was admitted

to the hospital for two weeks because the chemo wiped out her white blood

cells to the point where she was near death. She refused to go back for more

chemo and started on the apricot seeds, the 500 mg tablet and began juicing.

The doctors told her she'd be dead by Christmas. Well, Christmas has past

and her latest scan showed that five of the eight tumors have shrunk and the

other three are stable. She feels great and thanks G-d 100%. Call our office

for her number...she'll be happy to speak with others with bone or breast

cancer, This is her letter

Dear Jason,

Thank you for the phone

call 12/29/98. This is my story of a Christmas
miracle.

In

November 1993 I discovered that I had breast cancer-stage 3, and both
breasts were removed.
I received 6 months of chemotherapy consisting of 1

treatment a week for 3
weeks and 1 week off. This was done for 6

months. I received bone scans
and cat scans every 3 months for the first

2 years and then every 6 months
the 3 year and then 1 time a year from

that point on. When I had my 4th
year check-up it was discovered that the

cancer had spread to the bones
ranging from my skull, rib cage, right

femur, and spine with a total of 8
tumors.

My surgeon and

oncologist convinced my family that I would have to have
another round of

chemotherapy for the rest of my life or basically until
either the cancer

killed me or the chemotherapy did. I was determined not
to do the chemo,

however; when your family asks you to do it for them it is
hard to turn

them down. I received 1 treatment of the chemo, administered
to me while

I was in the hospital, and the drip lasted for 2 days. After
being home

for 3 to 4 days I became so ill that I was taken to the emergency
room

and re-admitted into the hospital because the chemo had wiped out my
white blood cells and I was unable to fight off any kind of infection. I
convinced my family that I could not do this anymore and promised I would
try to find a nutritionist who would help me through diet and herbs, etc.



I began to juice several times a week and started to begin vitamin and
mineral therapy. And then my oldest daughter had an E-mail message and
someone had sent her all the information on the B-17 and Christian Brothers.
My husband read the numerous pages of info that she printed for us and
immediately called for the seeds and the B-17 tablets(500 mg) along with the
video and book. Since 8/18/98 I have been taking the tablets 4 times a day
and eating 2 to 3 seeds a day. My bone scan was done this December and
reports that 5 of my tumors have shrunk and the 3 other tumors have not
changed in size since my bone scan of 5/98. My doctor called me 2 days
before Christmas with the news and my family believes that the combination
of the seeds and the B-17 tablets along with prayer and faith have
contributed to my Christmas miracle - only God knows for sure!!!! Thank you
Christian Brothers for making this non-conventional form of treatment for
cancer.

Mary

I'm not here saying that it is effective for everybody, but clearly it has helped some, to shrink tumors, and especially lessen their pain, so it offends me when you call it snake oil. With cancer, everybody has to "believe" in something.

Momine

Light, I am sorry you are offended. I am completely delighted that Mary is well. There is, however, no reasonable basis of any kind to support her belief that B17 had anything to do with it. As the saying goes, data is not the plural of anecdote.

lightandwind

Momine, no worries. I'll get over it.

There is some data present in the info I posted. However data doesn't save us, results do.  All the failed chemos supposedly had sound research behind them. So why did they fail? they had the data. This is why I say, with cancer, we all have to do what we "believe" is best for us.

In addition, there is a whole back story here re: b17. It's pretty interesting, and it does make me wonder.  

What do you think contributed to Mary's improvement? If not b17?

Momine

I do not consider factually based opinion to be the same as belief, and speaking of offense, it does offend me when people equate the two. I have read up on B17 a while back, and I know the various claims, studies, back story etc. My considered opinion on the subject was not arrived at out of thin blue air or gut instinct.

exbrnxgrl

I don't really want to get in to this, but it many things may have contributed to Mary's improvement. Using myself as an example, I take Arimidex, had rads to my bone met, drink 2 cups of strong coffee a day, eat with health in mind (but don't deprive myself of goodies) and do numerous other things regularly. I have been NED for more than 2 1/2 years and live a very normal life.Of all of these things, Arimidex and rads have research behind them. Did they cause this improvement in my health? I tend to think so however if anecdotes were my thing I could just as well claim it was the coffee or the dark chocolate or maybe I just have an indolent cancer. However, until there is some fact based research to support the positive effects of my coffee drinking or chocolate eating, I would not nor could not claim they have contributed to my state of NED, though they contribute greatly to my state of happiness.

Caryn

MelissaDallas

i don't understand why anyone would think that a substance that initially held enough promise to be studied seriously and scientifically but that didn't prove effective would be "buried". They seriously thought it might be a viable treatment, but it turned out not to be the case.  Obviously they wanted it to work but it doesn't work.  Lots of natural substances HAVE turned out to be effective. Why should this be some underground conspiracy?

Momine

Caryn, lol, I hear you on the happiness. I too drink two cups of strong coffee every morning and eat a square of 70% chocolate most afternoons. 

Momine

Melissa, the taxanes being one notable example.

Lily55

the study that "proved" B17 to not work turned out to be a flawed study. It does not appeal to me but I do believe in other complementary approaches, based on reading the MOSS report on breast cancer, a medicalresearcher who   assessed all cancer treatments, its a long dense read but worth the investment for those considering their personal treatment plan 

lightandwind

Melissa, perhaps like curcumin, it can't be patented and therefore profited off of, unless of course they change it molecularly to become something that it is not. It's not worth ($) it when people already have easy access to it as a food source, unless the FDA bans the food source. I feel protective of the health that we can currently derive from food/plants. It really bothers me that there is such a threat to it these days due to power and money.  

http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/why-law-forbids-m...

http://www.infowars.com/why-the-law-forbids-the-me...

Momine

Light, a fair number of studies have been done on curcumin, showing it to have benefits.

Lily55

but standard oncologists dont mention curcumin or any other proven things, like angioblock, so we really do have to be our own researchers and advocates. 

The EU is making it a lot more difficult if not impossible to obtain these things from April, very worrying, but the drug company lobbyists are very poerrful. 

lightandwind

Yes Momine, studies have been done on natural substances in recent years, after the whole laetrile fiasco happened. Thankfully, some made sure of that. People now know that curcumin fights cancer. If the drug companies make a drug that has curcumin in it they won't make much money because the word is already out that our food (tumeric) fights cancer. How much money can they make when tumeric and apricot seeds are already accessible in natural plant based food?

Momine

Not just in the last few years and not related to laetrile. When the "War on Cancer" was kicked off, 1000s of plants were tested and many more have been investigated since. That is how scientists came up with many of the drugs we use today.

lightandwind

Momine, whatever they tested a long time ago, then manipulated with additives and chemicals, to make patented drugs, didn't get rid of cancer did it? and people got very sick or more often, died following chemo. But the drug companies made a killing, so they kept prescribing stuff that did not only not help, but killed.. for way too long. How dare anyone come along and deface and possibly financially break the cancer industry with something that worked better or at least kept the patient alive longer than chemo? I just don't trust how it all went down with laetrile in the early days.

Natural remedies are not new but because this is the information age, and we now have the internet at our fingertips, there are easily accessible studies on plants and natural substances, that we can read about and buy or grow ourselves which gives us the power to make healthy and informed choices. 

I do think that today, in the modern world of alternative treatment, b17 is probably not one of the heavy hitters, but it apparently is helpful to some, and so for that reason, it is not useless, or snake oil.  One of the docs on the cancercured site said that b17 was "modestly to moderately effective with some cancers, not w/ sarcoma." 

flaviarose

http://www.cancertutor.com/laetrile/

this website talks about many alternative protocols - including hemp oil.  According to them, there is a protocol with B17 that you should follow.

Momine

L ight, chemo is not a cure, so the argument doesn't really work. 

Momine

Flavia, yes, there are various web sites that talk about laetrile. That is why the OP asked about it.

lightandwind

Momine, Yes, you are right. I don't think chemo was meant to be a cure either...in the early days especially...it was quite the opposite really.  

lightandwind

Flaviarose, thanks. I was looking into the book Alive and Well about the history of Laetirile. It gives an overview about what happened. The results of the studies were admittedly pretty remarkable, especially in comparison to patients treated by orthodox methods at that time. Here's the link.

http://www.whale.to/m/binzel.html

Momine

Light, for some cancers it is very close to a cure, including the one it was initially invented for - childhood leukemia. Bitch of it is that breast cancer is a different kind of cancer beast.

I had written a long post on this, but cyberspace ate it. If you are interested, look up Dr. Sidney Farber, who is considered the "inventor" of chemo.

When we look at new/other remedies, we have to look at whether they are more effective than what we already have, even if neither is a cure. 

lightandwind

Yes, there has been huge strides with childhood leukemia on the conventional as well as the holistic front.

Re: Laetrile: From what I read, it was a threat at that time because it worked better than what they had. Not that that was saying much.