Cheap, safe drug kills most cancers

New Scientist ^ | 1/17/06 | Andy Coghlan

[LibWhacker]

It sounds almost too good to be true: a cheap and simple drug that kills almost all cancers by switching off their “immortality”. The drug, dichloroacetate (DCA), has already been used for years to treat rare metabolic disorders and so is known to be relatively safe.

It also has no patent, meaning it could be manufactured for a fraction of the cost of newly developed drugs.

Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, and his colleagues tested DCA on human cells cultured outside the body and found that it killed lung, breast and brain cancer cells, but not healthy cells. Tumours in rats deliberately infected with human cancer also shrank drastically when they were fed DCA-laced water for several weeks.

[LibWhacker]

Thank you! :-)

[mysterio]

Maybe we will be lucky, and cancer will go the way of many other diseases......

That would truly be wonderful. Cancer is just awful.

Advances in its treatment make me proud I work in research.

[LibWhacker]

I'm sorry about your husband.

[SpaceBar]

Here's a related article and summary by the same group of Canadian researchers cited in the journal Cancer Cell (complete article requires purchase).

A Mitochondria-K+ Channel Axis Is Suppressed in Cancer and Its Normalization Promotes Apoptosis and Inhibits Cancer Growth

Summary

The unique metabolic profile of cancer (aerobic glycolysis) might confer apoptosis resistance and be therapeutically targeted. Compared to normal cells, several human cancers have high mitochondrial membrane potential (ΔΨm) and low expression of the K+ channel Kv1.5, both contributing to apoptosis resistance. Dichloroacetate (DCA) inhibits mitochondrial pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDK), shifts metabolism from glycolysis to glucose oxidation, decreases ΔΨm, increases mitochondrial H2O2, and activates Kv channels in all cancer, but not normal, cells; DCA upregulates Kv1.5 by an NFAT1-dependent mechanism. DCA induces apoptosis, decreases proliferation, and inhibits tumor growth, without apparent toxicity. Molecular inhibition of PDK2 by siRNA mimics DCA. The mitochondria-NFAT-Kv axis and PDK are important therapeutic targets in cancer; the orally available DCA is a promising selective anticancer agent.

[Chickensoup]

why should any drug company that wants to sell it need to re-prove its safety, at least at approved dosage

FDA approval, unless I am wrong, is by use.

[DainBramage]

Reportedly the Acai berry from the Amazon kills cancer cells and is the number 1 antioxidant in the world by ten fold.

[Salvation]

You have FReepmail.

[BenLurkin]

Could this be true?

[Running On Empty]

Marking

[txhurl]

Excellent. bttt

[DocRock]

Bookmark to read later

[Bender2]

bump for later read

[Rumplemeyer]

Ping, Read Later

[fso301]

Unless the FDA fast-tracks it, it will be years before US patients see it

Yes but that's why US pharmaceuticals do lots and lots of human testing overseas.

[Graybeard58]

bttt

[ChildOfThe60s]

Nothing works for emphysema. The lungs ability to function is simply destroyed.

Forget cancer, all smokers suffer decreased lung capacity, the difference is only in degree. That's why I quit 29 years ago. Not from fear of cancer, but because I couldn't breathe.

[Sergio]

Bookmark.

[biff]

I think somewhere back in to cobweb section of my brain I remember the American medical industry makes $20 billion a year off cancer. Now, can they afford to have a cheap cure?
Chemo, radiation, and surgery would dwindle.

[JSteff]

"Unless the FDA fast-tracks it, it will be years before US patients see it..."

The FDA and it's rules are for the drug companies. They have the money for the several 100 million it takes to get their approval.

No small company can afford to get their drugs or alternatives certified by the FDA. Even so yearly we here of FDA "approved" and "certified" drugs being taken off the market because of all those who the kill and maim.

The FDA is a tool of drug companies and basically run by them.

[HiTech RedNeck]

About a jillion things cure cancer in rats that don't do squat in humans. I think rats were created to taunt know-it-all scientists.