A new study shows that vitamin C might just function as
powerful anti-cancer medicine. Researchers at the University of Salford in the
U.K. found that using vitamin C inhibited the growth of cancer cells in the
laboratory. Vitamin C also showed a potency that was 10 times higher than the
experimental drug 2-DG in the process, researchers said. The findings were
published in the journal Oncotarget.
Cancer remains one of the leading causes of death worldwide.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the disease is the second
most common cause of death and disease around the world, accounting for nearly
nine million deaths in 2015 alone. Data shows that new cases of cancer are
expected to surge by around 70 percent in the next two decades.
The National Cancer Institute in the U.S. projects that
nearly 40 percent of American men and women will develop the disease at one
point in their lives. Various cancer therapies — such as surgery, radiation
therapy and systemic treatments — are currently available, but may not always
show efficacy. Some of the treatments are deemed to be toxic and may result in
a host of adverse side effects.
More aggressive forms of cancer may not always respond to
treatments, and cancer stem-like cells were believed to be the cause of disease
recurrence and metastasis. According to an American Association of Cancer
Research panel, a CSC is “a cell within a tumor that possesses the capacity to
self-renew and to cause the heterogeneous lineages of cancer cells that
comprise the tumor.”
Vitamin C starves cancer stem-like cells in recent study
According to researchers, vitamin C starves cancer stem
cells by blocking a process called glycolysis. The process is responsible for
glucose metabolism, and inhibiting it prevents the mitochondria from gaining
essential energy for survival. Using vitamin C as an add-on treatment to
chemotherapy may show potential in stemming tumor recurrence and further
progression of cancer.
Researcher Dr. Gloria Bonuccelli said the findings suggest
that vitamin C is a promising candidate for cancer treatment. “We have been
looking at how to target cancer stem cells with a range of natural substances
including silibinin (milk thistle) and CAPE, a honey-bee derivative, but by far
the most exciting are the results with vitamin C. Vitamin C is cheap, natural,
nontoxic and readily available so to have it as a potential weapon in the fight
against cancer would be a significant step,” said study author Dr Michael
Lisanti.
However, Cancer Research UK official Anna Perman cautioned
that the results are at its preliminary stages.
“The important thing for cancer patients to remember is that
this study is looking at the action of vitamin C in the laboratory, not the
effect of eating foods or supplements that contain vitamin C. This should not
prompt anyone receiving treatment for cancer to change their diet or treatment
plan,” Perman said.
The study backs the findings of a 1971 research by Nobel
Prize-winning chemist Linus Pauling. Pauling was a pioneer in testing vitamin C
efficacy against cancer. In his study, Pauling examined 1,100 terminally ill
cancer patients. One hundred patients were given 10 grams of vitamin C daily,
while the remaining cohort was used as the control group.
During a follow-up in 1978, the team found that all patients
in the control group died of cancer, while 13 of those who took daily doses of
vitamin C survived. In addition, 12 of these patients exhibited no further
signs of the disease.
Many studies that followed concludes that high vitamin C
doses, at more than 5,000 mg per day, provide optimal protection against
cancer. Source: Naturalnews.com
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