The Vitamin C “Eureka!” Moment: 30 Years After-the-Fact
Recently, the mainstream media has been abuzz with the news that vitamin C may help reduce tumor growth. A new study from the National Institute of Health has shown that high-dose intravenous vitamin C can reduce tumor growth by half. The study, which was published in this month’s issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showed that mice with aggressive brain, ovarian, and pancreatic tumors who received the intravenous vitamin C treatment had a 41-53% tumor reduction, and their cancers stopped spreading. (1) Furthermore, this vitamin C treatment did not harm healthy tissue, which means there were few to no side effects, as compared to traditional chemo and radiation administration. (1)
While mainstream media and traditional oncology are celebrating this “eureka!” moment, natural medical practitioners have to sit back and shake their heads. Why? Because we’ve been touting the benefits of vitamin C in the treatment of cancer since the 1970’s when Linus Pauling published one of the first studies showing its therapeutic potential in the treatment of terminal cancers. His study, published in 1976, showed that mean survival time for patients receiving vitamin C was more than 4.2 fold that of the control group. (2) A retrospective analysis of Pauling’s study showed that 22% of patients who received vitamin C had greater than one year survival after being pronounced terminal, compared with 0.4% in the control group. (3)
Pauling’s reputation and his findings were tarnished when Mayo Clinic reported that it was unable to replicate his results in two randomized trials. Subsequent investigation revealed that Mayo Clinic failed to disclose certain details about their studies, and they differed in critical ways from Pauling’s, including the fact that the patients in the Mayo studies were given vitamin C orally (until they were too weak to swallow the vitamins), instead of both intravenously and orally as Pauling had done. Oral administration greatly decreases the vitamin’s bioavailability in the body and as a result, oral administration did not show the same therapeutic effects documented by Pauling. Subsequent investigation also revealed that the Mayo Clinic control group patients may have also been taking vitamin C – a variable that would obviously invalidate the results because it would disguise the benefits between the patients receiving vitamin C and the supposed control group.
Multiple studies conducted since the Pauling/Mayo Clinic controversy have documented that vitamin C can increase the efficacy of traditional chemotherapeutic agents while reducing side effects and increasing quality of life for cancer patients. (4), (5), (6). By 1990, vitamin C became the subject of an NIH conference, as it had once again become a “respectable topic.” (7) Mark Levine and his colleagues, who conducted the most recent NIH study, have also been publishing on the benefits of vitamin C for years. (8), (9) In one such article, in 2006, Levine and his colleagues published 3 case studies of advanced cancer patients who received intravenous high dose vitamin C treatments, and in all cases, the patients achieved remission for at least 4 years. (10)
Eventually, traditional medicine and the mainstream media will begin to catch on to the benefits of advanced natural treatments. But right now, there appears to be about a 30-year lag.
Here’s to hoping that margin begins to close.
Resource Links:
NIH Press Release on New Vitamin C Study
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
References for this Post:
(1) Chen, Q, Espey, MG, Sun, AY, Pooput, C, Kirk, KL, Krishna, MC, Khosh, DB, Drisko, J, Levine, M. Pharmacologic doses of ascorbate act as a prooxidant and decrease growth of aggressive tumor xenografts in mice. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 2008 Sept; 105: 11105-11109.
(2) Cameron, E., Pauling, L. Supplemental Ascorbate in the Supportive Treatment of Cancer: Prolongation of Survival Times in Terminal Human Cancer. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 1976 Oct; 73(10): 3685-9.
(3) Cameron, E., Pauling, L. Supplemental Ascorbate in the Supportive Treatment of Cancer: Reevaluation of Prolongation of Survival Times in Terminal Human Cancer. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 1978 Sept; 75(9): 4538-42.
(4) Lamson, DW, Brignall, MS. Antioxidants in Cancer Therapy: Their actions and interactions with oncologic therapies. Altern. Med. Rev. 1999 Oct; 4(5): 304-29.
(5) Drisko, JA, Chapman, J, Hunter, VJ. The Use of Antioxidants with First-Line Chemotherapy in Two Cases of Ovarian Cancer. J. Am. Coll. Nutr. 2003 Apr; 22(2): 118-23.
(6) Yeom, CH, Jung, GC, Song, KJ. Changes of Terminal Cancer Patients’ Health-Related Quality of Life After High-Dose Vitamin C Administration. J. Korean Med. Sci. 2007 Feb; 22(1): 7-11.
(7) Dunitz, Jack D. “Linus Carl Pauling, 28 February 1901-19 August 1994”, Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 42: 316-338.
(8) Padayatty, SJ, Sun, H, Wang, Y, Riordan, HD, Hewitt, SM, Katz, A, Wesley, RA, Levine, M. Vitamin C Pharmacokinetics: Implications for Oral and Intravenous Use. Ann. Intern. Med. 2004 Apr. 6; 140(7): 533-7.
(9) Chen, Q, Espey, M, Krishna, M, Mitchell, J, Corpe, C, Buether, G, Shacter, E, Levine, M. Pharmacologic ascorbic acid concentrations selectively kill cancer cells: action as a pro-drug to deliver hydrogen peroxide to tissues. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 102(38): 13604-9.
(10) Padayatty, SJ, Riordan, HW, Hewitt, SM, Katz, A, Hoffer, LJ, Levine, M. Intravenously Administered Vitamin C as Cancer Therapy: Three Cases. CMAJ 2006 Mar 28; 174(7): 937-42.
October 8th, 2008 at 11:19 am
Did you see that very recent study showing that vitamin C interferes with some of the common chemotherapy drugs?
There is so much conflicting information.
January 30th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
There is certainly a lot of confusing information out there. Please read our second article on Vitamin C, called “The Vitamin C War Wages On, Should Cancer Patients Steer Clear?”
http://www.naturalissues.com/?p=20 (You can also access it under the “Cancer” category above).