Vitamin C injections proven to kill cancer
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VITAMIN C that is injected rather than swallowed can destroy cancer, research has shown.
The therapy halved the growth of aggressive tumours in mice, killing cancer cells while leaving healthy tissue unharmed.
It could provide a new lifeline for patients with a poor prognosis and few treatment options, scientists suggest.
Tackling cancer with vitamin C would also have the added advantage of being cheap.
Usually the body keeps a tight rein on vitamin C levels in the blood. But scientists found that the mechanism can be by-passed if the vitamin is injected straight into the bloodstream instead of passing through the digestive system.
When this is done it releases the powerful anti-cancer potential of the vitamin, according to the researchers.
Experiments showed that high levels of vitamin C in the blood generate hydrogen peroxide, which is lethal to tumours.
The chemical forms in the spaces between cancer cells, damaging membranes, upsetting metabolism, and scrambling DNA. Even the growth of aggressive, hard-to-treat cancers was held back in the studies.
But healthy tissues appeared to resist the effects.
The use of high dose vitamin C as a complementary or alternative cancer treatment has a long history dating back to the 1970s. Patients have taken the vitamin both by mouth and intravenously.
But despite some positive outcomes, reliable evidence that the therapy works has been lacking.
Experts
For this reason claims that vitamin C can treat cancer have been dismissed by conventional cancer experts.
The new US investigation led by Dr Qi Chen, from the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, involved testing the effects of vitamin C on laboratory cell lines and cancer-ridden mice.
In the laboratory, two hours of exposure to the vitamin significantly reduced the survival of ovarian, pancreatic and brain tumour (glioblastoma) cancer cells.
Similar results were seen when mice bearing the same kinds of tumours were injected with vitamin C.
- John von Radowitz
