Posted on 12/31/2018 2:46:58 AM PST by Daffynition
Mel Greaves has a simple goal in life. He is trying to create a yoghurt-like drink that would stop children from developing leukaemia.
The idea might seem eccentric; cancers are not usually defeated so simply. However, Professor Greaves is confident and, given his experience in the field, his ideas are being taken seriously by other cancer researchers.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
“The aim is to find six or maybe 10 species of microbes that are best able to restore a child’s microbiome to a healthy level. This cocktail of microbes would be given, not as a pill, but perhaps as yoghurt-like drink to very young children.
“And it would not just help prevent them getting childhood leukaemia. Cases of conditions such as type 1 diabetes and allergies are also rising in the west and have also been linked to our failure to expose babies to bacteria to prime children’s immune systems. So such a drink would help cut numbers of cases of these conditions as well.
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Interesting. I wonder if this also explains the rise in the number of children who are seemingly allergic to common foods such as peanuts.
I think I built up a tolerance to colds, too. We had one phone for the church and the parsonage, and it was in the house. If Dad got a phone call and was working in his study someone had to “go get Dad”. There was one large empty lot between the two places.
We lived a few miles south of Buffalo on Lake Erie, and got lake effect snow. My aunt reminds me of the times I’d run barefooted to the church to get Dad, through feet of snow. I hardly ever got, or get, colds.
It sounds like we had the same childhood. I never had poison ivy until I was in my 40’s and my husband never had it until his 70’s. I got it one summer while repairing barbed wire fence. I had some deep cuts from the wire and I guess it got in my bloodstream. I haven’t had it bad since though and not in over 10 years. I think a lot of allergies and autoimmune diseases are caused by our immune systems not being challenged like they need to be. Heaven knows mine has been well challenged in the last 64 years!
I saw a sign at the senior center the other day. It was for flu vaccination. It said, “THERE IS NO EXCUSE.” Well, here’s one from me: I don’t want it.
It sounds like we had the same childhood....the last 64 years!
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Youngster ...
They had lots of help and their home was probably as clean as today’s homes.
Probably never went to the lake and swam in a pool.
interesting a friends daughter who is in her 30s was a type one diabetic and now has AML. Lovely girl, breastfed and raised outdoors in the southwest.
Polio was actually due to clean water.
I would like to see the epidemiological data on the incidence of childhood leukemia and “affluence” and bacteria in the home environment before I would get too excited about this particular theory. There is sufficient variance in affluence and “cleanliness” within and among advanced countries to get a sense of how likely this pathway to leukemia is. The theory sounds plausible, but then so did the stress theory of ulcers and the beneficial effects of blood-letting.
I’m a female who grew up in the 50’s, in an ultra clean home, and boy did I get dirty when I was outside ...which was constantly. Our favorite pastime was to play on a mountain of dirt in our neighborhood. My mother had to hose me down when I got home.
Wow! This is very hopeful.
And nowadays, people use those anti-bacterial products constantly. Those really aren’t good for people.
Never called these pets but called them food a lot
Hope & pray if you like, but this research is abject BS. So is the article.
To-wit:
The author cites a “90% cure rate” but that is patently-false.
The citation is for the rate of remission. Survival rate is actually only 40-50%. That indicates a very high incidence of relapse. Furthermore, the mortality rate is pegged at 25% overall in England...certainly not the glowing “progress” given the tone of the article. “Survival rates” are subjective, referring principally to “5-year survival” rates. Furthermore, over the course of decades the cause of death was recorded incorrectly, leaving us with a very subjective baseline. Research in this respect suggests that there is a very real rise in the rate of leukemia. In one fell swoop we’re right back to where we began, aside from “5-year survival rates”.
Aside from the propaganda, the principal problem with this article is that it presents no cure at all.
It’s no different than taking a pill to relieve acid reflux:
The pill “cures” the symptom, but does not address the cause. That is no “cure”: In the case of leukemia, it is a ‘treatment’. A very, very expensive treatment. “Remission” is no cure. In fact, there is ample evidence to suggest that rates of leukemia are rising 1% a year.
Again, not addressing the cause. Inflammation has more than one cause and ignoring the other factors - focusing solely upon the microbiome - is a fool’s errand.
This is a “treatment” which serves its primary purpose: To provide a return on investment and I predict that it will have no impact upon rates of childhood leukemia.
The microbiome was largely-ignored by orthodox medicine until the last few years. Now pharmaceutical companies and others see great promise in projecting a “cure”...the promise being “profit”. Hope, but false hope.
At the turn of the prior century they had a name for this: Snake oil.
Probably the one thing that reverses the majority of the problem. Have dogs in the house and let them have contact with the kids.
Thanks. Informed postings such as yours are the reason I keep coming back to FR.
The scourge of childhood leukemia has been nearly defeated. The ‘cure’ rate is now above 90%, for the young ones. Adult leukemia is another matter. There is no silver bullet. Prayers for all the researchers who dedicate their lives to finding answers.
Agreed. I could have wrote a better one than this with a more plausible cause/cure theory.
We played outside. Lack of exposure to dirt outside seems to result in all kinds of problems such as peanut allergies, and now leukemia.
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