STUDY: LARGE DOSES OF VITAMIN C DON'T COMBAT CANCER
Author: By Judy Foreman, Globe Staff
Date: Thursday, January 17, 1985
Page: 8
Section: NATIONAL/FOREIGN
Linus Pauling - the Nobel prize winning chemist who has championed taking
mega-doses of vitamin C to combat cancer - is wrong, according to a study
published today.
That is the conclusion reached by Mayo Clinic and Mayo Foundation
researchers who found that patients suffering from advanced cancer of the
colon and rectum could not, as Pauling has claimed, prolong their survival or
reverse the course of their tumors by taking large doses of vitamin C.
One hundred patients suffering from colorectal cancer which had spread to
the rest of their bodies were given either 10 grams - a large dose - of
vitamin C or a dummy medication daily, in a carefully controlled study. Until
the study was over, neither patients nor doctors knew who was getting the
vitamin and who received the inert substance, or placebo.
There was no significant difference in their survival rates, according to a
report in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Although his study focused on only one type of cancer, said the clinic's
Dr. Charles G. Moertel, he doubted that vitamin C would be any more effective
against other types of cancer.
Pauling could not be reached by telephone yesterday.
None of the patients studied by Moertel's group had received chemotherapy,
which is ineffective against colorectal cancer. This, the researchers noted,
was an important consideration because Pauling hypothesized that vitamin C
might not work if the body's natural defenses had already been weakened by
chemotherapy.
FOREMA;01/16,14:39 LDRISC;01/17,14:27 VITAMI17
|
