Soda against cancer: a hyped sensation
About cancer, soda, press releases and Russian media
Peter Talantov, co-founder of the Evolution Foundation, member of the Society of Evidence-Based Medicine Specialists:
It is well known that the main scientific news in Russia is about cancer, and they are divided into two categories. From the first we learn that some food product causes or, conversely, prevents cancer. News of the second category appears about once a quarter and reports the discovery of a treatment method that promises another final solution to the problem. Given the number of new cancer drugs that we have learned about from the media in recent years, this disease should not cause any more concern for a long time than the February runny nose. Alas, this is still not the case. The news recently disseminated in the Russian media about another miracle method is an excellent reason to understand the reasons for some dissonance between publications in the press and reality.
This time we are not dealing with an innovative drug or a complex technology, but with an old contender for the role of a panacea with a pretty tarnished reputation, however. "Scientists have told how soda can save from cancer" – that's how, no less, the headlines of the news published by Lenta look like.<url>", RIA-Novosti agency and Zvezda shopping Mall.
From the editorial office of "Eternal Youth":
It is with a feeling of deep satisfaction that we note that this news is retold quite correctly on our website.
Attempts to treat cancer with ordinary baking soda have been made since the first rough measurements of the pH of tumors showed that they are characterized by greater acidity than healthy tissues. Immediately there were those who declared this change not one of the consequences of the pathological process, but the only direct cause of all oncological diseases. And where there is a new theory of cancer, simple enough to create the illusion of a simple solution for the patient, there are the worst of the medical charlatans – those who are ready to make money on the fear of people for their lives or loved ones.
One of the most famous such scammers was the Italian doctor Tullio Simoncini (Tullio Simoncini). In January of this year, he was sentenced to five years, and his assistant to two years in prison, after their attempts to treat baking soda for breast cancer killed a 50–year-old patient. Perhaps this victim was not the first: her death stopped Simoncini's activity only because the ambulance doctor refused to indicate death from natural causes in the conclusion. Alas, Simoncini is only one of hundreds of soda doctors. For example, an Internet search in Russian will quickly take you to the website of a whole network of Moscow medical centers offering to treat cancer and other deadly diseases with soda and hydrogen peroxide. They probably feel quite comfortable and their work is not in danger. In any case, until a tragedy happens, which will be difficult to conceal.
At the same time, the idea of manipulating the pH of cancerous tissues in order to influence the course of the disease has serious enough reasons not to be immediately ridiculed. pH changes are very characteristic of the tissues of some types of cancer. In particular, in tumors, there may be a decrease in extracellular pH while maintaining or increasing intracellular pH. As a result, the extracellular environment becomes more acidic than the intracellular one. Since normally things are usually the opposite way, this phenomenon is called an expanded pH gradient. It is believed that the unfolded gradient plays a role in the processes of tumor growth and metastasis. A number of studies have shown that the addition of ordinary soda to the drinking water of laboratory mice is sufficient to partially normalize the pH of tumor tissue. At the same time, clinically significant effects were also observed: although it was not possible to reduce the size of the tumor or stop its growth, metastases appeared less frequently in mice that were watered with soda diluted in it.
So what are we dealing with when we talk about the treatment of cancer with soda: with dangerous charlatanism or with a promising direction of scientific research? Maybe Simoncini, who is serving time for fraud and murder, is an incomprehensible genius who was ahead of the science of his time?
Despite the fact that attempts to influence the course of cancer by changing the pH began back in the 1990s, a medicine based on this principle has still not been created. Soda is not suitable for this role. As often happens, it is impossible to simply repeat on a person what was done on laboratory animals. The equivalent of the dose applied to mice, which would be approximately 0.18 g / kg / day for a person, will only be enough to neutralize the acid produced by a tumor with a volume of no more than one cubic millimeter. At the same time, regular intake of doses exceeding 0.5 g / kg / day (this is only three, almost three times more) can cause uncompensated alkalosis and lead to the death of the patient long before the minimal benefit from slowing metastasis is obtained. Alas, no matter how much I would like to treat a dangerous disease with a penny soda, there are no prospects for this approach. However, it cannot be ruled out that someday medicines will appear on the market that normalize the pH gradient in a different, more subtle way. For example, by suppressing the work of proton pumps built into the cell membrane.
As for the study that gave rise to the discussed noise in the Russian press, there are no sensational statements in the scientific article published in Cell based on the results of this work. The research team found that an increase in the acidity of cancer tissues leads to the fact that the intracellular signaling complex mTORC 1 "falls silent", which, in turn, disrupts the work of the so–called circadian clock - an intracellular mechanism that can both play a role in the development of cancer, and, under certain circumstances, affect the susceptibility of cells to chemotherapy. A small part of this work was a partial repetition of the previously mentioned experiments with mice - adding soda to their drinking water normalized the pH of tumors in some cases and started the circadian clock again. In other cases, however, it did not start.
This is certainly an interesting work, because it connects several areas that are currently at the forefront of research interest, and improves our understanding of how cancer diseases arise and develop. But there's nothing in it about "finding a cheap way to fight cancer." Hundreds of similar papers describing new biological phenomena obtained in vitro or on laboratory animals are published annually. Theoretically, almost all of them could contribute to the treatment of cancer. But there are very few fundamentally new working cancer drugs: there is an insurmountable gap between the biological phenomenon observed in the laboratory and the clinically significant result.
A significant part of the laboratory findings is not even followed by an attempt to create a medicine. If such an attempt is made, the chances of crowning it with the launch of a new drug on the market are extremely small – they amount to fractions of a percent. Even medicines that have passed the way to clinical trials on volunteers complete the registration procedure on average only in 8-9% of cases. At the same time, in oncology, this figure is even less – about 5%. What, then, explains the unbridled enthusiasm of the Russian media?
The fact that they were guided not by a balanced, without excessive sensationalism article in Cell, but by a press release published on the same day by Chi Van Dang, scientific director of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research. Unlike a scientific publication, this release is full of optimism. The article in Cell is called "Acid in hypoxia suppresses the circadian clock by inhibiting mTOR"; the press release is titled "How baking soda could improve cancer therapy" - do you feel the difference?
Almost the entire release is devoted to the fact that it does not take up much space in the original publication in Cell – the very mice who drank water with baking soda diluted in it, and the reasoning that the discovered phenomenon can increase the effectiveness of chemotherapy. "The concept is incredibly simple," Dr. Dan writes enthusiastically, "and it's not about some medicine for $100,000. It's literally ordinary baking soda." Forgetting to mention the inapplicability of baking soda on humans and that the idea itself is not new and the search for other ways to influence the pH of the tumor has been going on for many years.
Russian journalists had to take only a small step to bring the news to "perfection". A little imagination, a little reluctance to study not only a press release, but also a scientific publication, some courage in choosing headlines, and now the news is spreading online and collecting comments like "I always knew that a cure for cancer was invented a long time ago, and scientists are hiding it."
I actually understand everything. And about the fact that Scientific director Dan needs to receive grants and report on outstanding discoveries, so he cannot issue a press release with an honest but unattractive title “Yet Another Vitro Phenomenon with No Clinical Relevance” (Another in vitro phenomenon that has no clinical significance). And about the fact that Russian media make news "more interesting" because they need traffic: after all, it is necessary to sell advertising, bonuses and careers depend on it. But I can't get that unfortunate woman who was killed by Simoncini out of my head and stop thinking that, perhaps, right now some desperate person is going, after reading the news, to treat his serious and dangerous illness in the same network of Moscow medical centers. And may not come back from there.
Somehow it is necessary to be more careful, gentlemen.
Anatoly Bloshchinenko, oncologist, chemotherapist:
Without exaggeration, fifteen to twenty percent of patients use non-traditional methods of treatment: they drink soda, peroxide, ASD, vodka with oil, camel urine, kerosene. The methods are captivated by a lot of positive fake reviews, simplicity, cheapness and, most importantly, the ability to be treated at home, without the help of a doctor. Unfortunately, all this can lead to tragic consequences.
There are patients who, after learning about the presence of a disease or discovering a neoplasm, do not go to an oncologist, afraid of finding out bad news, but resort to similar methods. And they continue to be "treated" until one of the relatives insists on going to the doctor or until the patient gets to the hospital due to complications. It is then that it turns out that the time when it was possible to start adequate and successful treatment has been missed and only symptomatic, palliative therapy remains.
It is hardly possible to reduce the flow of information about the "successes" of alternative medicine in the treatment of malignant tumors. That is why it is so important to discuss non-traditional methods with scientific justification of their uselessness in the media, in social networks, to conduct educational seminars. And it is very important that oncologists communicate with patients (which many do not always have time for, though), explain that non-traditional methods of treatment are based on myths and give only false hopes.
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