This may not be recent news, but noteworthy.

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Newsletter #58–March/April 2000

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New Research Links Breast Milk To Cancer Cell Death

by Jane Sprague Zones

Despite evidence of widespread pesticide contamination in breast milk, the benefits of breast-feeding have long been touted by the medical community and many women's health advocates alike. Some advantages of breast-feeding over bottle-feeding are well established for infant health: Breast-fed babies show greater immunity to a variety of communicable diseases, as well as enhanced cognitive development. They have a lower risk of some childhood cancers, including acute leukemias1, Hodgkin's disease2, and lymphoma.3

Breast-feeding also appears to lower the risk of breast and ovarian cancer in mothers who nurse their babies. Research supporting this is mixed, but about half of the major controlled studies done thus far have found a significant reduction in breast cancer risk among premenopausal women who breast-feed, particularly among those who first lactate at a younger age and for longer total duration.4 (Negative or insignificant findings in other studies have been attributed to the generally short duration of breast-feeding in this country, among other variables. For a good review of this literature see "Lactation and the Risk of Breast Cancer," by Jennifer L. Kelsey and Esther M. John, in the January 13, 1994, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, pp.136-137.)

An Unintentional Discovery

Intriguing new developments indicate an even broader role for breast milk in assaulting cancer. In 1992 a Swedish graduate student, Anders Hakansson, accidentally observed mothers' milk bring about cancer cell death in his laboratory4.

Hakansson, his professor Catharina Svanborg, and their colleagues have since studied and resolved the means by which breast milk kills human cancer cells of all kinds. Synthesizing the critical components, the researchers are working on ways to develop usable treatments for cancer and bacterial infections. Svanborg is a physician immunologist at Lund University, and her primary interest has been in fighting communicable diseases.

The process that Hakansson observed is a hot, relatively new object of study in biology known as apoptosis, the systematic process by which cells, responding to environmental signals, self-destruct. it is the natural mechanism the body uses to recycle material that is not needed for functioning, a means of maintaining order. When apoptosis is initiated, the cell dries out and shrivels, and its genetic material becomes shredded so that the cell can not duplicate itself. With cancer cells, apoptosis is inhibited, allowing rapid growth of. dysfunctional cells.

Funding for Svanborg's work has been hampered by skepticism from American scientists, who dominate cancer research. Hers is a small operation in a foreign country, and its focus on apoptosis represents a relatively recent shift in their research, emanating from Hakansson's fortuitous discovery. Their first research paper on this topic was published in 1995 5, which led to a $200,000 grant from the American Cancer Society-the ACS's only foreign grant at the time. Hakansson continues to work with Svanborg, and their group is now collaborating with researchers from Stockholm's Karolinska Institute and Oxford University in England.

Unfurling the Mystery

The collaborative's research focuses on a protein known as alpha- lactalbumin, dubbed alpha-lac for short. When alpha-lac's amino acid chain is folded completely—its usual configuration—it assists in the production of lactose, the sugar found in milk.

As alpha-lac unfolds, however (and scientists are unclear as to what prompts it to do so), it ignites the process of apoptosis in cancer cells. The unfurled version of alpha-lac is termed HAMLET, an acronym for human alpha-lactalbumin made lethal to tumors.

Svanborg's team has figured out how alpha-lac transforms into an executioner of cancer cells, and has characterized and genetically engineered HAMLET. The protein requires an acidic environment to make this change, along with a component from breast milk that the team has identified but is keeping confidential (presumably for commercial reasons).

Preliminary animal testing suggests that mice given large doses of HAMLET experience few observable side effects, a rarity in cancer treatments. The research group is optimistic that HAMLET can be made into an effective cancer combatant with little deleterious impact for humans. But the process of testing the substance in animal tumors, and then in human safety and effectiveness trials, could take years.

The isolation of HAMLET as a trigger for apoptosis in cancer cells gives further weight to the value of breast milk as a natural means of strengthening the human body. Pediatricians and other child and-maternal health advocates enthusiastically endorse breast-feeding, despite evidence that breast milk is widely contaminated by pesticides and other chemical pollutants in the environment. Most international studies of human milk have detected DDT and other organochlorine pesticides in human milk. In Sweden—where use of chlorinated phenols as pesticides has been prohibited—the concentration of such pollutants in breast milk has declined over time.6

Because breast milk is at the head of the human food chain, its toxins are more concentrated than those in animal-based foods. Walter Rogan, a researcher at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, points out that breast milk does not meet the Food and Drug Administration's standards of purity required of infant formula.7

There are very few studies of, the damage this may cause a child who has been nursed, and because of the known benefits, public health promoters continue to urge new mothers to nurse their offspring. Biologist Sandra Steingraber, author of Living Downstream: A Scientist's Personal Investigation of Cancer and the Environment, believes that rather than choose between tainted breast milk (with all of its benefits) and nutritionally inferior but less contaminated formula, we need to eradicate the environmental toxins that inevitably wind up polluting our breasts.8

Approximations of mothers' milk and its components, such as infant formula and genetically engineered HAMLET, serve significant and potentially wonderful functions, but we also need to keep our attention on the fundamental work that preserves a nourishing and healthy environment for human beings.

1 Shu, X.O. et al., "Breast-Feeding and Risk of Childhood Acute Leukemia," Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 1999, vol. 91, no. 20, pp. 1765-72.

2 Davis, M.K. "Review of the Evidence for an Association Between Infant Feeding and Childhood Cancer," International Journal of Cancer (supplement), 1998, vol. 11, pp. 29-33.

3 Radetsky, P. "Got cancer killers?" Discover, June 1999.

4 Labbok, M.H. "Health Sequelae of Breast-Feeding for the Mother," Clinics in Perinatology, June 1999, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 491-503.

5 Hakansson, A. et al., "Apoptosis induced by a Human Milk Protein," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 1995, vol. 92, pp 8064-68.

6 Anwar, W.A. "Biomarkers of Human Exposure to Pesticides," Environmental Health Perspectives, 1997, vol. 105 (supplement 4), pp. 801-06.

7 Rogan, W.J. "Pollutants in Breast Milk," Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, 1996, vol. 150, pp. 981-90.

8 Steingraber, S. "Human Breast Milk Contamination." The Ribbon, Fall 1999, voll. 4, no. 3, pp. 8-10.

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More recent news about breast milk and cnacer patients.

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SOME FIND BENEFITS FOR CANCER, OTHER SERIOUS DISEASES

By Barbara Feder Ostrov Mercury News (http://www.mercurynews.com/)

Breast milk isn't just for babies at the Mothers' Milk Bank in San Jose, which quietly offers it to adults with cancer and other serious illnesses to ease their symptoms.

The milk bank is one of just six in the United States. It distributes donated breast milk primarily to premature and low-birth-weight babies. However, it also will provide breast milk to adults with a doctor's prescription.

Adult use of breast milk is rare, according to Pauline Sakamoto of the milk bank in San Jose, which has served 28 adult patients in the past four years. Adults with cancer, digestive disorders and immune disorders may drink several ounces of milk daily or weekly to ease the ravages of chemotherapy, bolster their immune systems and improve their digestion, she said.

No national figures exist for adult use of breast milk, but an informal survey of the nation's milk banks suggest that they currently serve dozens of adult patients.

Breast milk's benefits for babies have been well documented, with research showing that it helps fight infection, improves immune system function, increases intelligence and combats obesity in later life.

But can it help sick grown-ups? No one knows because so little research has been done.

In 1995 Swedish researchers isolated a protein in mothers' milk that seemed to kill cancer cells in a test tube. And they are still working on developing a drug that takes advantage of that protein. In 2004 the same research team found another compound that destroys many kinds of skin warts, raising expectations that the compound could help treat cervical cancer and other diseases caused by the human papilloma virus.

Still, most doctors are skeptical about the value of breast milk for adults, and mainstream medicine seems to consider it to be on the fringe.

Although Dr. Michelle Melisko, an oncologist at the University of California-San Francisco, acknowledges that mothers' milk probably won't hurt her patients, she worries about quality control -- some viral particles can be passed through breast milk -- and said she would advise them against using it.

A potential risk

"I'd say the same thing I say to all my patients who want to do alternative things: I don't know how it's tested," Melisko said. "Patients are potentially exposing themselves to as many risks by taking milk from an unknown source than by taking herbs that come in a bag."

Yet Margit Hamosh, professor emeritus at Georgetown University and an expert in the biochemistry of human milk, says breast milk contains compounds "that might definitely help in people who have compromised immune systems in the same way they might help the newborn."

Howard Cohen, a Palo Alto software consultant with a doctorate in theoretical physics, says he can live with the lack of medical evidence. Indeed, he's his own research study. Cohen believes that the twice-weekly smoothies he makes with breast milk and fruit have helped put his prostate cancer into remission and allowed him to avoid more invasive treatment, such as surgery.

"You give this stuff to newborn babies," Cohen said. "It can't be toxic."

After Cohen was diagnosed in 1999, his wife found an article about the Swedish research on breast milk and cancer cells. A friend who was lactating donated some milk, and Cohen soon found that his levels of prostate-specific antigen, a warning sign of cancerous cells, dropped back to normal. His doctor, a UC-San Francisco urologist, was skeptical but open to Cohen's self-treatment as long as his blood work looked fine. Cohen undergoes blood tests and other screenings religiously, and in the past 2 1/2 years, there have been no signs of cancer, he said. It's possible, of course, that without the breast milk, Cohen's prostate cancer might have grown so slowly that his health would not be compromised; that happens in many cases.

'It works'

Still, Cohen believes. After all, when he temporarily stopped the breast milk, his PSA levels went up. "It works," he says simply.

Patty, an East Bay health educator who asked that her last name not be used, said breast milk seems to be helping her 15-year-old son, who this spring was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a serious bowel disorder that can stunt growth and destroy the liver. Daily doses of breast milk mixed with chocolate syrup kept her son's symptoms under control, allowing him to gain weight and tolerate a regular diet, she said.

Although her son experienced a flare-up of symptoms that landed him in the hospital after five months on breast milk, Patty still gives him eight ounces a day, until their supplies are used up. Her son is now on anti-inflammatory drugs that control his disease. He can no longer tolerate chocolate syrup and must hold his nose to get the milk down, Patty said, but he's in remission. Because of the stigma surrounding adults drinking breast milk, her son wants to keep it a secret from his high school friends, she said.

"This is like liquid gold. We have this incredible untapped resource that we've only looked at for what it can give babies," Patty said. "I'd love for more studies to be done on this. There's got to be something helpful going on."

More information about the Mothers Milk Bank, located at Valley Medical Center in San Jose, is available at home.earthlink.net/~milkbank (http://home.earthlink.net/~milkbank/) or (408) 998-4550.

Contact Barbara Feder Ostrov at bfeder@mercurynews.com (bfeder@mercurynews.com) or (408) 920-5064.

Disclaimer: All material provided in asklenore.info is provided for educational purposes only. Consult your physician regarding the advisability of any opinions or recommendations with respect to your individual situation.

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Well, the moral of this story seems to be,

FIND A TIT AND SUCK ON IT...

I plan on going straight to the local tittie bar with a pocket full of $five dollar bills$.

"I am so sorry, honey. No lap dance for me, just let me suck you dry, O.K.?"





A-1

A-1, I knew you would suck up to women.