Nutraceuticals and nootropics for anti-aging

Treatments and other news about ‘bird flu’ (H5N1 Avian Influenza)

The anticipated bird flu pandemic has receded from the news lately because no dramatic new developments have occurred in the past several months. Nevertheless, the disease continues to infect poultry and wild birds, and it continues to infect small numbers of humans in Asia. The reasons for thinking that a disastrous pandemic will occur are just as valid as ever, but the timing is unpredictable.

Meanwhile, various efforts are being made to prepare for a pandemic and to find treatments and preventatives for the disease. Among the more important of these efforts are the following:

• A new website, www.truthmed.org, is bringing to light some proven treatments that are not new but are being ignored by mainstream medicine.
• Researchers are coming around to the view that anti-inflammatory drugs and supplements can prevent the lung damage that is the typical cause of death from bird flu infections.
• Supplement combinations are being proposed as preventatives or treatments for bird flu in humans.

And on the timing of flu pandemics:

• An interesting correlation between sunspot cycles and flu pandemics has been discovered.

New website describes effective influenza treatments

It is not widely known that during the 1918 avian influenza pandemic army doctors found a treatment that saved the lives of many critically ill patients. These were patients so sick that they were not expected to live more than a few hours. The treatment, dilute hydrogen peroxide given intravenously, resulted in the recovery of about half of the treated patients — an unprecedented success rate.¹

The mechanism by which this treatment worked is not well understood. This is to be expected, since it was quickly forgotten after being published in the Lancet medical journal in 1920, and is today being deliberately ignored by the medical establishment. One possibility is that hydrogen peroxide may be a signal for immune cells to take certain actions. Indeed, hydrogen peroxide is used by the immune system during invasions by foreign microorganisms. Or peroxide may act by directly damaging the invaders. Whatever the mechanism, the treatment appears to be more effective than any other, ancient or modern, and deserves a lot more attention than it has received. When will this proven treatment for avian influenza infections start receiving this long-overdue attention? Perhaps very soon, thanks to an organization called The Center for Truth in Medicine (‘TruthMed.org’). TruthMed has created a website devoted to finding the best possible treatments for bird flu using the available scientific evidence. The website claims that intravenous hydrogen peroxide is the only treatment in the medical literature that has been shown capable of reducing the mortality rate of a lethal bird flu virus in humans. One innovative treatment they propose is a transdermal hydrogen peroxide treatment as an alternative to the intravenous method.

The TruthMed.org website also discusses intravenous vitamin C treatment, which has shown efficacy in treating infections by influenza A viruses similar to bird flu.

Anti-inflammatories get attention from bird flu researchers

The fact that people who die from bird flu infections are usually killed by lung damage, not by the direct actions of the flu virus, has not escaped the attention of some researchers. Recently published studies suggest that preventing lung inflammation should be the highest priority in bird flu treatment. Among the anti-inflammatories found most effective are quercetin and other flavonoids, and the omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil and evening primrose oil.^2,3,4,5

Supplement combinations for fighting bird flu

LifeLink’s website carried an article in November of 2005, suggesting a combination of supplements as preventatives and treatments for bird flu infections. The combination included NAC (N-acetyl-cysteine), green tea extract, quercetin, alpha-lipoic acid, fish oil, and vitamin C.

Another such supplement combination was recently proposed in the medical journal Medical Hypotheses.³ It consists of: selenium, vitamin E, NAC, resveratrol, and quercetin.

The timing of pandemics

An interesting study was published in June 2006 that showed a strong correlation between the sunspot cycle and the likelihood of influenza pandemics.⁶ It was shown that influenza pandemics tend to occur in association with periods of heightened sunspot activity. The proposed mechanism for this correlation involved the effects of sunspots on weather, and the influence of weather on the interactions between migratory birds — the carriers of influenza.

References

[1]  Influenzal pneumonia: the intravenous injection of hydrogen peroxide. Lancet 1920;1:432-433

[2]  Influenza ("Bird Flu"), inflammation and anti-inflammatory/analgesic drugs. Inflammopharmacology. 2006 Mar;14(1-2):2-9

[3]  A nutritional supplement formula for influenza A (H5N1) infection in humans. Med Hypotheses. 2006;67(3):578-87. Epub 2006 Apr 18

[4]  Effect of Quercetin on lipid peroxidation and changes in lung morphology in experimental influenza virus infection. Int J Exp Pathol. 2003 Jun;84(3):127-33

[5]  Inhibition of influenza A virus replication by resveratrol. J Infect Dis. 2005 May 15;191(10):1719-29. Epub 2005 Apr 13

[6]  A hypothesis: Sunspot cycles may detect pandemic influenza A in 1700-2000 A.D. Med Hypotheses. 2006 Jun 24