Oxygen free radical study out today

[Guest guest]

UCL study questions basis for treatment of diseases including cancer

and arthritis

One of the methods for treating diseases that include cancer,

arthritis and radiation sickness is challenged by new research by a

team of scientists at University College London (UCL). The current

orthodoxy on the role played by oxygen free radicals in the

development of a number of diseases is called into question by the

UCL team in a paper to be published in the 26th February edition of

Nature, in research that may hold profound implications for the

standard approach of the medical profession and pharmaceutical

industry in treating these conditions.

It is currently held that oxygen free radicals, atoms or groups of

atoms produced by white blood cells, are responsible, if produced in

excess, for the production of conditions such as arthritis,

arteriosclerosis and many others, including cancer. That is why,

since the 1970s, medical practice and the pharmaceutical industry

have sought to develop drugs to stop the production of free radicals

and mop them up with antioxidants (substances capable of preventing

the oxidation of organic molecules) as part of the process of

treating such diseases.

Following extensive study, the paper categorically discounts the

primary evidence upon which this theory is based, and suggests that

instead we need to look at other potential treatments, and that

specifically treatments should move towards the regulation of enzymes

released from neutrophil leukocytes, the most numerous of the white

blood cells.

" White blood cells produce oxygen free radicals, and the process by

which they do so is essential for the efficient killing of microbes, "

says Dr Tony Segal of the Centre for Molecular Medicine within UCL's

Department of Medicine, one of the authors of the research. " However,

people in whom this process is defective are prone to severe, chronic

and often fatal infections. This fact has led to the presumption that

the oxygen free radicals themselves are highly toxic, and that if

they can kill organisms as tough as bacteria and fungi they can also

damage human tissues. Free radicals are believed to be promoted by

many agents, including smoking and atmospheric pollutants and

smoking, and have been implicated in the production of conditions

that include cancer, arthritis, arteritis many other conditions

caused by an initial inflammation in which these neutrophil

leukocytes accumulate.

" However, our work shows that the basic theory underlying the

toxicity of oxygen radicals is flawed. Tens, if not hundreds, of

millions of pounds have been misspent by the pharmaceutical industry

in chasing the red herring of the involvement of oxygen free radicals

in the causation of many diseases . Many patients might be using

expensive antioxidant drugs based upon completely invalid theories as

to their therapeutic potential. All the theories relating to their

causation of disease by oxygen free radicals, and the therapeutic

value of antioxidants must, at the very least, be re-evaluated " .

###