"Benefits of Nutritional Yeast for Cancer"
In an article entitled "The Treatment of Inoperable Cancer,"
it was noted that "200 years ago, it was observed that a certain number
of malignant growths disappeared after an attack of (a type of strep infection)"
and that was 200 years before 1901, when this was published.
A disproportionate number of cases of spontaneous tumor regressions
have followed various infections.
The thought is that an infection may kind of so rile up the immune system,
the cancer may get caught in the cross-fire,
a phenomenon that may have inspired
healers dating back to the ancient Egyptians thousands of years ago.
But you don't know until you put it to test,
though it wasn't formally studied until the 1800's,
when doctors started intentionally infecting cancer patients.
The most famous proponent was William Coley,
the so-called "Father of Immunotherapy"
at what would eventually become Memorial Sloan Kettering.
He "was convinced that having a severe infection could cause cancer to regress,"
so with a great deal of courage he started injecting cancer patients.
The problem, of course, is that causing infections is quite dangerous
and two of his patients died; however, their tumors did shrink!
If only there was a way we could boost the immune system without killing people.
Well, that's the theory behind therapeutic cancer vaccines,
one of which has been in practice for decades:
squirting a weakened bovine tuberculosis bacteria into the bladders of patients
with bladder cancer to make the immune system attack,
boosting long-term survival up to 36%.
OK, but is there something we can eat that can boost immune function?
In my videos on countering stress-induced immune suppression
and preventing common childhood infections, I reviewed evidence
about a type of fiber in baker's, brewer's, and nutritional yeast,
called beta-glucans, which are considered immunomodulatory compounds,
suggested to enhance the defense against infections, and potentially cancer.
Beta-glucans themselves do not appear to have a direct cytotoxic effect
in terms of killing cancer cells,
but may boost anti-tumor immunity by activating our immune cells.
For example, if you take freshly excised tumors of breast cancer patients
and let loose natural killer cells upon them,
they can kill off a small percentage of the tumor cells.
But first, prime them in vitro with some yeast beta-glucans,
and they become about 5 times more effective at killing cancer cells.
What if you just eat it though?
When 23 women with metastatic breast cancer were given
just a 16th of a teaspoon of nutritional yeast worth of beta-glucans,
they experienced a 50% increase in the number of monocyte white blood cells
in their bloodstream, which are part of our natural defenses,
as well as a significant increase in their activation,
but it was just a two-week study.
The clinical significance of this finding is unclear.
What we want to know is if they actually live longer?
The only English language, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of
breast cancer patients and beta-glucan was more of a wound healing study,
where they found that the women taking beta-glucans healed so much faster
after surgery that the tubes could be removed from their chests and armpits,
in some cases days earlier.
This was the first clinical study to demonstrate
improved wound healing using oral beta-glucans.
The other two—showing benefits for pediatric burns and leg ulcers—
were performed using topical beta-glucan preparations,
putting it on the skin directly,
something that did not appear to reverse pre-cancerous skin lesions
better than placebo.
But that's because the placebo cream worked so well, too.
Both groups showed a significant reduction.
They speculated that since each patient acted as their own control,
putting the beta-glucan cream on one arm
and the placebo cream on the other, that
the application of beta-glucans on one arm may have been absorbed into the
system and helped on the other arm, given that systemic effects have been noted
following topical administration.
But what effect might oral beta-glucans have
on the progression of internal cancers?
Yeah, oral yeast beta-glucans can cause dramatic tumor shrinkage—in mice,
but there appears to be only one human study published in English.
Twenty patients with advanced cancer on chemo were given
a beta-glucan supplement in an open label, uncontrolled trial.
Sixty percent of the patients supposedly reported a sense of well-being
while taking the beta-glucan and asked to remain on the treatment after
the completion of the study, but that just sounds like classic placebo effect.
Same thing with reporting being less tired.
But this is interesting:
"one patient with lymphoma and enlarged lymph nodes
in the neck who delayed his standard chemotherapy for 4 weeks
during the study...noted a marked reduction
in the size of the nodes while taking [supplement] alone."
So this one kind of anecdotal case is interesting, especially since
there are no side effects, but not exactly revolutionary.
In Japan, there have been more than 20 randomized controlled trials
on the use of beta-glucans as an adjunct cancer treatment,
which evidently show an enhancement of chemo or radiation therapy,
resulting in "a positive effect on survival and quality of life..."
For example, there was evidently a study on taking a yeast beta-glucan supplement
to help cancer relapse after surgery.
There were no relapses in the treated group,
compared to about 1 in 5 in the control group.
Even more intriguing, yeast beta-glucans for inoperable cancer patients,
end-stage cancer, since only about 1 in 20 patients made it 3 months,
and by 6 months they were all dead,
whereas in the treated group, most survived for more than 3 months,
not 1 in 20, but most, and 43% were still alive after 6 months.
Now evidently, it's not clear how patients were divvied up
into treatment vs. control groups.
If they weren't randomly assigned, they may have inadvertently cherry picked
healthier patients for the treatment group, which could explain the results.
Now, I've looked for this study everywhere so I could get it translated,
but even the National Library of Medicine couldn't find it.
If anyone out there can though, I'll do a follow-up video.
But the amount of beta-glucans they used is what you'd find in a single pinch
of nutritional yeast, which would cost less than a penny,
and the only side-effect would be tastier popcorn, so why not give it a try?