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A Popular Sugar Additive May Have Fueled the Spread of Two Superbugs (latimes.com)
Zorro (Slashdot reader #15,797) quotes the Los Angeles Times:
Two bacterial strains that have plagued hospitals around the country may have been at least partly fueled by a sugar additive in our food products, scientists say. Trehalose, a sugar that is added to a wide range of food products, could have allowed certain strains of Clostridium difficile to become far more virulent than they were before, a new study finds. The results, described in the journal Nature, highlight the unintended consequences of introducing otherwise harmless additives to the food supply.
Nearly half a million people were sickened by C. difficile in 2011, when it was directly linked to 15,000 deaths. "The misuse and overuse of antibiotics has long been thought to be responsible for the rise of many kinds of antibiotic-resistant 'superbug'," notes the article, before citing a researcher who now believes "the circumstantial and experimental evidence points to trehalose as an unexpected culprit."
Nearly half a million people were sickened by C. difficile in 2011, when it was directly linked to 15,000 deaths. "The misuse and overuse of antibiotics has long been thought to be responsible for the rise of many kinds of antibiotic-resistant 'superbug'," notes the article, before citing a researcher who now believes "the circumstantial and experimental evidence points to trehalose as an unexpected culprit."
It seems like this 'highlights' one unique and unproven possibility, and nothing more. Getting ahead of ourselves....
I was pissed that I had to click on the stupid article link just to find out the name of the sugar, so there it is.
From Wikipedia:
Trehalose, also known as mycose or tremalose, is a natural alpha-linked disaccharide formed by an ,-1,1-glucoside bond between two -glucose units. In 1832, H.A.L. Wiggers discovered trehalose in an ergot of rye,[3] and in 1859 Marcellin Berthelot isolated it from trehala manna, a substance made by weevils, and named it trehalose.[4] It can be synthesised by bacteria,[5] fungi, plants, and invertebrate animals. It is implicated in anhydrobiosis—the ability of plants and animals to withstand prolonged periods of desiccation. It has high water retention capabilities, and is used in food and cosmetics.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
And shame on both the LA Times and /. for not ensuring that there was a link to the original article or at least a DOI.
I've never trusted artificial sweateners. Call it irrational if you want but they just seem like getting something for nothing and I don't trust that. In this case we just discovered Trehalose's hidden "price".
I have a close friend who has been diagnosed c.diff free for almost three months now. It took him years of discomfort and our last line drug for the disease (which apperently is new enough insurance companies arent covering it yet) to get to this point.
To improve my own diet I just ate less and less sweet stuff over time. After a while you don't crave it any more.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
to get rid of the sugar import tax? And for the FDA to rescind some of the crap they allow in food products.
Very little sugar is still grown in the states so which farmers are being protected and how is the populace benefitting from this tax?
Yes, too much sugar is bad for you but, it seems like the corn sugar and the other products that are being used as a substitute for sugar are worse for the consumer.
I attribute this to the price of imported sugar being high, if the import tax on sugar has ANY bearing on this issue it's time to take action.
The upside of this is I don't purchase or consume much of these products because I read the labels and avoid particularly yellow #5 and sugar substitutes.
I prefer home made sweets where I can control the ingredients.
The FDA has allowed the use of these compounds (to the benefit of the corporations) based on their "recommended" consumption guidelines.
It is becoming obvious that the prolonged consumption of these products is harming the populace.
It's obvious that the populace is unable to police themselves and follow obscure product warnings, why are they still allowed to be used?
Rick B.
Tobacco was considered "harmless".
Leaded fuel was considered "harmless".
Salt was considered "harmless".
Sugar was considered "harmless".
I forgot to add, I know this because, well, everybody knows it. It seems to make sense, therefore it's absolutely true.
What's wrong with salt?
You may want to consider using that wording very carefully. The number of cancer cases per capita in the west has literally grown ten-fold during the 1900's, with the increased usage of chemical additives we considered "harmless".
All current evidence supports the view that cancer is literally the result of sufficient accumulation of mutations & low immune function--there is no 'magic' way to avoid it, it's not proof of sinful indulgence in scary chemicals like dihydrogen monoxide or anything. You just did not die before your body stopped being able to kill off cancerous cells fast enough.
Since the 1900s, life expectancy has steadily increased due to the discovery of such things as 'antibiotics' and other means to keep people from dying. Most of modern pharmacology doesn't date back to before the 1900s, damn few things date to before the 1850s or so, and a lot of the stuff used circa 1900 for medicine that isn't still in use was dropped from the pharmacopeia. (The only ways to pull off that feat is having truly horrible side effects and/or being proven to be snake oil. Only the second is 100% certain to result in removal.)
From the perspective of somebody who actually studied physiology+biochemistry and then wandered into neuroscience?
Absolutely nothing is wrong with salt, except most people don't consume anywhere near sufficient potassium. Sodium and potassium really, really need to be kept in balance--they're key to neurons' ability to generate action potentials and electrical signalling. (One interesting test on how to treat high sodium levels actually tried potassium supplementation instead of cutting salt intake to great success--it doesn't hurt that most Americans have a potassium deficiency. If you don't use the salt shaker and supplement potassium, then you should be fine and if you're not then you need to see a doctor & then a licensed dietician.)
Summary reads as though it was written by someone with a stake in the price of trehalose, calling it "otherwise harmless". A bullet can kill you if it enters your body at high speed, but they're are otherwise harmless; we still don't allow people to shoot guns randomly so long as they're not aiming at someone. I'd just like to point out that "otherwise harmless" is a weasel-word for "harmful".
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
So you're saying I should eat a salted banana for breakfast every morning?
But seriously, this information was actually useful as I recently increased my salt intake because I wasn't getting enough and have felt somewhat of a mental fog ever since; I'll add potassium into the mix and see how that goes. Now, why didn't my doctor tell me about this when he told me I wasn't getting enough sodium?
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
Yes and no. What they propose is happening is that Cdiff, which something like 30% of the world's population carries in their GI, has become an infectious problem (Cdiff infection, or CDI) in the last 15 years because of the following process: First, a patient takes life saving antibiotics for a medical problem. Without antibiotics something like 60% of infections are fatal (the bad old days before penicillin was discovered). Those antibiotics wipe out the infection, but also the good GI bacteria, but Cdiff is able to make an impervious spore form that is immune to all known antibiotics except for Metronidazole and Vancomycin (which are both not normally given for infections, Vancomycin especially has some very nasty side effects). Once the patient is better and they discontinue antibiotics, the Cdiff can flourish in the absence of other bacteria. It produces some very nasty toxins, one that destroys cells as well as a systemic poison that can kill you (toxin A and B).
The new discovery is that it is not just the absence of healthy bacteria in the GI that triggers CDI, but the presence of this food additive Trehalose that was previously thought to be safe, because the body doesn't absorb it very well (though it does get absorbed): "Trehalose is nutritionally equivalent to glucose, because it is rapidly broken down into glucose by the enzyme trehalase, which is present in the brush border of the intestinal mucosa of omnivores (including humans) and herbivores." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The bottom line is now that we know that Trehalose is a aggravating risk factor for CDI, any foods that contain it should be required to carry a large warning label on the front of the package (like cigarettes) describing the danger, if it is not banned altogether as a food additive. At the same time, the companies that are profiting from the manufacture and sale of Trehalose are looking at a serious lawsuit, since about 50,000 people in the US alone have died from Cdiff in the last 10 years.
There will be no human trials, other than to ban Trehalose for patients during and for a month after treatment with antibiotics (typical incidence time frame for CDI). If the cases of Cdiff drop precipitously, especially in high risk patients, that will be all the confirmation required.
If you disagree, please post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like
Probably because he didn't do his undergrad as a biochemist--that's part of why the sequence I suggested included a registered dietician, because while your GP won't necessarily have a deep knowledge of biochemistry and physiology, it's pretty hard to become a registered dietician/nutritionist without it.
But yeah, raising your potassium should help with the mental fog--you might want to step it up carefully, and it might also help some with the sodium since your body will do its best to keep them relatively even. Add in a decent source of calcium if you want to make sure you've got all three of the major ions for your nervous system just to be sure.
Scientist try to make bug resistant plants, jack around with DNA to stop this or that in NATURE. Oh, but it's 100% safe. Yeah, right. Granted, the over prescription of antibiotics in the 80's was a mess, but that isn't the only reason. I for one, am very fortunate...the number of times I've had to use just plain old run of the mill antibiotics you can count on one hand. My younger sister on the other hand, has to have those really jacked up price kind to do her any good.
If you eat a western diet, you get 5 - 10 times the amount of salt you "need" without any need to use a salt shaker.
The idea "I did not get enough salt" is utter nonsense, unless you live on a special diet and avoid every standard food you would get in a shop or restaurant.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Just because overuse of antibiotics is the primary cause of many problems doesn't make that the primary cause of all problems. Vaguely tested food additives are also the primary cause of many problems, and this may well be one of them.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Odd, the biochemist didn't raise that point. I think I'm going to trust them over you, thanks.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
I tend to consider that to be due to a "safe" level of multiple pesticide residues rather than to mainly be due to insufficiently tested food additives. Not saying there can't be interactions between the two phenomena.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Disgusting as it sounds, the use of Maggot Therapy has recommenced for the treatment of necrosis. Leeches are being used in plastic surgery. Phages and other potions are being employed for resistant bacterial infections.
If it acquires resources on instantiation like a duck, then its a shared_ptr<Duck>
Pharmacopias would not include any of these things; they deal with pharmaceuticals, not therapies. I also chose the dates I did in part because of knowing the rough timeline of things. Going through your list...
So that's why my barber says "the necrosis is setting in nicely" - always wondered what he meant.
If it acquires resources on instantiation like a duck, then its a shared_ptr<Duck>
Almonds are a great source of potassium and a tasty low-carb snack.
Why would the scare quotes? People do need salt.
Because parent was talking about a particular "salt" and another salt in the same context.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Now, that's just wrong if you're actually cooking/baking a dish, rather than just adding salt to a soup or something. Sometimes the salt is there for chemical reactions necessary for the result.
Now, why didn't my doctor tell me about this when he told me I wasn't getting enough sodium?
From a biochem perspective (I have background here, so I follow what Cinnamon Beige is saying; it's not my strong point so it tends not to click with me right away like a lot of other things) it makes sense that your body, in an attempt to maintain balance between sodium, potassium, and calcium levels would eliminate sodium (e.g. you pee it out) if you're not getting enough potassium or calcium. In fact, that's actually what happens so, yes, you can eat the LD50 of salt for your body weight every day and still have low sodium; you'd have to also be drinking a lot of water to eliminate that much sodium from your body and you'd have a litany of other issue along with it, but it's possible if your potassium and/or calcium intake is low enough. And that actually makes sense for me, as well, as I've been avoiding milk-based products -- which have been my primary calcium source for basically my entire life -- due to other recent (and temporary) issues, and the occasional mental fog of which I complain did start rolling in about a month or so after that change. Low calcium = biochem balancing act = low potassium = low sodium as both are eliminated through urine.
But yes, I probably get a day's worth of salt from the ham and egg sandwich I have for breakfast every morning. I also probably piss most of it out an hour or so later; your book didn't point that out, so maybe you need to read another?
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
Indeed they are. I actually took a second look at this from a biochem perspective and realized I probably have low calcium intake due to some recent dietary changes, which would be bringing down my potassium and sodium as my body eliminates them in an attempt to maintain some semblance of balance between the three. It's amazing, the things I've learned and then later forgotten because they don't apply to anything that pays the bills or fills my leisure time -- then remember again when someone points out some little detail.
For the record, I keep a bowl of almonds at my desk. I do get a small amount of calcium from them, but I only munch on them when I crave them, about once a week or so. Now that I realize there's probably a dietary reason for the craving, I'll step it up a bit. Your comment lead me to look into the calcium content of almonds and I was surprised to find that they're actually a better source than the milk I've recently (mostly) removed from my diet. Thank you.
An additional note for the record, follower by a question: I've received two helpful replies to this post actually grounded in fact and genuine knowledge; and only one troll thus far. That, of course, is leading me to wonder: am I actually still on Slashdot?
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking. I'll try not to do it again. :-)
Rofl, :)
why that hostillity?
I only pointed out that salt deficit for a modern western life styke is extremely unlikely.
So bottom line you have no salt deficit but a deficit of other minerals? So why do you try to get more slat then?
Seems I don't grasp it
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
So bottom line you have no salt deficit but a deficit of other minerals? So why do you try to get more slat then? :)
Seems I don't grasp it
Indeed it seems you don't, as I'm no longer doing that. There's a timeline, here, that you might want to try and follow. Let's review:
I went to see my doctor. Doctor tells me I need more sodium (specifically), so I follow that advice.
Some time later, a biochemist comes along and points out something that, were I still involved in that field, would have been blatantly obvious to me.
I use that information to further determine that, perhaps, a deficiency in some other nutrient is causing my body to eliminate what it deems to be excess sodium.
I review the tests my doctor ran and note that none of them report calcium or potassium.
Well, damn, looks like my problem may well lie elsewhere, then, because -- as you so astutely pointed out -- I'm obviously getting enough sodium.
So, with that in mind, I'm no longer seeking more sodium in my diet but, rather, correcting the likely imbalance that caused the low sodium to begin with.
Follow?
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.