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Can Two Injections of Tuberculosis Vaccine Cure Diabetes? (fortune.com)
An anonymous reader quotes Fortune:
The causes of Type 1 diabetes can be significantly reversed over several years with just two injections of a common tuberculosis vaccine injected a few weeks apart, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital announced Thursday in a paper published in the journal Nature. Researchers found a substantial reduction in the blood-sugar marker HbA1c that is used to diagnose diabetes.
All subjects with diabetes who received the vaccine had a 10% reduction after three years and 18% after four years, bringing them below the cutoff point for a clinical diagnosis. Those subjects followed for a full eight years retained most of the reduction. Participants who received a placebo or were in a reference group that followed normal diabetic management saw their blood sugar measurement rise by a few percentage points during the same periods followed... A 10% reduction in Hb1Ac reduces the risk of death as a result of diabetes by 21%, and drops by 37% other complications, like blindness and loss of feeling in hands and feet, according to a 2000 study.
All subjects with diabetes who received the vaccine had a 10% reduction after three years and 18% after four years, bringing them below the cutoff point for a clinical diagnosis. Those subjects followed for a full eight years retained most of the reduction. Participants who received a placebo or were in a reference group that followed normal diabetic management saw their blood sugar measurement rise by a few percentage points during the same periods followed... A 10% reduction in Hb1Ac reduces the risk of death as a result of diabetes by 21%, and drops by 37% other complications, like blindness and loss of feeling in hands and feet, according to a 2000 study.
Or maybe scientists and researchers should have some ethics to make sure their studies are valid and repeatable before pushing claims?
So perhaps type 1 has some sort of auto-immune connection (congratulations on RTFA I didn't)
love is just extroverted narcissism
The article suggests that it might, but that would involve a separate study (and more grant money :-).
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
It strikes me as though there is a large number of oral medications and injectables all geared toward "managing" diabetes. That's a lot of revenue for somebody. Now to have something that (if it's true) can reduce the need for diabetic medications seems like it would make those drug manufacturers very unhappy.
An effective "democracy" creates the illusion the people have a say in their government.
To be clear, the intervention is not a cure for type I diabetes mellitus. The authors go out of there way to prove and explain this:
"In this study we observe the long term and stable lowering of blood sugars in humans after BCG vaccinations. In the human, this stable blood sugar control was not driven primarily in these human subjects by pancreas recovery or regeneration. The human pancreas after BCG even at four years after repeat vaccinations did not secrete significant insulin as clinically measured by C-peptide. The mechanism for lowered HbA1c values was not equivalent to the NOD diabetic mouse pancreas regeneration after BCG treatment, despite equally restored and long term improved blood sugar control. The BCG-treated type 1 diabetic subjects at year 4 after glucagon challenge had a negligible to no return of clinically significant C-peptide. The C-peptide values after glucagon were in the range of 2–3 pmol/L of C-peptide (Fig. 1c), but with no known clinical significance. Therefore we concluded that BCG vaccinations did not induce a clinically meaningful return of C-peptide levels in the pancreas by regeneration, as observed in the NOD mouse model of diabetes17,18 Thus pancreas rescue or regeneration could not fully account for the persistent and long term HbA1c lowering in humans receiving BCG."
The study didn't include type 2 so we really can't say how this intervention will work on that group; however, I don't see a reason to think it wouldn't be effective in this group.
This is a really interesting study. I've been heavily involved in the past with diabetes mellitus management. This is a novel approach as far as I know. This may revolutionize the approach to treatment for many with diabetes mellitus.
There probably are several new medicines that will cure or alleviate symptoms for all manner of things developed each month. Sometimes the news is a bit premature as the drug hasn't even been tried in humans yet. Once further testing is done some of these are found to cause all manner of nasty side effects, some worse than what they cure. Sometimes the FDA approves it anyhow if the side effects don't appear to be life threatening, even as off-putting as they may be.
The article suggests that it might
The article does not say that. There is no plausible mechanism for this to work on type 2.
The sample size in the study (12 people, 9 getting the treatment, and 3 in the control group, and only 3 receiving the treatment were followed for the full duration) is so small, that it is not even clear if it works on type 1.
The article refers to type one diabetes, not the far more common (and epidemic) type two.
Nice, but not as useful
Type 1 diabetes is inherited, it is not from germ phobia.
Type 1 diabetes, like many other autoimmune disorders, is correlated with excessive cleanliness.
Both Type 1 and Type 2 have a genetic component, but it is actually stronger for type 2. The heritability for type 1 is about 3% if you mother has it, and about 5% if your father has it. For some Native American tribes, such as the Pima people, the type 2 rate is nearly 40%, nearly all of which is heritable because their genetic heritage isn't adapted to a modern diet.
"no plausible mechanism for this to work on type 2"
A few years ago the same thing could have been said about type 1.
A few years ago the same thing could have been said about type 1.
I don't think so. It is widely accepted that early stimulation of the immune system can head off autoimmune disorders, including Type 1 diabetes. The only thing new here is that the stimulation occurred when the patients were older.
But Type 2 is not an autoimmune disorder, so there is no known mechanism for stimulation of the immune system to have any effect, and no evidence that it does.
According to the poster above this was a very small sample group consisting only of type 1 patients.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
BCG is hard to find in the US. Vaccination with it will cause a person to have a positive PPD (tuberculosis test), and the rate of TB is low enough that public health policymakers would rather have a very accurate and simple test than vaccinate everyone. The only use for it in the US that I’m aware of is in treatment of bladder cancer.
Alright, you're trying to make this a dig about Republicans all being fat, and it's working, but you don't have to go that far for the punch line here. The truth is that this is about religious fanaticism more than party lines. The (+80% Christian) Republicans think type 1 diabetes is punishment from God, because you're born with it. That is why they care less about it than type 2.
Seems like it's possible to find at clinics which specialize in travel vaccines. (granted the research done was a couple of googles.)
You should avoid carbohydrates too. Cut them out of the diet completely for a good month or two in fact, then re-introduce them in very small measures. Bulk up on animal protein. Always grilled or broiled. Do not fry, boil, or bake. Green vegetables, but not the "leafy" ones; they are useless. Go for broccoli, asparagus and the like - and this is important - you must never microwave the vegetables.
That's been known for a while.
Europe does't put up with their crap, like the US does, so a lot of good basic research is getting done over there.
Which is why this study was done at the "Massachusetts General Hospital"?
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
I'm not sure if "stimulation" is the right word, being that Type 1 is an autoimmune disease. It almost seems like "suppressing" may be the correct term.
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
The sample size in the study (12 people, 9 getting the treatment, and 3 in the control group, and only 3 receiving the treatment were followed for the full duration)
Agreed, this sounds like a case study. I think Andrew Wakefield had a bigger sample size in his anti-vax trials, and we know how that turned out.
I'm Type 1, and I want this to work more than anybody. There's a lot of very smart people trying to find a cure, but at the end of the day it's a very complicated disease with multiple factors that could trigger it.
If you post as Anonymous Coward, don't expect a reply.
Over 100 years actually. Problem is no one has figured out "why" the immune system randomly gets up one day and decides to start destroying the pancreas of a 4 year old.
Om, nomnomnom...
Got some more quasi-religious nonsense to share?
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Found the moron in the discussion. The study that claimed that was for one specific vaccine, the primary author had an alternate vaccine coming out a few months later he claimed was better and his PhD was by now removed because the study was completely fraudulent. Look it up. No, vaccines do not cause autism.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Native tribes and gypsies are not known for excessive cleanliness. So the germophobia link is likely pure BS.
The Native Americans get Type 2. The lack of germs causes Type 1.
It's probably under patent any longer.
Big Pharma is hard at work on new, patentable therapies for diabetes.
His doctor probably wants to sell him the meds. Diabetes 2 is big biz right now for big pharma.
and this is important - you must never microwave the vegetables.
Oooo wah woo.
Do I need to keep my veggies away from my cellphone and wifi router, too?
The native tribes part was for diabetes type 2 which is likely NOT an autoimmune disorder. The idea is that many autoimmune disorders happen when parts of the immune systems that were evolved to target once common germs and parasites never encounter their true target and then target similar human proteins.
"Germ phobia" or "excessive cleanliness" is not such a good description, e.g:: even without any focus on cleanliness, nearly everyone in developed countries will only drink clean water free of worms and similar parasites. They used to be very common, however.
Jan
You rely on health and nutrition information from InfoWars? Seriously?
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Since getting those injections does no harm why not test responses tor type 2 diabetes?
If you think that an opioid antagonist is going to have an effect on a dopamine agonist, maybe you should go retake some of your med school classes?
I don't trust atoms -- they make up stuff.
No, that's ridiculous. Just make sure your veggies use WPA2. And for God's sake, don't leave the default password in use, on your broccoli, especially.
I don't trust atoms -- they make up stuff.
Not that this has anything whatsoever to do with diabetes, but they're the ones who begged for $1800 to finance a press release informing the Iranian authorities that apartment building fires are actually caused by explosives. Please look elsewhere for rubes to fleece. Thanks!
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Instructions unclear, have just given my bank details to a Nigerian cauliflower mogul who needs to move his assets out the country.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
I'll try and identify a few of them.
First up: define what a Type 1 diabetic is.
We had this come up some weeks back, when some Scandinavian doctors came up with the conclusion that the several thousand diabetics they studied did not fall neatly into 2 groups ie. Type 1 & 2. Instead they identified some half a dozen groups.
I angrily posted about this at the time because this was known over 20 years ago. What was worse is that I (a diabetic who needs insulin) wasn't covered in their groupings and neither was somebody with gestational diabetes or ....etc.
There's also the problem of what an American doctor diagnoses as a "Type 1" might be somewhat different to what a British or Japanese or Ugandan doctor does. It may even subtly vary among the doctors in just one hospital.
Treatment regimens will vary also: human or analog insulin? Which analog? Short acting, long acting, mix? Pump, pen, syringe? Which pump running what software?
The authors of this paper obviously start with the assumption that all the "Type 1 diabetics" they studied were as a result of this mysterious auto-immune disease, a disease whose pathology or very existence is entirely unclear.
They say in the paper that their cohort had all been diagnosed as "Type 1" as if it's a choice between black or white. It's not, because that term is undefined and in clinical practice covers a significant spectrum of people.
The Machine stops.
This is exactly why we still don't have any way to prevent smallpox or polio—there's entirely too much profit in waiting to treat those diseases after they occur!
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Or maybe scientists and researchers should have some ethics to make sure their studies are valid and repeatable before pushing claims?
Scientists don't publish claims, they publish results. The media publishes claims.
"BCG is pretty much useless for TB, but they still give it out to everyone in the philippines."
So Type 1 diabetes is pretty much unknown in the Philippines?
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
"Would this work for type 2?"
Quien Sabe? The study was done on a VERY small number of type 1 diabetics. Frankly, while I think it's worth following up, I'm quite skeptical that the study really shows anything meaningful.
1. The sample size is very small
2. There are surely a large number of probably poorly controlled variables (diet, exercise, other medications, lifestyle changes, etc,etc,etc) Is every aspect of YOUR life that might affect blood glucose levels unchanged over the past five years?
3. "They" have only the haziest idea of underlying mechanisms.
It'll be nice if this works out, but I wouldn't get my hopes up.
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
They do and did. The real work is being done by Dr. Faustmann's lab at Mass. General Hospital, and I've been keeping an eye on it. It also requires tight blood sugar control for the month of the treatment, which is why at first other laboratories could not reproduce the results in lab animals. Tight blood sugar control for Type 1 diabetics requires many blood glucose tests and careful diet, schedule, etc. And it costs a lot more in personnel to do the animal care and the blood glucose test strips are $1/each, it really raises the cost of the lab animals. So other labs failed to replicate the work until they did a "laying on of hands", sending personnel from Dr. Faustmann's lab to other groups to see what the issue might be. This is startlingly common in research and science: unstated, implicit components, such as the frequency of blood glucose testing and quality of lab animal care, are not automatically spelled out in even a good scientific paper.
There was a similar, not so well documented and published study at University of West Virginia more than 20 years ago. I was never able to find what the chemical treatment was, only that they had encouraging lab animal results. Eli Lilly took, owner of insulin production around the world, over their funding: as best I can tell, they've never published anything useful again. Don't know if the approach failed, or the manufacturers of insulin helped poison the research to protect a market. Mass. General Hospital, fortunately, is big enough and has enough political pull and political savvy to avoid that trick.
If this works, and works well, but gets held up by at the FDA for decades more of human testing, I expect medical tourism to India, or even Cuba, to balloon with Type 1 diabetics like me taking badly needed month long vacations for a cure. A month or so of complete dietary control, daily exercise at the beach or the gym, and very attentive diabetic treatment to keep things right during the cure are *much* cheaper than a year of Type 1 diabetic supplies. With 6 test strips daily at $1/each, Humalog short-acting insulin at $25/day, insulin pump or insulin pump supplies adding a few more bucks a day, $2000/month is pretty reasonable for us Type 1 diabetics even if we're stable.
I'd do it in a *heartbeat* once I have a sense of the doses. The trick for me would be keeping tight blood sugar for the whole month, especially avoiding hypoglycemia as my insulin production improves and I'm still using an insulin pump. That's tricky, like any general lifestyle change for us Type 1 diabetics.
Type 2 responds quite well to intermittent fasting.
>Type 2 responds quite well to intermittent fasting.
20/4 here. My experience matches this. I haven't had any appreciable weight loss, but my doctor is happier with my lab results. (Though candidly I do miss my morning McDonald's sausage biscuit with cheese.)
Part of me wonders if this isn't an artifact of the tests though. Triglyceride testing specifically is extremely sensitive to fasting.
Unfortunately it's not helping my knees. They are suffering accelerated wear due to excessive loading.
Maybe combine it with low carb or keto. That's what I did. I only lost 10 kg in 2 months but I was only slightly overweight to begin with. My insulin resistance has vanished and I can eat stuff like bread again but I won't go back to dinners with a ton of rice or spuds with something to color it a bit. Not gaining any weight back so far.
I've worked in US communities with a very high concentration of Philippino immigrants and their recent offspring. My anecdotal observation of Type I diabetes rates in this community is that it's markedly lower than what I'm used to seeing in areas of the US with predominantly European genetic stock. World health statistics also show that the Philippines has significantly lower rates of diabetes than the US.
"No, no, no. Don't tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to."
When I was a kid in the UK in the '60s I was vaccinated with BCG. TB was still common enough then, that even though I lived in a 'well-to-do' town, you'd see these large white vans parked up on occasion which contained an X-ray machine. The idea was to X-ray people's chests and look for TB lesions. I last saw one of those vans in the mid-70s.
TB is still diagnosed over here but mainly in immigrants from 3rd world countries. I've no idea if kids still routinely get BCG (it used to be done at school).
The Machine stops.
naltrexone also blocks certain endorphines
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Does Bayes play here? https://www.google.com/search?... I don't have access to PubMed but others here might. Would those May 2017 research articles suggest the area of research around treatment that is now publishing?
InfoWars stole this information from ME.
The patent protections on the old insulin ran out. Lilly Pharmaceuticals can't have you using that *old* insulin that they don't have a patent on.
It's similar to (offtopic warning) the way that Freon formulations are determined to be 'bad for the environment' after DuPont's patent runs out on them. Then a new Freon type * needs to be used and your refrigeration equipment updated or scrapped.
(*that DuPont happens to have a patent on)
according to a 2000 study.
Does this mean this study was done in 2000?
Or, is the data from this study compared to a different study in 2000?
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
type-2 is truly a lifestyle choice.
Speak for yourself.
I'm a disabled veteran. I don't eat poorly, but I can't exercise very well (or hardly walk) because of the injuries that caused my medical retirement. Type-2 diabetes is also caused by corticosteroids - right now I'm in the middle of working to get my Type-2 diabetes connected as a secondary condition to one of my service connected disabilities, because I didn't have Type 2 diabetes before having to get massive steroid injections and prednisone treatments.
There *are* a lot of fat fucks that could lose their diabetes if they would put away the cookies and get on the treadmill - but there are OTHER causes too.
When I was a toddler in the 1960s, my granny died of TB. Unsurprisingly, when I got my TB test in the 1970s, I was positive - I'd been exposed to the bacterium enough that my immune system had a response to a challenge dose. So I didn't get BCG'd, because I was already immune. Since then I've worked in TB clinics (test on joining, test on leaving) and I've had three call backs to be re-tested because someone at my workspace has come back from working abroad and then developed TB (XDR, fatal in one case if the grapevine is correct).
TB is expected to become endemic again in the UK in the near future as drug resistance spreads. It certainly remains a quite common diagnosis. If they've stopped vaccinating schoolkids, then that's a false economy. My immunisations passport remains up to date.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
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