This article is about how Hydrazine sulphate interferes with the cancer cell - glycolysis - liver - glucose downward spiral which can lead to cachexia, weight loss and death in cancer patients, and covers the potential and research on how the compound might be an alternative cancer treatment; especially as it seems to help make chemotherapy more effective, with no side-effects.
Hydrazine Sulphate and cachexia
In the late 1960s, a Dr. Joseph Gold had a flash of lateral thought. Instead of tackling the cancer cells, why not tackle the ultimate cause of death in many cancer patients having chemotherapy, namely cachexia? Estimates vary, but Gold concluded as many as three quarters of patients on chemotherapy may actually die from cachexia (debilitation and weight loss) rather then the actual cancer. (Note: UK estimates vary between 7 and 40 per cent suffer from cachexia during chemotherapy).
Why not tackle the ultimate cause of death in cancer patients having chemotherapy - cachexia?
Cachexia is a serious concern in patients having chemotherapy. It's why nurses in UK Hospitals, backed by NHS leaflets insist on trying to force feed cancer patients with poor diet information involving cheeseburgers, milk shakes, milky sugary tea and chocolate cake. They don't know their research.
In 2012, researchers from the San Giovanni Battista Hospital in Turin (see Cancer Watch), showed that fish oils could improve appetite and reduce the risk of cachexia. Boston College Biology Professor Thomas Seyfried also talks about the power of fish oils in his studies on the metabolism of cancer cells, fasting and the Ketogenic diet as a helpful part of cancer treatment.
Gold noted that cancer cells are different. Their biochemisty has little in common with healthy cells and we have known this since Warburg's time when he won a Nobel Prize (1931) on cancer metabolism. Unlike normal healthy cells that produce their energy in the mitochondria, or power stations, using oxygen, cancer cells use a fermentation process - as found in common yeasts - to burn glucose in the absence of oxygen and inside the cytoplasm of the cell in a simpler but far less efficient prodess called glycolysis.
The waste product from the cancer cell is very specific: A form of lactic acid, rather like the chemical that causes cramp in athletes. Lactic acid is obviously harmful to the body and so passes to the liver where it is broken down. A by-product of this process is ......... glucose!
They are really rather clever, these cancer cells. They take over the host and use its own systems to generate their food supply, just as a parasite might do. Because the cancer cell’s energy process is much less efficient than that of a healthy cell, it needs lots of glucose to develop. Stores of glucose in the body will be drained and, coupled with certain damaging effects of chemotherapy, this can produce debilitation and weight loss in the patient..
Gold proposed hydrazine sulphate (HS) as this anti-debilitating agent simply because it is known to inhibit the gluconeogenic enzyme at the heart of the problem.
Hydrazine sulphate seemed also to amplify the effect of the chemotherapy yet appeared to have no side-effects
He then argued that if the tumour energy gain and the host energy loss (resulting from the cancer-induced, excessive gluconeogenesis) were actually interlinked, hydrazine sulphate could probably break the downward spiral and prevent the parasite cancer cell being continually fed its favourite food.
Using rats and mice for his first experiments, he showed that the above hypothesis was true. Without direct cytotoxicity, hydrazine sulphate seemed to prevent body weight loss, with an added benefit - it amplified the effect of the chemotherapy. The chemical also appeared to have no side-effects of its own.
Russian research on Hydrazine Sulphate
Gold’s theory was popularised in the mid- to late-nineties. Here we reproduce what a number of journals and articles claimed at the time:
On 8 March 1976 congressman James Hanley requested a progress report on Hydrazine Sulphate (hydrazine sulfate in the USA) from the National Cancer Institute. They provided an answer saying that clinical trials had taken place in Russia (Dr Michael Gershanovich) and no evidence of effect had occurred. In fact a few days later the actual report emerged from Russia saying the opposite! "Clinical observations enabled us to state a definite effect of Hydrazine Sulphate in patients, when other measures failed" (Seits, Gershanovich et al Vopr Onkol 21, 45; 1975). Because of the positive findings, the Russians even enlarged the test!
Clinical Trials on Hydrazine sulphate
By 1975, a phase II clinical trial from Russia using ’factually terminal’ patients reported that 58 per cent demonstrated anti-cachexia response and 35 per cent anti-tumour response. The trial was then enlarged. A second pharmaceutical-sponsored study of 84 terminal patients produced responses of 59 per cent and 17 per cent respectively.
Clinical observations enabled us to state a definite effect of Hydrazine Sulphate in cancer patients, when other measures failed
By 1979 the Soviet study was enlarged to 225 patients, with 65 per cent and 44 per cent responses respectively. This was reported in March 1979 (Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research).
Critics rounded on the Russian research suggesting it had not been conducted properly, with inadequate controls and so on.
Fans of Hydrazine Sulphate then witnessed the US Authorities’ response, but claimed the first studies were nothing short of scandalous; with people recruited for trials dying within 11 days of the start, or no controls exerted over other drugs administered, often those which inhibit the action of HS. So still no one had a clue whether Hydrazine Sulphate was indeed helpful, or simply just quackery.
Finally in 1981, the American Cancer Society sponsored a double-blind, randomised, placebo controlled trial and by 1984 reported that in 38 patients with all manner of cancers, HS had shown activity. "Alteration of abnormal host metabolism could result in measurable clinical benefits, including weight improvement and stabilization" (Chlebowski, Heber, Richardson, Block, Cancer Research 33, 1984).
This breakthrough research should have put an end to the politics. It didn’t. And it still continues today. Gold, who stayed silent throughout, finally presented a personal review of it all - with an appendix of 78 peer group papers on the subject (The Truth About Hydrazine Sulphate: Dr Gold Speaks. www.hydrazinesulphate.org/). This 2004 paper is his first and only comment on it all.
Hydrazine sulphate Activity
Hydrazine Sulphate is a low cost chemical and this simple truth may account for much of the politics. However it can be contaminated and so has to be supplied by a reputable dealer.
Hydrazine Sulphate is a low cost chemical but has to be
supplied by a reputable dealer
HS is a monoamine oxidase inhibitor. It is incompatible with tranquilisers, barbiturates, alcohol and other central nervous system depressants. They can destroy its action. Also foods high in Tyramine, for example aged cheese or fermented products, are to be avoided.
Perhaps the most recent apparent ’scandal’ belonged to the NCI who reviewed the product in 1994 (Journal of Clinical Oncology) and said, basically, that it didn’t work. However they appear not to have been very strict in controlling the intake of the trial sample. A review of the trial, under direct orders from Congress, revealed that 94 per cent of the patients had taken benzodiazeprine or phenothiazine, 50 per cent on a long-term basis (Journal of Clinical Oncology, June 1995), thus wiping out the effect of the Hydrazine Sulfate!
Fans believe that in all of these Clinical Trials two studies stand out. The Russian study above, and a study which subsequently corroborated it by Harbor, UCLA (Filov, Gershannnovich et al, Invest. New Drugs 13, 89-97 1995). If this were replicated in real life in Britain we could expect of every 100,000 late stage cancer patients treated, perhaps 50,000 would show measurable symptom improvement and 40,000 actually some regression. If these results were true this is not something to hide or belittle? The problem is that the waters have been muddied; whether that is because all the research has been poorly prepared as sceptics will claim, or because Hydrazine Sulphate would be an inexpensive route to increase survival time at the expense of drugs, your guess is as good as mine!
Side Effects of hydrazine sulphate
Patients claim a more positive outlook on life
Few are reported; sometimes tiredness, a little dizziness, pins and needles and occasional nausea. Usually though the patients claim a more positive outlook on life.
Latest developments on hydrazine sulphate
The Russians are still using HS and claim great effect. In Russia HS is called Sehydrin, also the trade name in the Western World, and they have completed studies on all manner of cancers from lung to brain tumours (see http://scri.ngen.com).
I started looking into HS for my daughter who had a grade IV brain tumour. Of most relevance to her condition is a Russian study published in 1994. Patients with malignant brain tumours having chemotherapy and taking hydrazine sulphate apparently had symptom response of 61 per cent and partial regression of 71 per cent, quite incredible findings given the Lancet paper of February 2004, which basically says that no Western brain tumour chemotherapy drugs actually work!
Using Hydrazine Sulphate as a Cancer Treatment
Dosage usually starts low and builds to 180gms maximum. It is recommended that you work with a doctor at all times on the treatment programme - a doctor with experience of using hydrazine sulphate.
Remember: no barbiturates, sedatives, tranquilisers, alcohol, anti-depressants.
And avoid all cheese, all fermented products, smoked fish and meats, and even monosodium glutamate.
Is Hydrazine Sulphate Rocket fuel?
It should be noted that the National Cancer Institute has fervently denied all allegations against it.
Wikipedia reports that a 17 year old Clinical Trial at the Petrov Cancer Institute in St Petersburg, found only questionable evidence of performance (less than 1 per cent) and that the trial was improperly handled. Wikipedia also report that the trials at Harbor-UCLA Medical Centre were criticised by the Journal of Oncology.
Wikipedia also reports that, although Hydrazine Sulphate has only mild side-effects in the short term, it is in fact both toxic and carcinogenic.
Wikipedia notes that the use of Hydrazine Suplhate was popularised by Kathy Keaton, wife of Penthouse owner, Bob Guccione. Kathy had breast cancer. Three articles were produced in support of Hydrazine Sulphate before her death.
As readers may know, the independence of editorial content on Wikipedia is nowadays highly questionable. A variety of administrators and sub-editors block, rewrite and alter articles about complementary and alternative health matters. Accurate articles on both CANCERactive and Chris Woollams were taken down from Wikipedia after editorial challenge. This is sadly the nature of the world in which we live.
Cancer Research UK calls Hydrazine Sulophate, ’Rocket Fuel Treatment’, because of Hydrazine’s links to certain rocket fuels. They pose the question, from a mythical person ’I have heard about a cancer treatment made from rocket fuel. What is this and could it help me?’. Well, that should certainly scare everyone off!
CRUK describes the ’early’ Russian research as ’not randomised’, and the results ’doubted by doctors’. It then talks of 4 unspecified research studies where placebos were involved in the USA, dismissing three and saying the fourth showed some small increase in weight amongst patients.
Cancer Research UK states that it is a nutritional supplement, shows no effect as a cancer treatment, but may provide a small reduction in weight loss to patients on chemotherapy.
Readers should always consult a fully qualified medical professional before taking, or refraining from taking, any action.
Hydrazine Sulphate and anecdotal evidence
I hope we have shown Hydrazine Sulphate in a balanced way here. We don’t aim to endorse it, write in glowing terms, or promote it. We just think you need information - good and bad.
At the end of the day, cutting blood glucose levels is crucial to survival and there are plenty of ways you can do that - starting with diet and exercise.
Some London oncologists actually aim to cut blood sugar levels by giving their cancer patients the diabetes drug metformin.
Others do it through the use of herb ingredient Berberine.
Sugar control can be achieved through a healthy diet - you can always eat whole carbohydrates, soluble fibre, good fats (fish oils, Extra Virgin olive oil, coconut oil and flaxseed) and raw vegetables that contain good calorie levels; it's called the Rainbow Diet. You don’t have to eat chocolate cake and sticky buns.
Cachexia can mean that people actually die from the drugs they take. That is the fact that really has to be solved. Loading both cows’ dairy (with growth hormone) and glucose into the body, merely feeds the cancer your oncologist is trying to eradicate. Fact. There are several research studies covered in CANCERactive showing taking a daily fish oil reduces cachexia risks.
Go to: Understanding Cachexia
There is almost vehemance against Hydrazine Sulphate from the orthodox medical community, yet anecdotes abound that it can do a job. Here is one:
In 1987, Erna Kamen, a sixty-three-year-old lung cancer patient, was administered hydrazine sulfate after her discharge from a Sarasota, Florida, hospital. "Basically, my mother was sent home to die," says Jeff Kamen, an Emmy-winning television reporter. "She’d lost a significant amount of weight by then, and she had no appetite and virtually no will to do anything."
A doctor had told Jeff’s father, Ira Kamen, that hydrazine sulfate offered at least "a shot in the dark." So one Monday in August 1987, a home nurse gave Mrs. Kamen one hydrazine sulfate pill shortly before serving lunch. "On Tuesday morning," recalls Jeff, "there was a commotion in the house. My mother had risen from her bed like the phoenix rising from the ashes. She was demanding that the nurse bring her downstairs so that she could have breakfast with me.... When people you love get into this kind of facedown with death, you’re just incredibly grateful for each moment."
(Excerpted from Options: The Alternative Cancer Therapy Book ISBN: 0895295105)
Read more:
Fasting and Cancer CLICK HERE
The Ketogenic Diet and Cancer CLICK HERE