BACON FOREVER!

Linda would not approve of this blog

WHO do they think they are, messing with the best meal of the day??? I refer, of course, to the World Health Organization,  Unless you were climbing in the Patagonian Andes or bushwhacking through Borneo in search of hallucinogenic plants, you will have heard that WHO has just classified processed meats – and that includes bacon – as a carcinogen, thus lumping it with smoking, alcohol excess, and sniffing asbestos powder.  I heard this pronouncement  on two news broadcasts last night,  It was front-page on the highly influential Bellingham Herald this morning.  All this upset me so much that I went out for breakfast (my usual: biscuits and gravy, bacon and eggs).  On the way to the restaurant I punched the radio button – and there was Rush Limbaugh, weighing in.  (He thinks it is a liberal scam, like global warming, evolution and the existence of poverty.)  So what is an elderly carnivore to do?

Well, first of all, look at the fine print.  WHO tells me that eating plentiful amounts of processed meats (in my case, almost entirely bacon) will increase my lifetime probability of getting colorectal cancer by 18%.  Scary, no?  However – according to official health statistics the lifetime chance of dieing from this type of cancer is about 15 in 100,000 (or was, in 2012), which figures out to about 0.015%.  18% of that is a very small number: according to these statistics, eating bacon in profusion raises your risk of death from colorectal cancer to a whopping 0.018%.  I can’t speak for you, but at 82 I will damned well take my chances.

I guess it boils down to this question: do you want to live a long life eating oatmeal and yogurt, or would you prefer a  (perhaps) slightly shorter life eating bacon and eggs?

In passing, I read somewhere lately about an interview with the current oldest person in the world – about 116, I think.  She states that she has bacon and eggs every day.



QUILT FOR A CURE

Linda at Mt. St. Helens

Did you know that there is a Glasgow in Kentucky?  Well, neither did I.  When I saw this article on Google Alerts I thought it was the big Scottish city, where you need a translator to get around.  But it turns out to be a place in Kentucky, where you can probably get along with West Coast English.

It seems that the ladies of Glasgow make quilts and auction them off to support ovarian cancer research.  Linda was an avid and skillful quilter, and I am sure she would have thrown herself headlong into quilting for cancer research.  Most quilters are women, and perhaps the most deadly form of cancer for women is ovarian.  I would like to suggest that quilt guilds everywhere consider doing as the Glasgow (KY) women do: make quilts, have a show, then an auction.  I know I would damned certainly buy one.  If you belong to a quilt guild, why not bring up the idea?

http://www.glasgowdailytimes.com/news/pattern-of-support-homemakers-to-auction-quilts-for-cancer-research/article_5aa90420-79cc-11e5-b504-3f917c2aaf83.html

May I also suggest that the money raised be donated to the Marsha Rivkin Center for Ovarian Cancer Research, at Swedish Hospital in Seattle?  I have written about them before; they are the whetstone that sharpens the cutting edge of OVCA research.  (Sorry, my gene for enhancing bad writing seems to have gotten out of control.)  They are at:

http://www.marsharivkin.org/

 

 



IN-VITRO FERTILIZATION AND OVARIAN CANCER

Linda in Borrego Springs

No, wait.  This must be England

As most of you know, I use “Google Alerts” to help me keep up with developments in the ovarian cancer field.  Google Alerts isn’t very selective; it will feature a lurid apocalyptic article in a British tabloid  sandwiched between news from sources that are so sober and serious as to be the next best thing to an academic journal.  Of course, I ignore the splashy stuff (and puzzle over the rest).  Well, between October 20 and 23 there occurred a flurry of articles concerning a correlation between IVF (in vitro fertilization) and the probability of contracting ovarian cancer.  In a substantial British study, women who underwent IVF were about one third more likely to contract OVCA than women who did not.  The researchers hasten to say that the fault lies not with the IVF procedure itself, but rather the need for it.  In other words, some molecular mistake contributes both to infertility and ovarian-cancer susceptibility.  They are now searching for the causative link.  Good, fundamental biology, I guess.  Nine articles on this same subject were noted in three days.  Here is the most informative:

http://www.foodworldnews.com/articles/45755/20151021/can-infertility-point-to-ovarian-cancer-risk.htm

It should be pointed out that several of these articles note that this (British) result contradicts the findings of a much larger study performed recently in Sweden,  I consider this kind of thing  major drag.

And, if you have begun to think that cancer researchers all are meticulous, cautious and not given to premature enthusiasm, read this:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-10/uosc-boc101915.php

It appears that there is evidence that having a BRCA1 mutation enhances the ability to smell, in addition to increasing the probability of contracting breast and/or ovarian cancer.  This is the conclusion of a murine experiment.  (Murine means mouse.)  The statistics can’t be too griping, however: the whole damned thing had an N of 4!



LETS KICK BIG PHARMA A FEW MORE TIMES

Linda had a good time in London

For those of you who need to raise your blood pressure to lethal levels every so often in order to stay awake, here is another article on drug pricing and Big Pharma that should do the trick.  There are some deliberate misrepresentations here (see below), but by and large the thing rings true.  Market forces aren’t designed to deal with a situation like this, and our politicized regulatory system is not making things much better.  We need a  re-think, and soon.  But, as FaceBookers seem to like to say: LOL.

Where this article asks us to stretch our credulity a bit too far concerns the implication that academic institutions develop drugs with public funding and that Big Pharma just manufactures and delivers.  In reality – insofar as I understand reality – many drugs are developed by the drug companies as part of self-supported basic research, and academic labs normally provide “proof of efficacy” studies only – that is, they demonstrate that some bio-molecule they have found may do the trick, whatever that trick is supposed to be.  And then, as often as not, these dedicated academics form a company, patent the molecule, and promptly sell out to – you guessed it – Big Pharma.  How do you think Porsche stays in business? 

So I believe the statements that new drugs may cost several billions of dollars to bring to market.  Part of this is the ponderous, sloth-like mechanism for gaining FDA approval.  But, yes, my blood pressure does rise to dangerous levels when I learn that more is spent on advertising than R & D, and that profit margins can be as high as 20 to 30%.

  Ask yourself: what would Bernie do?

http://theweek.com/articles/583337/brief-guide-big-pharma



I LEARN SOMETHING - AND TEACH IT TO YOU

Linda in the Tower

(of London, that is)

 

Well, you learn stuff all the time.  For instance, today I learned that I have (actually, had) the only dental bridge in existence (in my mouth, of course) that has ever needed to be replaced because it has broken in half.  This little piece of knowledge will cost me $2492 – surely worth every penny.

I also learned something about cancer, or – more specifically – the mutations that cause them.  There is an article attributed to The Atlantic, introduced by a picture of Angelina Jolie, about new research involving the breast (and ovarian) cancer gene BRCA1.  Naively, I thought of a BRCA mutation in terms of all-or- nothing; the protein coded for by the gene works when the gene is whole, and doesn’t when it’s not.  Seems it is much more complicated than that.  BRCA is a whopping big gene, and it can mutate (get damaged) in lots of places.  Each of these qualifies as a mutation, but not all of them are dangerous.  They are called “variants of unknown significance” (VUS).  Thus, if you sequence a woman’s genes you may find a BRCA mutation – but you don’t know what it might or might not do.  So far about 350 VUSs are known – and the task of sorting them out is just beginning.  Heading the work is a researcher from the University of Washington, one Dr. Lea Sarita.  She has a long row ahead to hoe.

And, for those of you who like to boil your blood once in a while, there is a bit in this article about Myriad Genetics, the outfit that first developed the BRCA test – and is trying to patent it.  I am a confirmed capitalist and would never deny a company that has done good work a legitimate profit, but this seems to (even) me to be going too far.  Apparently they are sitting on a valuable data base about VUSs and have not shared them with the scientific community.  Sic Bernie Sanders on ‘em!

Here is the article:  http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/10/filling-in-the-unknown-unknowns-of-cancer-genetic-testing/409828/

 

 



SCIENCE OVER LUNCH

Mock Gothic ruin, Somewhere upon Thames

What was she doing back there?

 

Sorry for posting two days in a row, but I have just returned from an “event” and am filled with enthusiasm.  The event was Science over Lunch, sponsored by Fred Hutch, and the science was provided by Dr. Johnnie Orozco, who seems to be both a practicing oncologist (at the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance) and a member of one or more research teams (at the Hutch).  He is an energetic young man, obviously enthusiastic and capable; he and his team are doing cutting-edge investigations in the area of targeted therapy.  It warms my heart to be reminded, as I often am, that so much talent, energy (and money) are being applied to the fight against cancer.  I’d give you his email if I could find it, but I can’t.  That’s probably for the best; I don’t want him wasting time answering emails when he could be working on just the perfect nanoparticle to blast epithelial ovarian cancer to hell.  Anyway: thank you, Dr. Orozco, for an illuminating talk and for all your efforts on the front line.



TO BLINDSIDE CANCER

Proof that Monkey Puzzle trees are hardy

This was taken in Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands

Yes, I still have plenty of Linda pictures, but I want to slip others in from time to time.

Here is a basic primer on the genetics of breast and ovarian cancer.  Most of you won’t need it, but you might want to recommend it to your friends.

http://www.good4utah.com/news/local-news/expert-explains-the-genetics-of-breast-cancer

Having nothing much to do these days, I find myself watching more and more NFL football.  I feel ashamed of this sometimes; watching all those young millionaires bashing out their brains for the amusement of a bunch of atavistic savages (us) surely must be deplorable.  Two centuries ago we enjoyed watching bears and bulls kill each other; or dogs; or roosters.  Now it’s humans.  Well, at least they (the millionaires - not the dogs or roosters) live it up for a while.

But why I brought this up is this.  It seems as though the NFL has ordered all their gladiatorial bands to wear pink during their battles, in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, which is October.  September is usually Ovarian Cancer Awareness Month, and NFL games are played then, too.  Do you think that if we all wrote Roger Goodell and asked him for teal* next September, it would work?  Probably not, but I suggest we give it a try.  Maybe somebody can figure out how to contact him electronically,

Breast cancer is far more prevalent than ovarian cancer: in 2012, for instance, about 130 women per 100,000 contracted breast cancer, whereas 12 were diagnosed with ovarian cancer.  However, in terms of the seriousness of the diagnosis the picture is much less one sided:  21 0f 100,000 died of breast cancer that year, compared to 7.5 of ovarian cancer. 

So let’s put teal on the Pittsburg Steelers defensive line and see if they can blindside both cancers next year.

*You did know that teal is the OVC color, right?

You can contact the NFL this way:
http://www.nfl.com/contact-us



ELEPHANTS AND CANCER

Church somewhere along the Thames

Left to right: Derek, irascible captain of our river boat; our two fellow passengers (names long since forgotten); Linda

 

Wow!  Daughter Kristen has alerted me to a fascinating article about elephants and cancer.  It seems that elephants rarely get cancer, at least when compared with humans, even though they have far more cells in which mutations can accumulate.  My simple-minded understanding is that mutations can occur spontaneously and randomly, even in the absence of what sophisticated people seem to want to call “mutagens”.  (Yes, I know that elephants don’t smoke, but they don’t use sun block, either.)  If the “right” kinds of mutations accumulate, cancer will develop.  Thus it should follow that elephants, having vastly more cells than even the largest humans (even the defensive line of the Green Bay Packers), they should get more cancer.  But they don’t.

Well, it turns out that evolution or some higher power has provided them with protection.  There is a gene, p53 by name, which codes for a protein which acts as a tumor suppressor; that is, it functions as a brake on uncontrolled cellular division.  As you know, uncontrolled cellular division is one way to describe cancer.  We humans have two copies of the p53 gene; elephants have very many more.  Thus, if one or two of our genes gets screwed up we are potentially in hot water, whereas the elephant has many to spare.  Great, simple story.  I hope I understand it.

So, doesn’t that suggest a way to grapple effectively with a whole range of cancers?  We can splice stuff into genomes; half the food we eat has been modified in that way (I know you didn’t want to hear that.  Get over it.)  So why can’t we simply splice extra copies of the p53 gene into the germline of everybody?   Of course, that would take more money than exists in the visible universe, but it is a thought.  I may have the biology totally screwed up here, too, and if I do I hope somebody will set me straight.

The Seahawks lost today - but they were wearing pink.  Maybe breast cancer lost, too.



HOW DNA SURVIVES

Linda at San Simeon

The latest Nobel Prize for chemistry has gone to three guys who  made fundamental contributions to the biology of DNA – specifically, how it manages to survive in the real world.  As diligent readers of this blog you already know that a considerable amount of energy is being and has been expended in figuring out how to inhibit DNA repair (and thus hasten death) in cancer cells.  Well, these three lucky, diligent and super-smart gentlemen have helped lay the foundation for this research.  Here I a short, readable NY Times article on the subject.  Read it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/08/science/tomas-lindahl-paul-modrich-aziz-sancarn-nobel-chemistry.html?ref=health&_r=0

 God bless these guys, and I hope they enjoy their $320,000.

 

 



DO NOT READ THIS BOOK...unless

Granddaughter Angie contends with the horse from hell

Do not read this book unless you are an obsessed biochemical hotdog, a masochist, or an insomniac. 

The book is Life’ Greatest Secret by Dr. Matthew Cobb, described as a professor of zoology and history of science at the University of Manchester.  I, of course, am indisputably obsessed with this stuff; I read everything that comes along.  I read Dr. Cobb’s book faithfully, from cover to cover, and benefitted thereby.  However, if I had not been so obsessed it would have been painful to plod through at least the opening 2/3 of the book (I will explain why), and I could have managed to do so only if I had a deep-seated self-loathing.

But one thing is certain: for anyone, the first sections of Dr. Cobb’s book  provide an unfailing, fast-acting remedy for insomnia.

I should add that the assessment above does not apply to what must have been Dr. Cobb’s target audience; the several dozen molecular geneticists in the world who also happen to be interested in the history and philosophy of science.  I wonder why he didn’t simply write them a letter.

Okay, so now let’s stop flinging mud at the poor guy and get down to business.

The book is 314 pages long.  The first 218 constitute a methodically detailed chronology of developments in genetics until the end of the 1960s.  At times it seems to be little more than a record of papers presented at various conferences, with some discussion of their significance.  Additionally, there lurks everywhere throughout this section the sense that it is necessary to refute the notion that cybernetics and information theory are vital to understanding what was going on.  Cobb thinks not, and I agree – but, anyway, who in heck cares how many bits of information may or may not be contained in a stretch of DNA?  All we should care about is what the damned stuff codes for, and what that means for human beings.  In this section we learn such vital stuff as how to pronounce the names Gamow and Rosalind.  Well, I didn’t know, so thanks, Matt.

This same material is covered more accessibly by Horace Judson’s book The Eighth Day of Creation.

Then suddenly, on p. 219, the machine drops into 4-wheel drive and new, interesting material appears.  Gene splicing, epigenetics, retroviruses, transposons, the nature of “junk” DNA, CRISPR, lots of topical stuff, much of it explained very well.  Is this the same guy, I ask.  This part – most of it, anyway – is not the least soporific; in fact, it kept me awake past my bedtime.  I should remark that you probably won’t get much out of this section unless you are at least at my level of biochemical sophistication, which Lord knows is saying very little.  But if you don’t know what mRNA, tRNA or codons (similar creatures) are you will have a hard time.

So, sorry to be so hard on you, Matt.  You should have written 314 pages on the last third of the book.

I want to close with a quotation, from p. 312.  It seems to me to capsulize much of what is wrong with the current phase of our War on Cancer:

“The increasingly tight budgets of funding organizations encourage large teams by promoting multidisciplinarity and often require the probable outcomes to be clear before the experiments have begun.  It seems unlikely that the small, curiosity-driven teams that led to the cracking of the genetic code would survive in today’s climate.”



WHY I WRITE THESE THINGS

Springtime in Borrego

Probably 2009

From time to time I get a little bummed out about this blog.  I love doing it, that’s the bottom line.  However, I am sometimes skeptical of its value.  Is anybody really reading these carefully crafted  meticulously researched little gems?  (Well, it usually takes me at least an hour to put one together, including the time needed to dig up the facts.)  I’m not sure.  If I leave an entry on Blogger without inflicting it on Facebook I can expect to get 20-40 hits – in six months or so.  Many of these are from places like Ukraine or Moldova, and are vanishingly unlikely to represent real human beings.  If I put it on Facebook I can look forward to 20-40 hits in a month or so – most on the first day.  Also, I get up to perhaps ten “likes”; usually far fewer.  Hell, I could get ten “likes” by posting a picture of a dead spider!  The evidence, as they say about global warming, is inescapable: “Myrl’sBlog” is not a big hit, in the usual sense of the term.  So why do I keep on blogging?  Here’s why.  (It just came to me this morning.)

When Linda was diagnosed with epithelial ovarian cancer, I literally had almost no idea of what that meant.  Rolled back on my heels, I perforce accepted the oncologist’s assessment without means of eliciting important information.  Of course, I knew that ovarian cancer was cancer of the ovaries.  Here is a partial list of things I didn’t know, but should have learned.

What stage was she in?

What is the prognosis?

What does the epithelial part mean?

Are there clinical trials she could benefit from?

Are there novel treatment protocols permeating the practice?

Who is the best damned OVCA oncologist in the known universe?

And so forth.  It wouldn’t have been necessary, or even very useful, to spout stuff about PARP inhibitors, targeted therapies, immune system manipulation, etc., etc. – heck, the oncologist I was talking to probably had no time to follow up such esoteric stuff.  But he could have answered several of those questions, and told me where to look for answers to the rest.  I simply didn’t know what to ask.

So here is why I think this blog remains useful.  I AM TELLING YOU WHAT TO ASK!  You can search my list of (over 360) blogs for things like “clinical trials”, or “targeted therapies”, or “types of ovarian cancer”, and you will find basic information and clues as to where to learn more.  Then if, God forbid, you need to ask the questions I couldn't' ask – you will know what to say.  A particularly important blog in this regard is the following:

http://ljb-quiltcutie.blogspot.com/2014/07/clinical-trials-and-how-to-find-them.html

I wish to hell there had been a Myrl’sBlog in 2007, and I had been reading it.  And that is why I will keep on writing this thing.



MORE ON HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY

Linda's quilted parrot

Just an artistic doodle while she planned her next blockbuster

 

Those of you who actually READ these things certainly are aware that hormone replacement therapy is a contributing factor to ovarian cancer and  should be avoided if possible.  Now, however, there appears  a new study that seems to indicate that HRT is okay, and possibly even slightly beneficial, if you already HAVE epithelial ovarian cancer (the most common kind).  HRT in such instances is not a cure, but it may buy a significant amount of precious time.  Apparently it is early days in this research topic, but results to date are encouraging.  The article itself is a downer.  Here it is:

http://www.webmd.com/ovarian-cancer/news/20150929/hrt-ovarian-cancer-women