Coke
Prevents Cancer
All you Coca-Cola fans calm
down. The coke referred to here is cocaine, as in the drug often used in
notorious dance club Studio 54 in the late 1970’s. This study looked at 163
patients diagnosed with testicular germ cell tumors (TGCT) and 292 patients
without TGCT as a control (Lacson et al. 2012). TGCT will see 8590 new cases of testicular cancer in
2012 according to the American Cancer Society (American Cancer Society.: Cancer Facts and Figures 2012). The authors in this study wanted
to see if this form of cancer had any ties to recreational drugs. As we know
from genetics, when testing for environmental influences on a disease or
condition (such as exposure to recreational drugs), you perform an odds ratio,
which compares incidence to exposure remember this table (Franco 2012)?
Participants were interviewed
about their drug use habits and then Odds Ratios were calculated for exposure
to marijuana, cocaine, and amyl nitrate (Poppers). The results are pretty
interesting. Remember, an odds ratio of 1 means there is no association between
exposure and the condition. An odds ratio of less than 1 means the data shows a
negative correlation, or that exposure decreases ones chance of getting the
disease.
For those that ever used
cocaine, the odds ratio for developing testicular cancer was 0.54 (with a 95%
confidence interval). What? Yes, the data seemed to show that exposure to
cocaine actually decreased ones chances of developing TGCT. Here is the kicker especially for Colorado; the odds ratio for TGCT in those who smoked marijuana
was 1.94 (95% confidence interval). According to this data, marijuana users are
94% more likely to develop testicular cancer than non-users.
Now, before all you crazy
graduate students that could develop testicular cancer go out and buy cocaine,
note this; IT IS ILLEGAL, so don’t. Secondly, the authors suspect that the
decreased odds of developing TGCT is because cocaine use may actually be
killing the germ cells, thus, there are less cells that could potentially
develop cancer. If you don’t have the germ cells, you are less likely to get
germ cell cancer.
References:
Lacson JA, Carroll JD, Tuazon E, Castelao EJ, Bernstein L, Cortessis VK (2012).
Population-based case-control study of recreational drug use and testis cancer
risk confirms an association between marijuana use and nonseminoma risk.
Cancer, 118(21), 5374-5383. doi:10.1002/cncr.27554
American Cancer Society.: Cancer Facts and Figures 2012. Atlanta, Ga: American
Cancer Society, 2012. http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/content/@epidemiologysurveilance/documents/document/acspc-031941.pdf
Franco, MD. 2012.Genetics of Common Disorders with
Complex Inheritance. Lecture, Fall 2012. Regis University Department of Biology
Who knew that illegal narcotics could have beneficial health impacts! I looked around for a potential mechanism for how cocaine was preventing cancer and found a cool mouse study. This study found that in mice, cocaine had to main effects on cell morphology and function. They determined that chronic use of cocaine caused a shift in the membrane potential of the mitochondria as well as inhibiting cell cycle progression (Badisa et al., 2010). The only problem with that study was it was specifically looking at glial cells rather than germ cells. Maybe the cocaine is acting the same way in both types of cell.
ReplyDeleteReferences:
Badisa, R.B., Darling-Reed, S.F., Goodman, C.B. (2010). Cocaine Induces Alterations in Mitochondrial Membrane Potential and Dual Cell Cycle Arrest in Rat C6 Astroglioma Cells. Neurochemical Research 35(2): 288–297.
I did a little more research into the cancer/cocaine connection and found a study from Dec. 1997 in the British Journal of Medicine that concluded that men who use cocaine are twice as likely as abstainers to develop intermediate- or high-grade non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL). So, there may definitely be a trade-off of NHL for testicular cancer, which I consider to be similar beasts.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the major problem with these sorts of case-control studies is that they only can indicate correlation, not causation. Perhaps cocaine users are so wrapped-up in their addition that they aren't exposed to other risk factors associated with the development of testicular cancer, such as diet? If so, that would largely discredit the statement the conclusion that coke may be preventing cancer.
Overall, I find these results very surprising because HIV rates are higher in IV drug users, and HIV is a known risk factor for the development of testicular cancer as well...
References:
R. A. Nelson, A. M. Levine, G. Marks, and L. Bernstein.(1997). Alcohol, tobacco and recreational drug use and the risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Br J Cancer. 1997; 76(11): 1532–1537.
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ReplyDeleteyou know what's even crazier? or just as CRAZY I should say...the use of MDMA analogues in the treatment of blood cancers. MDMA also known as ecstasy.
ReplyDeleteAccording to Hog et al,: "based on MDMA’s ability to kill Burkitt’s lymphoma cells, by stimulating serotonin release that stimulate the pro apoptotic BCL-2 proteins so the Burkitt’s lymphoma cells goes into apoptosis."
Crazy right? all these "recreational" drugs that are known as horrible and can destroy a person can be used to kill cancer cells and potentially cure some rather nasty cancers!
I think that shows that we don't know as much as we think we do about alot of chemicals and thier affects. It's amazing to see how these drugs can be manipulated to be used for the advancement of cures.
Who would have thought cocaine and ecstasy...crazy!
reference:
Hog, K., Antar, Z., Megens, N., Sonderholm, N., Jensen, T.A. (2012). Can MDMA analogues be used in blood cancer treatment? Roskilde University Digital Archive.
Retrieve from:http://rudar.ruc.dk/handle/1800/7120