From Marcus This is an audio interview with Ray Peat from 2014. It's part of my effort to archive and augment Ray's complete works within this website, Ray Peat Rodeo. You can donate to the project on GitHub sponsors, cheers🥰.
Well thank you once again, this is Ask Your Herb Doctor. KMUD Garberville. 91.1 FM. My name’s Andrew Murray, and for those of you who’ve, perhaps, never listened to the show, which runs every third Friday of the month from 7 till 8PM, I’m a liscensed medical herbalist who trained in England, and graduated there with a degree in herbal medicine. My wife and I run a clinic in Garberville where we consult with clients about a wide range of conditions and recommend herbal medicines and dietary advice, and has become very consistent with the last couple of years, Dr. Peat is happily joining us on the show to share his latest discoveries in his research.
So, you’re listening to Ask Your Herb Doctor on KMUD Garberville, 91.1 FM, and from 7:30 until the end of the show at 8 o’clock you’re invited to call in with any questions, either related or unrelated to this months subject of nitric oxide. The number, if you live in the area, is 9233911, or if you live outside the area the toll free number is 1800KMUDRAD, and we can be reached toll free on 1888WBNHERB for consultations or further information, Monday through Friday, 9 till 5.
01:04 So Dr Peat, thanks so much for joining us again.
Uh-hm.
For those, perhaps, people who’ve never heard you, would you give an outline of your academic and professional background so that people can understand the work that you’ve been doing.
First, I studied for a master’s degree at University of Oregon, in Literature related things and then studied Linguistics for a while. Finally came back to study biology, 1968 to ‘72, specialising in physiology of reproduction and ageing, and especially the biochemical side of ageing physiology.
01:51 OK. All right, so, I wanted to ask you some questions about your most recent newsletter which was based on Nitric Oxide, and hopefully open it up for people to understand the context in which we’re talking about as a product.
I think, the very first question that I wanted to pose, given that the compound manufactured by Pfizer will be well-known to many, both in its generic form and in the off-counter or other brand label types of product, being Viagra. So, Nitric oxide has a majorly vasodilatory effect, as I understand it, and that’s just one of them though, I guess, that’s mediated by Viagra. And that drug is approved, or has an FDA approval, for erectile dysfunction.
What is it about nitric oxide that makes it so dangerous and responsible for things like cardiac arrest, stroke, arrhythmias and also increased ocular pressure, which most people wouldn’t even associate with Viagra, but I’ve had several people who have used it and have had heart attack, and stroke, and that prompted me to even look at it as being something that should definitely be taken seriously. And I know also the kind of recreational drug users whose use poppers, exactly the same compound, has some very damaging effects on the body. What’s your take on nitric oxide?
Speaking of poppers, several of the early theorists of AIDS were blaming it on whatever the chemical is, I guess it’s Nitric Oxide, that’s produced from the poppers—
Right—
Some kind of nitric compound anyway—
Yeah—
And they were arguing that that in itself was enough to account for the AIDS among the people who were using that as a pleasure drug.
Uh-hm.
But in the 1980s, everyone knew nitric oxide primarily as a toxic component of smog. And so when people started discovering that it was being produced in small amounts in the body, immediately they started looking for the parallels with smog poisoning: lung injury, circulatory disease and so on. And one of the first things they found was that it kills the beta cells in the pancreas that produce insulin. So in early 1940s there was this flurry of papers demonstrating that our internal smog is just as toxic as Los Angeles smog!
04:53 But then the Viagra patent and publicity came out in the later 1990s. And right then suddenly the medical publications all found that it was a glorious, protective and natural— oh, protected just about every function you can think of. Making you smarter, have more endurance and all kinds of good things.
But then, after a few years, I guess the investment in publicity started wearing off and people started coming back to the diabetes-producing effects and looking at what it’s actually doing biochemically.
The basic way it causes harm, probably is that it is kind of parallel to the effects of carbon monoxide or cyanide, in being a competitor for oxygen in the mitochondria, the enzymes that produce most of our energy. It, in several ways, knocks out not only the key final respiratory enzyme, cytochrome oxidase, but it poisons the previous electron transporting parts of the mitochondrion too. So, simply turning off the energy supply can account for a lot of its problems.
But it also, when you’re stopping the oxidative run through the mitochondrion, as the mitochondrion starts leaking, in effect, electrons that have no place to go, and the whole cell shifts over to a reduced chemical state, the electrons aren’t being constantly drawn down, and so the balance, if you imagine a stream of electrons falling steadily towards oxygen, when you cut off that they accumulate and float back. And literally the reducing environment shifts the whole balance of the self-reduced sulphur compounds. And it’s expressed all the way out to the surface. And the surface properties of the cell change. And there are some enzymes right across the surface, so that this reducing energy from inside the cell is available to reduce oxygen outside the cells since mitochondria aren’t using it productively. In fact this cloud of excess electrons flows through the enzyme called NADPH-oxidase and directly reduces oxygen on the surface.
And that produces superoxide, a possibly toxic free radical which then produces hydrogen peroxide. And in the immune cells, that are under stress, that’s considered productive because it helps to break down bacteria or whatever is exciting/disturbing the white blood cell.
So this toxic, oxidative burst has its useful aspects. But probably it’s one of the better outcomes rather than just using the hydrogen peroxide directly, or producing nitric oxide. This hydrogen peroxide can be used to oxidise chloride that is always present, into hyperchloride which becomes one of the very strong germ digesting chemicals, that when a phagocyte has eaten something then it’s basically like chlorox. It helps to break down the particle.
09:47 OK, so in general the nitric oxide forms a pretty energy wasteful mechanism, and also damaging in its free-radical producing effects.
Yeah, this shift of the whole cell away from oxidation starts that whole process that people are still just starting to put together the whole picture of how it fits in to physiology. But it has its effects on the nervous system, that people are now seeing that Parkinson’s Disease, for example, has the signs that nitric oxide is one of the central damaging components of the dopamine system.
Ok. Alright, you’re listening to Ask Your Herb Doctor on KMUD Garberville 91.1. From 7:30 to the end of the show, 8 o’clock, callers are invited to ask questions about this months subject of nitric oxide and the ramifications thereof. Doesn’t have to be specifically about this subject, I know people often call in about other subjects that Dr. Peat’s well versed in, like Thyroid, etc. But the number here, if you’re in the area, is 9233911. If you’re outisde the area there’s a toll free number, which is 1800KMUDRAD.
11:14 So, so far as the damaging effects of nitric oxide are concerned, I think there is three species of nitric oxide and the one I think that’s most commonly referenced in PubMed and other scientific literature for its effects, both negative and for that small beneficial effect of its energy burst effect on bacteria etc. is the inducible nitric oxide synthase. And that’s been implicated in causing an increased severity of disease in quite a few different models. One of which was a herpes simplex model; encephalitis, which is a brain inflammation in mice; and then I saw other references as well to chronic viral hepatitis in man as definitely being aggravated by nitric oxide and potentially nitric oxide suppression might be a useful treatment for people suffering from chronic hepatitis. What are the most reasonable ways of blocking nitric oxide synthesis in the body or at least managing its production and providing a buffer to it so that you can maintain the little nitric oxide that is beneficial, whilst keeping in check any excess?
The body has its various, natural ways of keeping it under control. For example, progesterone inhibits the enzyme that makes nitric oxide, while estrogen excites and activates that enzyme. And so when the cell is stabilised by a generous amount of progesterone and related neural steroids—the stabilising things, including pregnenolone—those hold down the production. Anything that irritates the cell and excites it: the endotoxin from the intestine is probably the biggest single constant promoter of the production of nitric oxide, and sometimes serotonin and histamine—which are produced in reaction to endotoxin and other irritating things—these can increase in various tissues, serotonin and histamine can increase the formation of nitric oxide.
In some situations, caffeine and similar drugs that are known to have a variety of protective anti-toxic effects are acting by—locally in a certain type of tissue—turning down the nitric oxide production. But, in recent years, the old dye—it was used as a treatment for malaria 100 years ago—called methylene blue—it’s a common lab chemical used for showing the presence of a reducing compound, for example Vitamin C turns it white, and lots of people use it to demonstrate chemistry in a visible form—it’s being used for a tremendous variety of therapeutic purposes. And simply by turning down nitric oxide, which causes so many bad effects, methylene blue is having very positive effects in this great variety of things. Including herpes and other viral and chronic viral diseases.
The recent news about the Ebola virus, some people have noticed that one of the things if the patient is going to die, their nitric oxide level in the blood is very high. And it’s what is causing the blood vessels to leak and break down, causing a blood to leak out every place where it shouldn’t. But you see something similar in ordinary influenza and other viral infections. The blood vessels tend to become leaky and produce swelling, and a lot of very common side effects that you see in diseases of all sorts.
16:19 What would you think would be a good, short-term approach to that, to block that?
From what’s available presently, niacinamide and progesterone are things that are commonly available. But methylene blue is probably, when it’s available, is probably a good emergency thing to turn off the massive amounts of over-produced nitric oxide.
16:64 I did read an article, I think there were several references to methylene blue and its use, either promoting or suppressing depending on a dose, and it seemed like very small amounts of methylene blue were having this favourable suppressive activity, where larger amounts could actually cause—
Yeah, some of the toxicity experiments have been kind of ridiculous, in which they feed rats the equivalent— for a person it would be an ounce or two of crystalline methylene blue. Which it would— just that amount of concentrated any chemical is going to be harmful. But it’s been— twenty-five years ago someone did a very well-controlled study of severe depressed people, 15mg per day was all it took to relieve severe depression.
#26
Which well-controlled ~1989 study showed 15mg of methylene blue daily relieved severe depression?
The side effects of even many times higher doses than that are essentially zero.
Two studies, one by the NIH, 6 years ago
#27
Which 2008 NIH high-dose methylene blue rodent study showed no bad effects, and life extension in females?
and one more recent,
#28
Which 2008-14 high-dose methylene blue rodent study showed no bad effects, and even life extension in females?
gave greater doses up to what would be the equivalent of about 4 or 5 or 6 grams a day for a person of the crystalline material, many times higher than the curative, anti-depressive dose. And they did it for the whole lifespan of rats and mice and saw no life-shortening effects in either rats or mice. But in female mice, in both studies, they saw an extension of the maximum lifespan with the highest dose.
And so in these ridiculously high doses, many times, I guess about 5-10x higher than the dose Paul Ehrlich used more than a hundred years ago to treat malaria. And he cured two cases of malaria in a period of just a couple of weeks, giving 5 doses a day of 100mg each time orally.
But with very much smaller doses you see changes in the brain, and reduced stress, and curing depression and so on. At several times higher doses than he used to cure malaria, you still don’t see any harmful effects. And in animal experiments it took one of the gigantic doses, equivalent to, I think it was, about 8g a day for a person before it stopped doing the simple anti-depressive actions.
20:20 Wow. Now, do you think the effects of methylene blue are—there’s probably multiple effects—but I wonder if any of the electron quenching, or electrical stabilising activity of methylene blue might be responsible for interacting with different proteins and that kind of—
Yeah. One of the known mechanisms is that it can receive electrons from the mediator that receives them from glucose. And NADH The reduced form of NAD, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide. for example, can be oxidised, and then the methylene blue can pass those electrons on to the part of the mitochondrion that is still working, bypassing damaged parts of the mitochondrion. So it can act like the missing enzymes, simply restoring mitochondrial function.
But, in subtler ways it, for example, the receptor that causes excito-toxic damage from overdoses of glutamic acid, for example, anything that is depleting the brain of energy while stimulating it activates these glutamate receptors. And there are two sulphur groups in those proteins that respond to excito-toxins. Methylene blue oxidises those and turns off the receptor and stops the excito-toxic process.
And that’s one of the ways— the excito-toxic processes is one of the things that turns on nitric oxide production going ahead and killing the cell. That’s why the excited state is toxic. Largely because of the production of nitric oxide.
22:30 Okay. Now I guess methylene blue is not an FDA controlled substance or anything, I thinks it’s fairly widely available. It’s just a dye isn’t it? I think typically it’s known as a dye, I know it’s a tissue stain—
And fish stores use it. I’m not sure how they use it, whether it’s for sterilising aquariums or something? And fish farmers use it to cure various fish infections.
22:58 Huh, okay. Okay, well people listening perhaps might want to start looking up methylene blue and its implications in the treatment and/or prevention of different degenerative conditions. So, extremely cheap I’m sure. Not at all patented. Not controlled. And if there’s some good studies coming out showing methylene blue’s positive effects, I mean blocking nitric oxide I think that could be well worth people looking at as an alternative to many of the drugs that people might be using for different conditions.
Okay—
I’ve counted about 6 different ways that methylene blue stops or blocks the production of nitric oxide.
Okay, go on.
…
Do you want to share them or?
Erm… no.
Haha, okay.
But the excito-toxic thing was one. Preventing excess polymerisation of the microtubules, another. Probably increasing progesterone production, inhibiting estrogen production. But probably the most important thing people should do is to start being critical about the tremendous amount of propaganda selling the idea that people should eat more arginine to increase their nitric oxide production.
24:36 Wow. Yep. I don’t know, it always amazes me how this stuff actually comes into circulation as quote “common knowledge” and how easily influenced the media is by Big Pharma. Anyway, not to go on too much about that, because we could probably go on forever about how Big Pharma have their hooks all over.
Anyway, it’s comming up for 7:30. I’ve seen the light flashing a couple of times, I don’t know if anyone’s on the line at the moment. No. Shaking his head. Must have gone off. No problem. Well you’re listening to Ask your Herb Doctor on KMUD Garberville 91.1 FM. From now until the end of the show at 8 o’clock you’re invited to call in with any questions either related or unrelated to this months subject of nitric oxide and how to control it’s damaging effects.
And Dr. Raymond Peat is with us in the studio. He’s a pretty foremost authority on lot’s of different subjects surrounding hormones and aging and all the interactions of thereon and he’s with us in the show so we’ll be— yeah we have a caller on the line already look at that.
25:44 Okay caller, you’re on the air and where are you from?
I’m from Southern Humboldt here.
Okay.
C1. John. I wanted to know if all of the estrogen imitators, that are around us in the environment that we’ve created for ourselves to live in, are also something that will put us at risk?
Very much. Very much so, yeah. That’s a—
I think I’ve seen that bisphenyl A Bisphenol A (BPA) is used in the manufacture of plastics. activates nitric oxide production.
There you go, and that’s an estrogen promoter, or a mimic.
26:25 Yep, Okay. So, environmental estrogen is very much a negative impact on our health, many of which have come from petrochemical industry, plastics industry, etc. Dr Peat what do you think some of the most damaging environmental estrogens that you know of, that—
Oh, the natural estrogen is—
It’s damaging enough!
Yeah, it’s through the sewage it’s getting into the rivers.
Uh-huh.
And for the environment, I think, the natural estrogen and the birth control—
Right—
estrogens that are many times stronger than natural estrogen is showing up in all of the downstream waterways that receive sewage.
So waste water management does not selectively remove hormones from the water then? Are you saying that it’s found— I wonder if it’s reasonable to posit that there is detectable amounts in drinking water even?
Well, as a sewer board person I can tell you that one of the ways that they tell whether water’s coming from a sewage system or from nature, is they look for caffeine. That’s considered one of the chemicals that makes it through and is a marker for sewage as oppose to, you know, animal waste or whatever. So, yeah a lot of those chemicals do make it through.
Okay, did we have any other caller—
27:54 Yeah, the other part of my questions was: ss there a plant or an herb that actually produces or mimics methylene blue that you can ingest instead of—
Oh, I’ve been looking around at various molecules, and it was a precursor for many of the drugs— the tricyclic anti-depressants and tricyclic anti-histamines, and anti-inflammatories, I think all grew out of the dye industry, that methylene blue was one of the very first examples of. But, it’s a three ring molecule, and that seems, probably because it’s structurally roughly the same size and shape as the steroid hormones, it probably can get into the many different places that natural steroids act.
And so I’ve looked around at plants that make analogous things. The tetracyclines have many the same anti-inflammatory effects. I suspect they’re also working against nitric oxide. They just have one extra ring but in a very similar arrangement. And Vitamin K and Vitamin E are even analogous in some ways.
Lapacho, a chemical from a South American tree. It’s a dye that has many of the anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer properties of methylene blue.
How do you spell that?
Lapacho is Tabebuia impetiginosa. So T-A-B-E-B-U-I-A. Tabebuia. And impetiginosa, it’s a South American tall South American hardwood. But it’s used extensively for cancer, as Dr Peat mentioned. They call it Pau D’Arco.
30:18 Recently people are talking about an Asian herb, I think one of the names is Black Cumin, but it contains thymol quinone. And the quinones are, I think, the essential model of the protective pro-oxidant, stabilising chemical. And thymol quinone is considered to be a very powerful anti-inflammatory. And I suspect that it’ll turn out to be acting against excess nitric oxide.
It’s a free radical quencher again, isn’t it, the quinones?
Yeah, that’s just one of their many— they seem to activate the right kind of oxidation whilst quenching the bad kind.
OK, very good.
Alright, well thankyou very much.
Yeah, thanks for your call caller. We have three callers on the line here, so let’s get them one after the other.
31:21 Caller you’re on the air and where you from?
Me?
Hi you’re on the air. Where you from?
Arcada.
Arcada, okay. Go ahead, what’s your question?
Thanks, I’ve been listening to your show for a good 4 years or so.
Haha, good.
A couple of quick review questions from the past that I’ve been wondering about for a long time. It was mentioned some time ago about a nutrient, I believe, that could help, or remediate or you know fix an earlobe crease. Does that ring any bells?
What was the last thing you said?
Earlobe crease?
Oh earlobe, that’s a thyroid deficiency isn’t it?
Yeah, I think that is mainly a thyroid deficiency.
Okay, and did I hear at the time a simple recommendation for correction of that, was there a nutrient or is that a much more complex matter to address?
I think the main thing causing hypothyroidism in so many people, is an excess of the polyunsaturated fatty acids. Because they are able to block the production of thyroid, its transport, and its action. So they’re very capable of antagonising thyroid function.
So to avoid all the nuts and seeds that contain liquid oils in them. So nuts and seeds, principally the kind of polyunsaturated sources. And obviously there are other polyunsaturates commonly available in food that you should definitely avoid. So any of the liquid oils, obviously—
What about, like, coconut oil?
Coconut oil is saturated, so that’s good. That’s— Dr. Peat’s always recommending coconut oil and butter as being the two saturated sources of fat that should be the most consumed, and then to avoid all the liquid polyunsaturates. Obviously fish oil being the worst.
Okay. Woah, like cod liver oil?
That too but I think, Dr. Peat, don’y you say that the vitamin content in cod liver oil—
Oh yeah, if you don’t have any better source cod liver oil is a great source of Vitamin D. But it’s better to get sunlight.
Right, okay. Can I ask one quick other question?
Go ahead.
33:44 There was something that came up about eating carrots and, I don’t know what the term would be but I want to say, like, an astringent or a cleaning or a purifying—
Yeah. Anti-septic—
Or a helpful aspect of eating carrots. It was recommended that the carrots be cut diagonally? As a juicer and a cook, I guess, of my own food, I thought that was a bit peculiar and I wonder if that could be elaborated upon?
Now, I think Dr. Peat’s always mentioned that grated— Grated carrots to increase the surface area is the mechanism that’s preferred and that’s basically as a anti-septic, if you like, for the gut, removing excess estrogen and other waste products. And it’s undigested so it has a pretty good action in the gut without physically being changed.
But, like, chewing it is not enough to enhance the surface area, like breaking it down?
Well, not the same because, ultimately, when you grate the product in a grater then you obviously have a big surface area then, and whatever you chew that up from then is gonna increase it still.
The juice does contain a lot of good things. But if you throw away the fibre you are then losing the most important thing for stimulating and cleaning the intestine.
Alright, well thanks for your help.
Thanks for your call. I got a couple more callers here. So let’s take the next caller. Where you from?
…
Hello caller. You’re on the air. Where you from?
…
Was on the air? Engineer, is he on the air or?
I guess not. Caller, 3-2-1, actually the other caller hung up too, so—
Hello?
Oh! There you go.
Oh, I’m here. Yeah…
Where you from caller?
[coughs twice] excuse me, I’m from Southern Humboldt.
Okay. Go ahead, what’s your question?
35:39 Well I had a couple of questions. Firstly, Did you say that l-arginine was bad? I’d heard that that was supposed to be good for you, but I’m not sure what it’s supposed to do?
Okay, Dr. Peat, arginine. You mentioned it a moment ago as being—
Yeah, I’ve been noticing—
And is there a difference between arginine and l-arginine?
Yeah, the internet is just swamped with advertisements for ways to supplement arginine. l-arginine is just the natural amino acid. But if you get more than you need it will increase your tendency to over-produce nitric oxide. And too much tryptophan happens to boost that, and possibly by increasing serotonin. But it’s very important to keep your amino acids in a good balance, especially avoiding too much cysteine, tryptophan, methionine and arginine.
So you don’t recommend taking an l-arginine supplement?
No, I think it’s very dangerous.
36:48 Ooohhh, O-kay. Now, did you say that Viagra is bad for you because it’s made out of this nitric oxide stuff?
It inhibits an enzyme that is supposed to inactivate a substance made by the production of nitric oxide. Nitric oxide starts a chain reaction and Viagra keeps that chain reaction going. And in the process it ends up systemically increasing, not only the effect of nitric oxide, but even, in some situations, the level of nitric oxide. So it probably is increasing the aging process, basically, in brain, heart, pancreas. Everywhere you get an excess of nitric oxide.
But they say that having sex is good for you. If you can’t have sex that’s not so great either. I mean is it a matter of moderation and not using it too often? Can it be okay if you use some of it? I mean I don’t know I’m not a man.
Oh, well its one of the essential amino acids. And so if you eat any good, high quality protein, even potatoes, milk, cheese, you’re going to get all the arginine you need.
No, no, I’m talking about Viagra now.
Oh, Viagra!
Yeah, yeah. I mean, is that, like, totally bad or is it okay, you know, to have some of it. Because I’m saying if that improves the sexual function, you know, of an older man, then sexual function is supposed to be a good thing?
Well Dr. Peat—
I mean, is there a balance there or do you think it’s totally bad?
I think it would be better to work on the actual physiological problem, improving natural circulation— for example, restoring good thyroid function will often increase libido and potency.
39:03 Now Dr. Peat, where— I remember now, some time ago, you also mentioning pregnenolone and/or progesterone as being very positive. I mean, in the past you’ve always talked about progesterone potentially being slightly sedative and maybe decreasing, I think now you have said this, let me quote you, I think you said, ‘decreasing penis size’, but it does not block the vasodilatory ability, and so therefore actually does promote and enable erection and naturally is a reasonably safe way of doing that in males.
But what about testosterone?
The—
One thing at a time ma’am.
Aging men have decreased amounts of testosterone and progesterone, and increasing amounts of estrogen. And that increased estrogen and the decreased amounts of the protective steroids, I think, will increase the tendency to have erectile problems. And one of the really odd side effects of increased nitric oxide is that it decreases the ability to make testosterone. And, at least in women, it lowers the progesterone synthesis. But those are synthesised very similarly, so I think in both men and women, nitric oxide is opposing and lowering those protective steroids while increasing estrogen.
Or what about Cialis? Is that just the same as Viagra? There’s several products on the market that are supposed to help men with their erection.
Yeaj, it’s another version.
Are they all the same?
Yeah, pretty much.
Mmh. Alright—
Okay—
Well thank you.
41:01 Yep. Thanks for your call. Okay, Dr. Peat, I wanted to ask you some more questions about nitric oxide and/or some of the articles that I’ve seen about it promoting cancer? What are your thoughts on the cancer promoting effects of nitric oxide?
I think it’s one of the central factors in keeping cancer going. And so turning it off—
You don’t necessarily think it’s a promoter then, or, in as much as—
Oh yeah, it is a definite promoter of cancer growth and metastasis.
Okay.
Many publications are now recognising that, of breast cancer, prostate cancer, and probably every cancer will probably eventually be discovered to respond badly to nitric oxide.
Huah, okay.
The function of anything interfering with respiration, that’s where the Warburg Hypothesis was that simply shifting away from oxygen as the energy source, to being able to produce too much lactic acid, even when there’s oxygen, because the cell has lost its mitochondrial function. Nitric oxide and carbon monoxide are both able to knock out the mitochondrial function and imitate the cancer metabolism. And there are several recent publications showing that the Warburg cancer metabolism is created by nitric oxide excess and is turned off by methylene blue.
#29
Which studies (approaching 2014) showed nitric oxide excess creates the Warburg cancer metabolism, whilst methylene blue turned it off?
Simply by turning off the production of nitric oxide.
43:03 Okay, you’re listening to Ask Your Herb Doctor on KMUD Garberville, 91.1 FM. From now until the end of the show, 8 o’clock, we’re pleased to have Dr. Raymond Peat joining us on the show. The number here’s 9233911. Or if you live outside the area there’s a toll free number which 1800KMUDRAD.
So, Dr. Peat, again, I had a question on my mind during this week that, reading different research on different diseases and, apart from that, knowing that some individuals are just inherently more able to enjoy good health seemingly against all odds, have you any understanding of why some individuals, for example, are immune to HIV? Some individuals mount a successful response against hepatitis. Some individuals just have an innate immunity which enables them to overcome what it is they come into contact with, and they don’t suffer from it. Do you think there’s any connection between anything that you’ve read, that you know about, that you might explain that from?
Yeah, there are new ideas about the whole functioning of the immune system that have been coming up in the last twenty years. Jamie Cunliffe and Polly Matzinger are the leading figures in that view on the immune system. And I see it as imagining the body as an eco-system which is simply so strong in some people at maintaining its own organisation and stability that when something extraneous like a bacterium, or a virus, or a cancer cell, happens to invade it the situation is so tightly organised in favour of maintaining the host organism that the invader can’t find their place. The niches are all occupied doing business with the owner of the property—
haha, a-hah—
that there’s simply no place to camp out.
Like the strong man in the house. No one can invade it!
Yeah, and I don’t see it as a killing of the invader, but simply as using up all of the electron space productively so that—
keeping the door shut—
the invader can’t do strange things with it like turning sugar into lactic acid.
45:51 Okay, I’d love to be able to get into the subject that I saw posted last thing today. And that was, to quote what I’ve said before many times, and I think has been repeated through generations that ‘you are what you eat’. I think I’d love to get into that subject with you next month. I think we have another caller on air anyway, but I’d love to get into that subject next month and just show that what we hear sometimes really does mean a lot more than we take for granted, and that actually a lot of the things that are passed down from old generations to now really have their roots in fundamental science and that science now is at last being able to bear that out.
So let me just get this other caller on the air and then we’ll carry on.
46:37 Actually, two simple questions coming through me.
Okay.
First one is MSM, and does it have an influence on male or female libido?
Okay, Dr. Peat, MSM: Methylenesulfmethon is it? Methylsulfonylmethane (MSM)
I believe—
I’m very cautious about it. The dimethyl sulphide, I think, has its uses but I’m not sure that there’s anything really fully safe with MSM.
47:10 And what about DCA or dichloroacetate for cancers?
That happens to be very similar to methylene blue in the way it is essentially non-toxic in moderate amounts. People are now getting as much as 10 or 12g of it per day intravenously and feeling great. But what it does is restore the productive oxidation of glucose, getting the electrons to go all the way from glucose to form carbon dioxide. Pretty much what methylene blue is doing in different situations. But the DCA is reversing the cancer metabolism, or the so-called Warburg metabolism the same way that methylene blue does. So I see it as a very important way of making up for the toxic effects of nitric oxide, endotoxin, free radical, fat oxidation, and so on.
48:24 And you’ve spoken of anti-oxidants that are too strong. Can you maybe give a spectrum of anti-oxidants, and to say is ALA Alpha-lipoic acid (ALA) too strong? Or what is the strongest anti-oxidant that you would recommend? And is THC Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in that spectrum as well?
Vitamin E and ascorbic acid, in the right proportion and the right situation, are very safe and constructive. Alpha-lipoic acid is pretty safe but I would be very cautious with the acetyl-cysteine, I think large amounts of it can push the balance in the wrong direction.
49:16 Okay. Alright. Dr. Peat, I had a question, actually, from a person who wrote to me who said that they were unable to call in because they were outside the country and I think by the time I responded to them to ask them what country they were in it was probably already too late. And I have come across this with other people anyway in our own practice and working with you, I think I understand the situation but I’d like to hear it from you.
It particularly was a woman who said that she had hypothyroidism symptoms including depression, weight gain, cold hands and feet, dry hair and skin. Her TSH, her thyroid stimulating hormone, was 1.6 which wasn’t super high but I know you like it to be as close to zero as possible. And her T3 was 3.5. She said, she used to take Armour thyroid. She was prescribed this by a Doctor and it helped with symptoms for a few months. And she said that when she tried to supplement with T3 or a T3 and T4 combination she developed anxiety and tachycardia.
She said she’s experimented with doses as small even as 1mg of T3 and she said it would send her into a hyperthyroid type state. I think that’s kind of anxiety and palpitations. It maybe an adrenalin thing. But she said is there anything she can do to better tolerate thyroid supplementation. She was currently taking zinc gluconate, Vitamin D, Vitamin K. She’s using 4000iu of Vitamin D. She’s using Progest-e the second half of her menstrual cycle. Aspirin, magnesium and calcium. She also eats liver, weekly. What do you think might cause that in a person who previously might have used thyroid and then suddenly becomes, what they call, sensitive to it and unable to use it?
Sometimes I think it’s that the product has changed. European forms of thyroid supplement seem to be very unpredictable. But if it’s for sure the same product, then usually a magnesium deficiency can cause exactly those symptoms, because the thyroid makes your cells able to use magnesium and so take it up, but a big organ like your skeletal muscles and bones can take up so much from your blood that your brain, and heart, and such, have trouble getting the magnesium they need to respond to the thyroid. And then you get an exaggerated stress and adrenalin reaction.
And low cholesterol is another limiting factor. If you have very low cholesterol you can’t respond to increasing your thyroid, because one of the basic functions of thyroid is to turn cholesterol into progesterone, pregnenolone, and DHEA.
Okay, so what kind of dose of magnesium would you think for that kind of person would be suitable?
About 100mg at a time. As you take the, say, 1 or 2 mcg of Cytomel, or Cynomel. 100mg will be plenty for the first 2 or 3 hours of responding to 1 or 2 micrograms.
52:51 Okay, I looked earlier on as I was doing some searching around. I saw that the main principle sources, it seemed, of magnesium were nuts. Nuts and seeds, and I think there were small amounts in soy. But I think, principally, what would you recommend as a good magnesium source?
Fruit juices and coffee. I think if you want a really intense source you can boil leaves like kale or beet greens or something, just for two or three minutes, and the green water that comes out quickly is very concentrated in magnesium and calcium.
Okay, excellent.
That’s a very, pretty safe, supplement. Coffee and fruit juices are practical and something you can do every day.
53:48 Okay, alright, like I said, perhaps next month if you are available, I’d love to look into that new research. Well actually I think it was brought out in the mid 1960s by that Korean.
#30
Which 1960s work by a Korean introduced the idea of the "third circulatory system" and food changing your DNA?
It sounded very interesting about the third circulatory system in the body, and actually that ‘you are what you eat’. Because there is a pretty intimate interaction between food products and our own DNA. They can be switched on and off and regulated. That sounded pretty fascinating.
Yeah, there’s a German group that have been doing this for about 15 years now,
#31
Which German group (since ~1999) have been investigating DNA in food being incorporated in our own DNA?
looking at the DNA from our foods getting incorporated into our own DNA. And some biologists have been theorising about this for the last 100 years and Carl Lindegren was someone who reviewed the topic about 50 years ago, showing good evidence that organisms all across the spectrum are sharing nucleic acid. Pollen, for example. When you ingest pollen that’s blowing in the air some of the DNA is probably actually getting incorporated into our chromosomes.
Yep. Well listen I wanna let people know how to find out more about you if they’ve not heard about you. So, thanks so much, giving your time for the show this evening, Dr. Peat.
Okay, thank you.
Okay. So, for people who’ve listened to the show, or maybe haven’t heard of Dr. Peat before, he’s got a wealth of information on his website. It’s freely accessible. It’s fully referenced scientific material. It’s not just made up, it’s fully referenced and there’s plenty of articles, both on PubMed and other medical research sites that valid what Dr. Peat’s saying. It’s science that provides the answers, and it’s not what we know in the mainstream media, which is told to us by pharmaceutical companies and other vested interests. But the scientists that are interested in humanatarian causes are definitely finding lots of very novel ways of treating disease. So, don’t just think that what you see on the television, or read in the newspapers is the only way that you can get yourself healthy. So, Raymond Peat’s website is www.raypeat.com. He’s got lots of articles, and those of you who’d like to get in contact with us during regular business hours, we can be reached on—