Chillies could help beat cancer as research finds capsaicin destroys diseased cells

The active ingredient that gives chillies their kick can surround cancer cells and kill them off, scientists say, which could help develop a cure for cancer

BYANTONIA PAGET

• 15:48, 2 JAN 2017
• UPDATED11:06, 3 JAN 2017

  

by Taboola 

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Chillies could help fight breast cancer after scientists revealed the spicy ingredient causes diseased cells to self destruct.

Capsaicin, the active component that gives chillies their trademark kick, can switch on specialised channels surrounding cancer cells causing them to die.

Other cancers including colon, bone and pancreatic could also be killed off by the compound.

However, capsaicin isn't effective if it's eaten, inhaled or injected, and researchers think it will only be effective as a pill attached to another drug that targets cancer cells.

Scientists from Ruhr-University in Bochum, Germany, treated human samples of breast cancer cells with the hot ingredient to find out more about its ability to destroy them.

Scientists say breast, colon, bone and pancreatic cancer cells could be caused to self destruct by the spicy ingredient (file photo) (Photo: Getty)

Dr Lea Weber, writing in the journal Breast Cancer - Targets and Therapy, said: "Capsaicin is capable of inducing apoptosis (cell death) and inhibiting cancer cell growth in many different types of cancer, for example, osteosarcoma, colon, and pancreatic cancer cells, while normal cells remained unharmed." 

When capsaicin reaches a cancer cell, the spicy ingredient attaches itself to the edge of the cell known as the cell membrane and switches on a cell receptor called TRPV1.

The receptor TRPV1 is a channel that controls what substances such as calcium and sodium go in and out of the cancer cell. 

When TRPV1 is switched on by capsaicin, the cancer cell is sent into overdrive and starts to self-destruct. 

As more and more cancer cells die, the tumour is stopped from growing larger.

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Dr Weber said: "In this study, we aimed to identify the TRP channels in different breast cancer subtypes and to investigate the effect of TRPV1 ligand [capsaicin] on breast cancer progression. 

"To our knowledge, no studies have yet conducted a large-scale comparative study of the TRP channels expression profiles in breast cancer cell lines. 

"In our experiments, a significant reduction in cell proliferation after capsaicin stimulation was observed.

"This finding was in accordance with the results of other scientists, who demonstrated a significant decrease in the cell growth rate of MCF-7 breast cancer cells upon capsaicin stimulation."
This study was carried out by scientists from the Ruhr-University in Bochum, Germany, the hospital Herz-Jesu-Krankenhaus Dernbach, Germany, and the Centre of Genomics in Cologne, Germany.

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UConn Proves Women’s Sports Don’t Need To Come In Second

by Jon Baum 

 

UConn fans and cheerleaders react to a basket from Crystal Dangerfield of the UConn Huskies against the Baylor Bears on November 17, 2016, in Storrs, Connecticut. (Photo by Tim Clayton/Corbis via Getty Images)

We here at GOOD Sports have spent December focusing on women’s sports, largely as a counter to the disproportionate amount of coverage men’s sports receives. It’s not difficult to understand how the inequity became reality, but it can be frustrating to see how slowly that reality is changing, if at all. Of course, when it comes to experiencing women playing sports at a high level in front of a passionate fan base and with extensive media coverage, maybe I’m spoiled. After all, I’m from Storrs, Connecticut.

In my home state, there’s something called Huskymania. It describes the fervor around UConn basketball, for which the state’s sports fans are arguably more passionate than they are about any other team. Sure, the Yankees and Red Sox, the Pats and Giants, the Celtics—they all receive plenty of love, but it pales in comparison to the attention and media coverage given to Husky hoops. The program is Connecticut’s own—even more so since the NHL’s Hartford Whalers left the state nearly 20 years ago.

Over the past 17 years, the UConn men’s team has been one of the most successful in college basketball, winning four national championships during that span. And that doesn’t even compare to what the women’s team has done.

Eleven NCAA titles in that same timeframe. A current win streak of 87 games. Past win streaks of 90 and 70 games. Five No. 1 WNBA draft picks, and the top three picks in the 2016 draft.

This is one of the most successful programs—with some of women’s basketball’s biggest stars—in women’s sports history.

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Gampel Pavilion hosts UConn basketball games. (Photo by Matthias Rosenkranz via Wikimedia Commons)

I grew up about a mile from Gampel Pavilion (and before that, the Field House), the on-campus home of University of Connecticut basketball. The men’s team won the second-tier National Invitation Tournament in 1988, and two years later—when Gampel opened—they won the Big East and reached the NCAA Tournament Elite 8 on a spectacular last-second shot before falling a buzzer-beater short of reaching the Final Four. The fan and media frenzy (the press contingent following UConn was nicknamed “The Horde”) crescendoed, and Connecticut’s Huskymania was born.

The women’s team, meanwhile, was also finding more and more success, winning some conference titles and making a surprise run to the Final Four in 1991. And while interest and attendance was growing, in the early days of Gampel, my high school friends and I still could get tickets at the door and sit a row or two behind the basket. The women’s games were enjoyable, but not necessarily a “big deal.” Still, all women’s games not on standard cable could be watched on Connecticut Public Television, allowing further growth of fan base.

It didn’t match the men’s program’s popularity, but that was about to change.

In 1995, UConn started an annual game with Tennessee, which sold out in advance. The biggest powerhouse in women’s basketball, led by legendary coach Pat Summitt, visiting the undefeated, upstart Huskies. The game aired on ESPN. The Associated Press delayed its weekly poll to determine which team should be No. 1., and UConn won, becoming the nation’s top-ranked team—not losing the rest of the season and claiming its first title with another victory over Tennessee, no less.

Regularly from then on, the crowds were big—and discernibly higher-pitched than the men’s crowds. There was a large fan base overlap between the two teams, though they weren’t exactly the same group. The women’s games also featured a bit less caustic fan rancor—as one commonly hears at men’s sporting events—toward opposing players. Until UConn-Tennessee, 1999 edition, that is.

The game was televised on CBS. Tickets were being scalped for $200. UConn’s Svetlana Abrosimova and Tennessee’s Semeka Randall tangled for a loose ball, with Randall allegedly sneaking in a cheap shot (though the reality is unclear). Abrosimova was furious, as were the fans, who mercilessly booed Randall for the rest of the game.

And more sports fans were exposed to the intensity at the top levels of women’s basketball.

The following year’s matchup became the first women’s basketball game to be televised live in prime time (ESPN). And fans kept showing up and tuning in.

Fast forward to last season, and Division I women’s basketball attendance was 8,286,356, marking the highest total in the 35 years of NCAA women’s basketball. Sure, there are concerns about UConn’s dominance impacting ratings, as well as whether it’s good for the sport. But fans are attending games in record numbers. Women’s basketball is holding its own.

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In 2004 and again in 2014, both the Connecticut men’s and women’s teams won national championships, marking the only two times that has ever been done by the same school in the same year. And UConn, which begins each season with a scrimmage involving both teams playing a co-ed game, honored the men and women with a joint rally/parade. The 2004 celebration brought in 300,000 people, while the 2014 edition drew 200,000 to downtown Hartford. When the men—but not the women—won the championship in 2011, the parade crowd was about 40,000.

This isn’t to say the programs themselves are perfect. The men have run afoul of NCAA regulations on a couple of occasions, and women’s coach Geno Auriemma’s recruiting tactics have come into question now and then. But these types of issues are common—for better or worse—in college basketball, and that’s not even the point.

It’s that within this market, in this sport, the men’s and women’s teams are viewed on equal footing. Other schools have top-notch, championship-caliber teams that draw crowds and ratings in both sports as well, including Notre Dame, Maryland, and Louisville, just to name a few.  

 

Fans gather outside the Connecticut State Capitol for a victory parade for the University of Connecticut men's and women's basketball teams on April 13, 2014 in Hartford, Connecticut. (Photo by Darren McCollester/Getty Images)

The U.S. Women’s soccer team is viewed the same way—at least by fans. They are fighting for that to be reflected in paychecks, marketing, and support, as well. You can market the hell out of a bad product and probably see some bump, but it’s not sustainable. But when all the ingredients are there—a great team, a fan base, marketing, media exposure—there’s no reason the fans won’t follow. Which creates more media interest, which bolsters fan interest, and so on and so forth.

ESPN networks were set to broadcast 66 NCAA women’s basketball games this year (more if you include their conference affiliate networks), plus the conference tournaments, and the entire NCAA tournament. Of course, that pales in comparison to the hundreds of men’s games ESPN televises, but once upon a time the fledgling network partnered with the fledgling Big East conference to televise men’s games, and the relationship grew from there and greatly benefited both.

Now ESPN and men’s college basketball are big business with die-hard fan bases.

In other words, for many women’s sports, there’s a long way to go. But this kind of growth has been achieved before. And with the UConns and Notre Dames and Baylors and Tennessees leading the way, it can be done again.

Researchers have found a surprisingly powerful effect of sleeping more

By Ana Swanson November 13  2016

Sleeping is the least energy-intensive activity. It's also good for you. (iStock)

We all know sleep matters for job performance. After a week of vacation, you may find your work better than ever. But rack up a week of sleepless nights — say, following a polarizing presidential election — and you may find yourself struggling.

It wouldn't surprise anyone that sleep affects attention, memory and cognition — important factors in the workplace. But striking new research suggests the effect of additional sleep has a high monetary value. A paper— from Matthew Gibson of Williams College and Jeffrey Shrader of the University of California at San Diego, based on data from Jawbone, the fitness- and sleep-tracker company — says that additional time sleeping can translate into thousands of dollars in wages.

In fact, they calculate that a one-hour increase in weekly sleep raises wages by about half as much as an additional year of education.

Now, the story is not so simple. Don't think you can start to sleep more and you will instantly make more money. It's more about the subtle interplay between how people schedule their lives, how much time they have available to sleep and how that affects worker performance and, ultimately, earnings.

To investigate how sleep affects worker wages, the researchers took advantage of a kind of natural experiment — sunset times across American time zones. Past research shows that people naturally end up sleeping longer when the sun sets earlier, for example in the winter, even if the person goes to bed well after dark. When the sun sets an hour later, it reduces nighttime sleep by roughly 20 minutes per week.

Within a single time zone, the time of sunset varies substantially, as the map below shows. For example, the sun sets about an hour and a half earlier in Mars Hill, Maine, than in Ontonagon, Mich., even though both are in the Eastern time zone. Because there shouldn’t be any significant differences in workers on the eastern or western edge of a time zone beyond the amount of time they sleep, researchers use this variation to calculate how much sleep influences wages.

They find that a one-hour increase in average weekly sleep in a location increases wages by 1.3 percent in the short run, which include changes of less than a year, and 5 percent in the long run. By moving to a location where a sunset is one hour earlier, a worker will make an additional $1,570 a year..

American Medical Association–a doctors’ cartel that has controlled the medical labor market in the U.S. like its personal fiefdom for a century.

8/26/2009 @ 12:00AM

The Evil-Mongering Of The American Medical Association

In his war against terrorism, President George W. Bush declared a simple, binary formula to judge the world: “Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.” Now, Obama and the Democratic leadership have borrowed the same formula to draw the battle lines over health care reform, dividing the country into those who are for ObamaCare and those who are evil-mongers.

But the entities that will be most injurious to the nation’s health are not so much in the evil-mongers’ group but the first group, including the American Medical Association–a doctors’ cartel that has controlled the medical labor market in the U.S. like its personal fiefdom for a century. Instead of “palling up” with it, President Obama should do everything in his power to break its choke-hold and bring physician salaries–among the biggest drivers of health care costs–back down to Earth.

The association has managed so far to escape the wrath of MoveOn.org and other Democratic apparatchiks by muting its opposition to their beloved public option–the proposed government-run health care plan–and joining a coalition of industry groups pledging to cut $80 billion in health care costs over the next decade. The president has been touting these savings as if they have been signed, sealed and delivered to the bank. But anyone who buys–even for a nano-second–that anything good can come for taxpayers or patients from an alliance between Big Government and Big Medicine should see a doctor.

The fact of the matter is that even if the AMA delivered its share of these “savings,” it wouldn’t begin to make up for the costs it imposes on the country–both in lost dollars and poorer patient care.

According to a 2007 study by McKinsey&Company, physician compensation bumps up health care spending in America by $58 billion annually,on average, because U.S. doctors make twice as much as their OECD peers. And even the poorest in specializations like radiology and surgery routinely rake in around $400,000 annually.

Doctors–and many Republicans–constantly carp about the costs of “defensive medicine” because it forces providers to perform unnecessary procedures and tests to insulate them from potential lawsuits. But excessive physician salaries contribute nearly three times more to wasteful health care spending than the $20 billion or so that defensive medicine does. “While the U.S. malpractice system is extraordinary,” the study notes, “it is only a small contributor to the higher cost of health care in the United States.” Meanwhile, other studies have found that doctors’ salaries contribute more to soaring medical costs than the$40 billion or so that the uninsured cost in uncompensated care–the president’s bete noir.

But how has the AMA managed to get away with such princely remuneration that ordinary mortals in other professions–even ones such as law and engineering that also require arduous training–can only dream of? After all, in a functioning market, a profession offering such handsome returns would become a magnet for more people who, over time, would bid down “excess” wages.

But that’s not how it has worked in medicine since 1910 when the Flexner report, commissioned by the AMA, declared that a surplus of substandard medical schools in the country were producing a surplus of substandard doctors. The AMA convinced lawmakers to shut down “deficient” medical schools, drastically paring back the supply of doctors almost 30% over 30 years. No new medical schools have been allowed to open since the 1980s.

Still, the AMA along with other industry organizations until recently had issued dire warnings of an impending physician “glut” (whatever that means beyond depressing member wages), even convincing Congress to limit the number of residencies it funds to about 100,000 a year. This imposes a de facto cap on new doctors every year given that without completing their residencies from accredited medical schools, physicians cannot obtain a license to legally practice medicine in the U.S. Even foreign doctors with years of experience in their home countries have to redo their residencies–along with taking a slew of exams–before they are allowed to practice here.

The upshot of all this is that now the country is facing an acute shortage of doctors that even the AMA and its sister organizations cannot deny anymore. Indeed, the Association of American Medical Colleges, a private nonprofit industry advisory group whose forecasts effectively determine how many new doctors will be allowed at any given time, reversed itself in 2002 issuing this belated apology: “It now appears that those predictions [of a glut] may be in error.”

One way to relieve the shortage of providers that the medical industry has created would be for the AMA to abandon its aggressive game of turf-protection and allow nurses, midwives, physician assistants and practitioners of alternative therapies such as chiropractors, to offer standard treatments for routine illnesses without physician supervision. For instance, midwifery, once a robust industry in this country, has been virtually destroyed, thanks to the intense lobbying against it by the medical industry. In 1995, 36 states restricted or outright banned midwifery, even though studies have found that it delivers equally safe care at far lower prices than standard hospital births.

Similarly, the AMA long regarded chiropractory as tantamount to “quakery,” and barred doctors from professionally associating with chiropractors or making referrals to them, something that the courts overturned as an illegal violation of antitrust laws in 1987. But the AMA is undeterred. Three years ago it launched something called the “Scope of Practice Partnership,” a self-appointed watch-dog group, whose express purpose is to ensure that chiropractors don’t offer any services that might be remotely considered outside their legal scope.

The AMA does all this in the name of patient protection. But Milton Friedman, the late Nobel laureate, noted in 1961 that the AMA’s licensure and other efforts to control the supply of doctors and services had produced a net diminution of care. “Licensure has reduced both the quantity and quality of medical practice,” he wrote in Capitalism and Freedom. “It has retarded technological development both in medicine itself and in the organization of medical practice.”

Although Friedman’s views were controversial at the time, they now enjoy an overwhelming consensus among economists. That’s because it has become painfully clear that the net effect of AMA-type restrictions hasn’t been to make better quality doctors available to more people, but to reduce existing options, especially in rural and other under-served areas.

Obama and his fellow Democrats blame the current health care mess on the free market. But a free market can’t exist when a cartel with the ear of the government is allowed to control a key input for its own self-aggrandizement. If the president is serious about lowering health care costs instead of advancing an ideologically driven government takeover of the industry, he should be doing everything in his power to disband it–not cozy up to it.

Shikha Dalmia is a senior analyst at Reason Foundation and a biweekly Forbes columnist. Ben Tonkin provided valuable research assistance for this column.