PUTTING THE C IN CURE: Quantity and Frequency are the Keys to Ascorbate Thera

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Orthomolecular Medicine News Service, December 15, 2009

 

 

PUTTING THE " C " IN CURE:

Quantity and Frequency are the Keys to Ascorbate Therapy

 

Comment by Andrew W. Saul

Editor-In-Chief, Orthomolecular Medicine News Service

 

 

(OMNS, December 15, 2009) What is it about a little left-handed molecule

of six carbons, six oxygens, and eight hydrogens that ticks off so many in

the medical community? Maybe it's cases like this one: Ray, a health

professional I know, had an 11-month old son who was very sick for over a week.

No

one, and I mean no one, in their family had had any sleep in a long time.

They were up night after night with this child, who had a high fever,

glazed watery eyes, tons of thick watery mucus and labored breathing. The child

would not sleep, and did little else but cry. The baby was under the care of

a pediatrician, who, in the infant's eleven months on earth, had already

prescribed twelve rounds of some very serious antibiotics. That they clearly

were not working was all too apparent to Ray, who out of desperation

decided to try something he previously had been taught to not try: bowel

tolerance quantities of oral ascorbate. Ray and his wife gave their baby

vitamin C

about every 15 minutes. As a result, the baby was noticeably improved in a

matter of hours, and slept through the night. With frequent doses

continuing, the child was completely well in less than 48 hours. Ray calculated

that the child had received just over 2,000 mg vitamin C per kilogram body

weight per day. This is even more than what vitamin C expert Dr. Frederick

Robert Klenner customarily ordered for sick patients. Remarkably, at 20,000

milligrams of vitamin C/day, that baby never had bowel-tolerance loose

stools. (1)

 

 

With such a little body, you have to marvel at where all that ascorbate

was going. Of course, it is the opinion of those who promulgate the US RDA

and related nutritional mythology that almost all of that baby's vitamin C

went uselessly into the toilet. Ray and his wife would tell you differently.

They would say that their sick child soaked it up like a sponge, and then

promptly got better. You choose the answer that works for you.

 

 

Quantity of Dose

 

 

Dr. Frederick Robert Klenner earned his MD from Duke University School of

Medicine and was subsequently board certified in diseases of the chest. (2)

A working summation of Dr. Klenner's therapeutic use of vitamin C is 350

milligrams vitamin C per kilogram body weight per day (350 mg/kg/day), in

divided doses. (3) Since a kilogram is about 2.2 pounds, this translates to:

 

 

 

mg of Vitamin " C " Body Weight Number of Doses Amount per dose 35,000 mg

220 lb 17-18 2,000 mg 18,000 mg 110 lb 18 1,000 mg 9,000 mg 55 lb 18 500 mg

4,500 mg 28 lb 9 500 mg 2,300 mg 14-15 lb 9 250 mg 1,200 mg 7-8 lb 9 130

- 135 mg

 

 

Although these quantities may seem high, Dr. Klenner actually used as much

as four times as much for serious viral illness, administered by

injection. The oral doses listed above are, for the doctor, comparatively

moderate.

 

 

Frequency of Dose

 

 

For those unable to obtain intravenous vitamin C, it is essential to pay

special attention to one of the most important aspects of vitamin C therapy:

dividing the dosage improves absorption and retention of vitamin C. High

oral doses of vitamin C yield higher blood levels of the vitamin, and

dividing the oral doses maintains those higher levels. Although initially

seeming

almost too obvious to mention, these are not self-evident concepts. Many a

medical website and government-based dietary recommendation hinge on

ignoring them. Hilary Roberts, PhD, writes: " Stressed and even mildly ill

people

can tolerate 1,000 times more vitamin C, implying a change in biochemistry

that was ignored in creating the RDA. In setting the RDA, unsubstantiated

risks of taking too much vitamin C have been accorded great importance,

whereas the risks of not taking enough have been ignored. Real scientists

understand that 'no scientific proof' is a fancy way of saying 'we don't like

this idea.' " (4)

 

 

And there is ample proof to not like. Vitamin C, in very high doses, has

been used to successfully treat several dozen illness (5), with a published,

peer-reviewed literature spanning the last 60 years. Therefore, the

effectiveness and safety of megadose vitamin C therapy should, by now, be

yesterday's news. Yet I never cease to be amazed at the number of persons who

remain unaware that vitamin C is the best broad-spectrum antibiotic,

antihistamine, antitoxic and antiviral substance there is. Equally surprising is

the

ease with which some people, most of the medical profession, and virtually

all of the media have been convinced that, somehow, vitamin C is not only

ineffective but is also downright dangerous.

 

 

Bias against Ascorbate Therapy

 

 

When you pick up a health or nutrition book and need to know really fast

if it is any good or not, just check the index for " Klenner " and three other

key names: Cathcart, Stone, and Pauling. Robert F. Cathcart, an orthopedic

surgeon, administered huge doses of vitamin C to tens of thousands of

patients for decades (6), without generating a single kidney stone. Irwin Stone,

the biochemist who first put Linus Pauling onto vitamin C, is the author

of The Healing Factor: Vitamin C against Disease. (7) Pauling cites Stone

thirteen times in his landmark book How to Live Longer and Feel Better (8),

a recommendation if there ever was one. The importance of vitamin C's power

against infectious and chronic disease is extraordinary. To me, omitting it

is tantamount to deleting Shakespeare from an English Lit course.

 

 

Because of such bias, the primary way patients (and through them, their

physicians) have been exposed to Dr. Klenner's work has been through Dr.

Lendon Smith's 68-page Clinical Guide to the Use of Vitamin C: The Clinical

Experiences of Frederick R. Klenner, M.D. (9) Upon discovering this book, one

of my undergraduates submitted a paper to another class discussing a

substantial number of medical references she had found on vitamin C as a cure

for

polio. That course's instructor told me privately that the student's work

was absurd, and he literally described her as a " dial tone. " I recall a

nutritional presentation I made to a hospital staff. All was going well until

I mentioned using vitamin C as an antibiotic, as Dr. Klenner did. The mood

changed quickly. And how many of us have heard this old saw: " If vitamin C

was so good, every doctor would be prescribing it! "

 

 

Cardiologist Thomas Levy, MD, explains: " I could find no mainstream

medical researcher who has performed any clinical studies on any infectious

disease with vitamin C doses that approached those used by Klenner. Using a

small enough dose of any therapeutic agent will demonstrate little or no effect

on an infection or disease process. " (10)

 

 

Preventive Doses

 

 

Dr. Klenner recommended daily preventive doses of 10,000 to 15,000 mg/day.

He advised parents to give their children their age in vitamin C grams (1

g = 1,000 mg). That would be 2,000 mg/day for a two year old, 9,000 mg/day

for a nine year old, and for older children, a leveling-off at about 10,000

mg/day. As for me, I simply say, " Take enough C to be symptom free,

whatever that amount may be. " It worked for my family. I raised my children all

the way into college and they never had a dose of any antibiotic. Not once.

 

 

It is high time for medical professionals to welcome vitamin C megadoses

and their power to cure the sick. Cure is by far the best word there is in

medicine. It would seem that you cannot spell " cure " without " C. " I do not

think Dr. Klenner would dispute that.

 

 

(Andrew W. Saul taught nutrition, health science and cell biology at the

college level, and has won three New York State teacher fellowships. He is

the author of Doctor Yourself and Fire Your Doctor! and, with Dr. Abram

Hoffer, co-author of Orthomolecular Medicine for Everyone and The Vitamin Cure

for Alcoholism. Saul is featured in the documentary film Food Matters.)

 

 

References:

 

(1) Bowel tolerance as an indicator of vitamin C saturation is discussed

by Dr. RF Cathcart at _http://www.doctoryourself.com/titration.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/titration.html) and

_http://www.doctoryourself.com/cathcart_thirdface.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/cathcart_thirdface.html)

 

(2) For more about Dr. Klenner's life and work:

_http://www.doctoryourself.com/klennerbio.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/klennerbio.html)

 

(3) Klenner FR. The significance of high daily intake of ascorbic acid in

preventive medicine, p 51-59, in: A Physician's Handbook on Orthomolecular

Medicine, Third Edition, Roger Williams, PhD, ed. Keats, 1979.

 

(4) Hickey S and Roberts H. Ascorbate: The science of vitamin C. 2004.

ISBN 1-4116-0724-4. Morrisville, NC: Lulu.

 

(5) _http://www.doctoryourself.com/vitaminc.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/vitaminc.html)

 

(6) _http://www.doctoryourself.com/biblio_cathcart.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/biblio_cathcart.html)

 

(7) The complete text of Irwin Stone's book The Healing Factor is posted

for free reading at _http://vitamincfoundation.org/stone/_

(http://vitamincfoundation.org/stone/)

 

(8) Pauling L. How to Live Longer and Feel Better, revised edition, 2006.

ISBN-13: 9780870710964. Reviewed at

_http://www.doctoryourself.com/livelonger.html_

(http://www.doctoryourself.com/livelonger.html)

 

(9) The full text of Dr. Frederick R. Klenner's Clinical Guide to the Use

of Vitamin C is posted for free reading at

_http://www.seanet.com/~alexs/ascorbate/198x/smith-lh-clinical_guide_1988.htm_

(http://www.seanet.com/~alexs/ascorbate/198x/smith-lh-clinical_guide_1988.htm)

 

(10) Levy TE. Vitamin C, Infectious Diseases, and Toxins: Curing the

Incurable. Livon Books, 2002. ISBN: 1-4010-6963-0 and 978-1401069636

 

 

Nutritional Medicine is Orthomolecular Medicine

 

Orthomolecular medicine uses safe, effective nutritional therapy to fight

illness. For more information: _http://www.orthomolecular.org_

(http://www.orthomolecular.org/)

 

The peer-reviewed Orthomolecular Medicine News Service is a non-profit and

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Editorial Review Board:

 

Carolyn Dean, M.D., N.D.

Damien Downing, M.D.

Michael Gonzalez, D.Sc., Ph.D.

Steve Hickey, Ph.D.

James A. Jackson, PhD

Bo H. Jonsson, MD, Ph.D

Thomas Levy, M.D., J.D.

Jorge R. Miranda-Massari, Pharm.D.

Erik Paterson, M.D.

Gert E. Shuitemaker, Ph.D.

 

 

Andrew W. Saul, Ph.D., Editor and contact person.

Email: _omns_ (omns)

 

 

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