Matt Hancock has said there are early signs showing that the antiviral drug hydroxychloroquine may be a very effective treatment, implying the government is acquiring significant stocks of it. This is the correct approach. Trustworthy research has found it disrupts the endocytosis process ruffling of cell membrane to ingest particles and nutrients from its surrounding environment meaning it blocks the entry of Covid-19.
In the same way, hydroxychloroquine can also starve cancer given cancer cells grab extracellular nutrients to feed themselves. Looking forward, we need to modernise our cancer care in the UK. We sadly have some of the worst stats for cancer recovery in Europe. Our cancer survival rates are not just worse than America, Scandinavia, Canada, or Australia, for some cancers, they are even worse than Brazil or Costa Rica.
Conventional NHS therapy must move with the science, this includes repurposing existing drugs, traditionally used for other conditions, which are proving to disrupt the metabolic pathways of cancer cells. There is a huge untapped medicine cabinet of generic drugs and herbs that could help treat cancer, and many other conditions such as motor neurone disease and schizophrenia. Despite facing a record-breaking 17 billion annual drugs bill, the NHS still retains an outdated, rigid attitude to innovation. This drugs bill is rising around 8% a year, as the NHS struggles in negotiations with Big Pharma to keep costs down.
In the US, the costs of cancer care have also surged by 40% in the past decade. There is existing evidence suggesting that, together, these repurposed drugs disrupt the metabolic pathways of cancer cells to slow down or prevent their reproduction. They are among several cheap drugs with proven anti-cancer properties that are not available to NHS cancer patients. Many thousands of published scientific studies already show they can disrupt tumour growth by reducing cancer cell nutrition, and the Medical Research Council (MRC) is running clinical trials to begin to collect more data on the benefits of these repurposed drugs. But the results are at least a decade away, and the dose of aspirin being used in this MRC trial is not one that is commercially available anyway.
To improve cancer care in the NHS, we need a parallel support system for people that links in with NHS treatment, but allows them to access the best of other science-based treatments, of personalised medicine such as circulating tumour DNA analysis and cancer stem-cell treatment with integrated oncology. We also must find a mechanism and a structure for the regulators to allow out-of-patent drugs to be used again. Lets learn from best cases around the world.
We rightly cherish our NHS, even more so now than we ever did. Our carers deserve a new settlement once the pressure is lifted, as do other key workers like bin collectors, delivery drivers and cleaners. But in the long term we must ask ourselves seriously why, if the NHS is the envy of the world, in over 70 years no other country has copied it? We should take the opportunity to radically improve long-term healthcare in the UK and reform the NHS and social care system together once Covid passes.
The NHSs traditional levelling-down attitude that if something cant be offered to everyone then it shouldnt be offered at all is bad for innovation, bad for short-term care and bad for people who would otherwise benefit. Did you know around half of people get better after a cancer diagnosis? A shocking statistic mostly for people with one of the first three stages of cancer. I am aiming to join this 50% as I have Stage 4 breast cancer. Given just two years to live, Ive since made remarkable progress through one of these clinical trials using repurposed drugs.
Covid-19 has meant Ive ended up an accidental health tourist locked down in Thailand where Im watching from a distance whats happening in the UK. I am determined to play my part in increasing the survival figure by raising awareness of simple science-based things that help you to biohack your body, take control of your own health and beat the statistics. As my hero Marie Curie said: Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.
Katharine Harborne is a chartered environmental scientist, artist and a former prospective parliamentary candidate for the Brexit Party, and former Conservative councillor in the London Borough of Richmond.
Read more:
Boris is back, and we need him to end the coronavirus crisis and heal the NHS - Telegraph.co.uk
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