From Cancer to Eyesight, is There Anything Cannabis Can’t Cure?

Marijuana Exposure Prenatally Helps Eyesight

This week I read an article on The Metro online with the title of: ‘Babies Exposed to Marijuana in the womb actually have better eyesight’ and I shuddered at the sheer thought of how poor a study this would have actually been. Not all too shockingly this was shared all over Facebook timelines by stoners and the ilk, I am assuming none of which have read the newspaper article or even tried to access the study (which is actually open access, so its free. There’s no excuse for ignorance here). I imagine thousands of cannabis users and pro-cannabis folk rejoiced at the new information, cannabis can cure cancer and now it helps with eyesight in children if you consume it whilst pregnant. How come this isn’t legalised? Well, Read on. 

The Study and the Media

The study is an open access study published in The Journal of Scientific Reports entitled: Prenatal Exposure to Recreational Drugs Affects Global Motion Perception in Preschool Children. This article was picked up heavily by the Daily Mail and the aforementioned metro, heralding the study, stating that babies which are exposed to cannabis have better vision by the age of 4. In the study, they tested the meconium from the children and tested for the presence of drugs. Essentially, they tested the eyesight of children who had known prenatal exposure to drugs at the age of 4.5 using the global motion perception. They found that those that had been exposed to alcohol and cannabis prenatally had better eye tracking than those of the control. Let’s look further into why none of this is as accurate as it appears and why the media are completely wrong:

·      Visual processing skills are developed at different rates and through different techniques (PDF). The old nature V.S. nurture adage, how do they know that the parents haven’t spent more time helping their children develop than the control group? Y’know, had they actually had a reliable control group.

·      The participants (n=165), were split into two groups control V.S. study. Like me, you would think that the ‘control’ would be those that haven’t had a prenatal exposure to drugs? You’d be wrong, this line is straight out of the article:

Participants in the IDEAL study were recruited to two groups on the basis of prenatal methamphetamine exposure (methamphetamine exposed vs. controls). Many mothers of methamphetamine-exposed children were poly-drug users. The control group included children who were also exposed to a range of drug combinations with the exception of methamphetamine as well as non-drug exposed children.

So, the control has been exposed to drugs, just not methamphetamine. That seems like an excellent measure. How do they know that one of the other drugs being consumed is making the eyesight worse and that the methamphetamine isn’t actually affecting the eyesight at all? Simple, they don’t, because they don’t have a proper control group. Even more, their control group only encompasses 15% of their sample group. So they have 165 subjects, 25 of which are the sample group and 140 are the analysis group. That should make for a highly unbiased statistical analysis….

·      The statistical analysis carried out compared the relationship between cannabis, nicotine, alcohol and methamphetamine on motion perception. As an add on, they assessed the relationship between the extent of drug exposure of cannabis and motion perception. Meconium analysis is an entirely feasible method for drug analysis. However, it doesn’t detect all drugs. Drug misuse has to occur in the 2^nd and 3^rd trimesters to be detected in the meconium, this study does not address this fact and includes the first trimester as a measure. It also doesn’t take into account the unreliability of the subjects’ recollection. For instance, the subjects could have taken multiple doses of drugs in one night, or even abstained but thought they had consumed more. Even more, from working in a drugs lab, I know that they may very well not be consuming what they think they’re consuming (with the exception of cannabis, I mean, that’s pretty obvious).

The alcohol and marijuana use was determined by a subset of questions, such as how much was consumed and categorised into ‘light, moderate and heavy’. Most people who drink at home don’t measure their drinks – so one drink could be classed as light but it could be stronger than the average. Which brings use to the concentration, surely that plays an effect. If someone consumes 3 vodkas, lets assume they’re measured amounts, then they have consumed more alcohol than someone who has had 3 alcopops for example. Only 40% of the subjects had been exposed to cannabis. So the media are now reporting on an article that is comparing 66 subjects to 25. More then doubling the subject group over the control more than doubles the statistical outcome of the study.

Impact Measures

The impact factor is possibly something that should be taken into account with these type of articles. Now, this is much debated in the scientific community as to whether an impact factor has any credence, in my opinion, it does. The impact factor is the frequency in which an average article within a journal has been cited for a particular year. This is used to measure the importance of a journal in its respective field. Articles that are contained to more prolific journals are more likely to be trusted due to the more rigorous peer review that the article receives. So, is the journal a well established journal with a high impact factor such as Nature (which for reference has an average impact factor of 41)? No, we are looking at The Journal of Scientific Reports with an impact factor of….5.

Conclusion

This study is the height of inaccuracy and what is incorrect with studies published in these low impact factor journals. Comparing 140 people to a control group of 25 is beyond ridiculous, as you can imagine, any differences will be prolifically highlighted in the statistical analysis, which is exactly what these studies rely on for publishing. As for the media, well they do what they normally do. Don’t read the study, just get someone which as high-school GCSE in science to write the study, as they ‘know enough science’ to be scientific reporters, right? No, the impact of these articles could be phenomenal on people who already have their preconceived notions about cannabis. I feel like I have to say this; the results of this study should not (and, unfortunately, have been) be extrapolated to mean that cannabis and alcohol consumption whilst pregnant has any benefit to foetal development. Again, tracking is something that can be improved by nurturing a child there is very little evidence here to indicate that drug consumption has helped at all. 

 

Previously I wrote an article on here about how cannabis cannot be and is not used to cure cancer, if you are a pro-cannabis aficionado who believes that it should be legalised on this basis, I suggest you read.

Sildenafil and Diabetes

Can Viagra Cure Diabetes?

Every other week there is a new treatment for something new. I was delighted today to be alerted to a new cure for diabetes: Sildenafil. Sildenafil commonly trades under the name of Viagra. So yes, Viagra is the new cure for diabetes according to many news sources. As any rational person would, I get skeptical when the word ‘cure’ pops up around incurable diseases. Sildenafil works by inhibiting phosphodiesterase 5 (PDE5) found in various tissues within the body. This causes a relaxation in smooth muscle, increased blood flow and vasodilation. As you may know, Viagra is a common treatment for erectile dysfunction and less commonly known for its treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (high blood pressure). There are a lot of problems with sildenafil as a medicine and an even greater amount of problems with counterfeiting. The media has caught onto a study that indicates Viagra can increase the secretion of insulin and ‘prevent’ the onset of type two diabetes.

The Study

The study in question was published in the The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism university entitled: Treatment with Sildenafil Improves Insulin Sensitivity in Prediabetes: A Randomized, Controlled Trial. The study separated 42 people into two groups, one of which was orally dosed with 25mg of Viagra 3 times a day whilst the other group received placebo. Three months later, insulin sensitivity was significantly greater in the sildenafil group compared to the placebo. I have a few gripes with this study, we’ll take them one by one:


Firstly; the subjects. All subjects were overweight people with ‘prediabetes’. This is essentially a stage where not all symptoms of diabetes are present, but there is a disposition. So we have study using drugs to cure diabetes in patients who do not technically have diabetes. That’s the equivalent of saying eating grass cures cancer in people that don’t have cancer. Insulin secretion isn’t uniform within the subjects, hardly makes this fair game. We have 31 subjects taking other medicines throughout the study. In their chart of all the data, they include data for 9 people that were excluded from the study, which leads to highly inaccurate results. The table of information states that only 15 of the subjects (n=25 as we appear to be including those who were dismissed) had impaired glucose levels. I was under the impression they all had impaired glucose levels as they're pre-diabetic, or is that not a requirement of pre-diabetes?

Secondly; the sample size of the study. The study uses statistics to reinforce the result with a p-value of .049, which is excellent. Wait, in 42 patients? The number of samples in each group really affects reliability of these trials. That’s 21 patients in each group. 21 people without diabetes, but showing some high levels of blood sugar took sildenafil and had an increased insulin secretion. So, do we have a cure? Not necessarily, small sample sizes create very big holes in these studies. With over 400 people being diagnosed with diabetes in the UK alone each day, surely that sample size could be larger? It’s surely not hard to find somebody with pre-diabetes, 42 subjects don’t really cut it enough to make such a large conclusion. In America, where the study was produced, diabetics are on the rise, it is a huge problem over there, but they could only use 42 patients?

Thirdly; their conclusion. They conclude with saying that this is somewhat preliminary and semi-speculative along with the fact that this could possibly be used to prevent formation in ‘high risk’ patients. My problem here is that they don’t state there is a cure, so why does the media portray it so? Even more, they state that further research is required, which is about as scientifically useful as saying 'water is wet'. More research could always be carried out to reinforce a point, always.

Fourthly; the medical implications. No medicine is without risks, which doesn’t appear to have been assessed in the study. Metabolic problems of sildenafil include: unstable blood sugar and hyperglycemia. Obviously both common problems in diabetic patients. Lest we forget the common side effects of respiratory, dermatological and hematological problems involved with the absorption of Viagra.

 

Media

Obviously the media hasn’t looked at the study in the same way you would as if you were going to report on something. You read it. Many of the major news outlets such as SKY or BBC have not (as of yet) picked up on this news break. But many other news sources have. Using ‘Viagra can cure diabetes’ as the headline. The Mirror used this headline, up until around 7pm when it was changed to ‘could stop you getting type 2 diabetes’ – which is a little more accurate in context of the study, but not accurate in terms of a wider picture. I am somewhat relieved to see that this article and the express are the only ones to really pick up on this and run with it, although I have no doubt that others will emerge. The express has a little differentiation in the story to The Mirror using a larger subject sample size n=51. I have read this study twice already and this goes to show how well they actually read the study. 51 people started, with 9 being dismissed from the study, leaving a total of 42 subjects. They also state:

Doctor Nancy Brown, of Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in the US, said: "Weight loss and exercise regimens can be difficult to maintain, and some current medications have been limited by concerns about adverse effects."

Really? Concerns about adverse effects in comparison to sildenafil? In 2007, the FDA stated that all PDE5 inhibitors required extra labelling for the adverse effects and potential sudden loss of hearing.
A drug that has a high number of related cardiovascular problems and deaths is more beneficial than something like metformin with mild side effects?

Conclusion

I recently wrote about diabetes ‘cures’ and how the media utilized bad science to propagate pseudoscientific nonsense. When I read this article on my lunch break it said nothing of the type of diabetes; type one or two. It also only really used conclusive terminology; ‘will cure’. Let’s be clear here, if this preliminary study is repeated on a larger scale double blind clinical trial and found to have more conclusive results, then we haven’t found a cure. We are looking at people who have a disposition to type two diabetes, these are at a point in which they don’t have diabetes and can revert via a change in lifestyle. So, if a change in lifestyle can reverse the effects of type two diabetes, which it can (in the early stages) then why would you take medicine with a higher risk of side effects? There is no cure being discovered here, in the same way that injectable insulin isn't a cure in type one diabetes. The problems with articles like this is that they cause more harm than good. People can read the version of the article I read and fully (albeit, naively) believe it. Taking the drug when you have no medical need for such a thing is blindly stupid. Precaution should be taken and these studies read carefully, unfortunately peer review and publishing scientific papers isn't a smooth and flawless process, cracks form and some fall through that are below standard.

Although, it would be interesting to see the results of a larger scale study (and a better subject sampling), things like this are not funded due to the holes that already really exist. This study has many issues with the subjects and the criteria for statistical analysis. Many preliminary studies like this tend to just stay as is; preliminary.

The Downfall of Homeopathy

Maybe no more water and sugar pills on the NHS?

 

Today a colleague of mine mentioned an article on the blacklisting of homeopathy on the NHS. How did I miss that in my morning news feed? Thank you Apple news. But yes, the NHS is considering blacklisting homeopathic prescriptions, meaning your local GP will not be prescribing you any overly expensive water. Homeopathy played a massive part in the NHS House of Commons Science and Technology Committee (SciTech) concluded that it was nothing more than ‘magic’. There was a victory back in 2013 when the Advertising Standards Agency stated that homeopathic medicines have to be labelled as ‘homeopathic remedies’.

Costs

The article states that the total NHS bill for homeopathy and homeopathic hospitals is around £4 million per year. See here, the Bristol homeopathic hospital, because this is the world we currently live in - where homeopathic hospitals actually exist. £110,000 is said to be allocated to prescriptions from GPs for homeopathic medication whilst the rest is allocated to these hospitals. There appear to be four of which in the UK. With the money strains put on the NHS and the ridiculousness of homeopathy combined with the lack of any evidence, this just sounds on the face of it: utterly ridiculous. 

  

Here in the UK, we have certain classes of prescription drugs. Schedule 1 drugs are drugs that your GP should not prescribe. These are for many reasons, such as efficacy or costs. The question of the article is, if blacklisted, will we see a political move to make homeopathic medication a schedule one drug? I certainly hope so. Homeopathy is a booming market that is multi-million pound industry in the UK alone, which, luckily, has faded over time.

Evidence

I have written before about Homeopathy and its complete lack of evidence. A lovely meta-analysis carried out by excellent physicians and statisticians; NHMRC Information Paper: Evidence on the effectiveness of homeopathy for treating health conditions found the following conclusions:

• Homeopathy should not be used to treat health condition
• There is no evidence that homeopathy is effective in treating health conditions.
• Homeopathy has zero effect on anything – except dehydration, as that is essentially what homeopathy is; expensive water. 

 

Scitech itself also ruled that homeopathy was pure bull and had zero evidence (PDF). This isn’t anything new. These are a drop in the ocean of studies that prove homeopathy doesn’t work. So why is it still popular? It appears to be hard to justify the NHS pouring money into something that has been time and time again proven not to work. Even the people who are proponents of it seldom use scientific evidence to back it up, because the studies just do not exist. 

 

The article details the side of Dr Helen Beaumont, a GP and president of the Faculty of Homeopathic Drugs said:

“other drugs such as SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) for depression would be a better target for saving money, as homeopathic pills had a "profound effect" on patients. She told the BBC News website: "Patient choice is important; homeopathy works, it's widely used by doctors in Europe, and patients who are treated by homeopathy are really convinced of its benefits, as am I."

That argument really doesn’t follow. Other treatments, such as treatments such as SSRI, come under a lot of fire due to their efficiency and side effects, but that doesn’t mean homeopathy works. She states she is convinced of the benefits of homeopathy. What benefits are those? If there was indeed ‘profound effects’, why have they not been found through double-blind clinical trials? Oh wait, they have? Yes…with zero net positives in the support of homeopathy. I think patient choice is highly important in medicine, especially more so when you are clued up on it. But this isn’t a question of choice, people are being given treatment that simply does not work at all. If people were informed correctly on what homeopathy actually is and its lack of evidence, they probably would not use it as a choice. Obviously, the placebo effect is a great and powerful thing. However, does this justify treatment in cancer for example? Placebo effects are objective, they are not actual benefits or cures, just because you feel better through delusion, does not mean that you actually are better, which can lead to further medical complications. 

Conclusion

How is it that this is still a thing? I didn’t think homeopathic hospitals existed in the UK anymore and was quite shocked to see how much money is plied into them. I mean, how much does water and lactose cost anyway? Let’s hope the MPs that are reviewing this in 2016 just put it straight onto the schedule 1 list where it belongs. Homeopathy should not be practiced or used by anyone, we live in a world that demands and uses evidence to prove assertion. Why on earth is this subject not been obliterated? Oh yeah, because people like Treddinick legitimately weigh in on scientific subjects  in our government. It makes perfect sense.

Do Psychic Abilties Exist?

 Are Psychics Real?

For many years I’ve grown up with people around me asking this question; friends; parents; aunts and grandparents. My mother even has her own anecdote as to why she believes in mediums and psychic abilities: ‘how did she know that if she wasn’t talking to [insert name]’. So, how real are they? With prevalence of names all over our TV such as Sally Morgan, Derek Acorah and John Edwards, how is it not to be real? I recently wrote about how psychics are used in forensic science, but what about everyday life?

Psychic Life

Last night, like most people in the U.K. I was enamored by a T.V programme entitled: MyPsychic Life. Which apparently, didn't do too well. It detailed the lives of psychics and how the ‘cope’ with their ‘abilities’. One of which, claimed he was contacted by the spirit of Michael Jackson, who started singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to his wife…Now, there’s a claim to fame. I mean, how short on heritage do you need to be? The show offered nothing in the way of convincing the general public that psychic abilities were actually attainable. At one point, one of the psychics couldn’t get the crowd livened up, he was trying everything in his power to get a ‘reading’ he may as well have said ‘I’m getting a name. Does anyone have a name?’. Still, people ended up believing. Furthermore, when one of the psychics attended an interview, the interviewer said ‘I’m Skeptical of this’. Great, I thought, shoot him down. 5 minutes later, the psychic told him he was ‘stressed’, possibly by a ‘move’ and the ‘skeptic’ was transformed into a believer…Funny how that always happens on television.

One of the mediums actually has a Facebook page, in which she will give you a reading over Facebook. Outstanding, she reads a random Facebook account (only of the believers, obviously) and then puts ‘personal’ information on a status. These people then believe she is in contact with a dead loved one. I honestly don’t know where the blame lies in that one.

Cold Readings

I have written before about how psychics carry out their ‘abilities’ when using police and media knowledge to ‘aid’ investigations. Cold readings are techniques used by people with paranormal abilities’ to get a subject to behave in a way that manipulates the subject to believe they have a special ability. Our desires to make sense of out experiences are overwhelming, they can lead us to make discoveries or lead us down a rabbit hole. It is the ability of a psychic to exploit this desire. The exploitations tend to be vague and callous, playing on the human nature to be self centred. Every guess incorrect guess made about the subject will be reverted by the one that is accurate.

The psychics are very good at reading people. Using age as an indicator, they can pretty much grab at atoms in the air and tug until someone falls to their folly. For example, Derren Brown states on his website an excellent breakdown of a cold reading:

“I sense a woman in your family with some sort of cancer. Could be your aunt or something like that. Yes? I am pretty certain it is your aunt and she had cancer. She is no longer with us, is she? Oh, she is? I just sense her somehow distant. Oh, she has moved away recently? Then that must be it. I just feel a lot of distance between you and her …”

It pretty much is that simple. Once you hit a sweet spot, you can make guesses until the person is screaming with satisfaction that a loved one has contacted them from beyond the grave. Whilst we are on the subject; why is it always loved ones coming through? Never people that have died but have hated them. ‘Oh, im getting Jean through. She was your neighbour yes? She said but that fence back up you nosy bitch’ – Just doesn’t happen does it? 

 

When they get a cold reading 'spot on', then comes the attacking of the skeptics. They will say things such as 'Winston Wu' - who, as opposed to proving psychic abilities are real, sets out to destroy skeptic credibility:

Wu writes: “For example, if someone had an amazing psychic reading at a psychic fair (not prearranged) where they were told something very specific that couldn’t have been guessed by cold reading, skeptics would start inventing false accusations such as: “Someone who knew you must have tipped off the psychic in advance”, “A spy in the room must have overheard you mention the specific detail before the reading”, “You must have something in your appearance that reveals the detail”, “You must have remembered it wrong since memory is fallible”, etc. Even if none of these accusations are true, skeptics will still insist on it simply because it‚s the simpler explanation to them.”

 You can find this being totally ripped apart by Dr Steven Novella here. I recommend you read that, it is exceptional. Making a cold reading doesn't make you psychic anymore than standing in your garage makes you a car.

Life's a Bitch

But all these people have their problems with their abilities. You will find accounts everywhere of them doing something treacherous. An article in the Mirror describes Sally Morgan even giving a reading for an alive audience member:

The stage blunder had the ­audience in stitches, according to blogger Myles Power. He said: “People can submit photographs of dead loved ones, in the hope Sally gives a psychic reading. Sally pulled out a photo of a woman. She began communicating from beyond the grave with a man holding a baby. She got in contact with the woman in the photo. When she got no response from the audience, she asked whoever submitted it to stand up. It turned out the woman got the concept of submitting a picture of someone to talk to wrong, and submitted one of herself”

I mean, how do you recover from that? There are many other instances too, with this being by far the funniest. But people still fork over their hard-earned cash in the hopes of being contacted by a dead loved one. To read that last sentence back, its is phenomenally dumbfounding.I find it somewhat disgusting when these people have people pouring their hear out to them about their dead relatives/lovers/friends and these people are saying they are talking to them.

Randi Challenge

The real crux of this is that it it all comes down to evidence. There is zero evidence for psychic mediums abilities anymore than there is evidence that I can sprout the wings of a dragon and fly. This lack of evidence isn’t through lack of trying on the scientific communities’ behalf, it is on the ‘psychics’ themselves. This has come to the point where James Randi, skeptical activist, set up the ‘one million dollar paranormal challenge’. This is an offer to pay out to anyone who can prove, under laboratory conditions, that they possess paranormal abilities. This was set up In 1964 with no successful applicants. 

Famous psychics that have refused to carry out the challenge include, Uri Gellar, Leigh Catherine, Rosemary Alta and Sylvia Browne. People in the U.K may remember Leigh Catherine backing out famously over twitter after Phillip Schofield live on This Morning said ITV would pay for her to travel to America to undertake the challenge. She backed out tweeting that it was ‘set up and impossible to pass’. Shockingly, she wasn’t the only one to make this claim.

I imagine the reason it is ‘impossible to pass’ is because psychic abilities are not real. One opportunity to prove it and without taking the test, they’re claiming that it is fixed.

Conclusion

Over the years, psychic mediums have had ample opportunities to prove themselves in actual scientific conditions. Why not take the challenge? Ultimately, they are conning people. Some of what was seen yesterday on the show wasn’t pleasant. Telling people who are grieving, about their loved ones isn’t exactly helping them. The much beloved Daily Mail have an article on how to spot the fake psychics (the ones that are just after your money and the ‘real’ ones…. that obviously wont charge you (call me skeptical, but I don’t believe that). Many websites that I have seen say there is ‘scientific evidence’ and ‘nonbelievers’ don’t actually believe this evidence (without stating what the evidence is). Again, I refer you to the challenge: take it.

Psychic abilities have absolutely no evidence or credibility. Please, if you believe in these, think about it. They have had ample opportunities to prove themselves and choose not to. They choose not to for a reason. That reason is very obvious. So, to answer my question: Do psychic abilities exist? The answer is no, there is no evidence to suggest it does. At all. If paranormal explanations were in fact true, then it should be possible to eliminate all the alternative hypotheses posed by skeptics. Again, this has yet to actually be proven.