Modifying drugs can sometimes make them a lot more effective - it’s not always just about the money, although if a business has to invest a billion quid to get a drug to market it’s not unreasonable to expect that to come back with interest.
Interesting. I have a theory that the “silver bullet” approach to drugs in fact is overly simplistic. It has always seemed to me that nature does it better and that the complexity of vitamins / enzymes / hormones / trace elements in natural products (ie as near as possible to the original plant) makes for much better healing with fewer side effects.
There’s no silver bullet, but by tweaking antibiotics for example, they can continue to be useful long after the natural drug has stopped working. Of course it’s not natural to find antibiotics in mammals, where normally they would simply die from infection.
I’m for ever grateful to antibiotics functioning un-naturally, as someone who survived pneumonia in their 30s and appendicitis as a child. 
1 Like
Fair point.
1 Like
Reptilian blood might contain antimicrobial agents though
So, it’s not that much of a stretch to suggest that mamalian blood might have something similar
As I was writing that a small voice in the back of my head said “someone will prove you wrong”. 
2 Likes
Phages are the future 
2 Likes
I couldn’t understand why I have been feeling ‘so well’ of late. I have been trying to lose weight, unsuccessfully, until I started intermittent fasting a few months ago and lost 3 kilos.
But weight loss in the past hasn’t made me feel as well as I do currently - until I read your posts including the words ‘Autophagy seems such an incredible latent system…’ & ‘Phages are the future’. I hadn’t heard of autophagy before now.
Could it be that autophagy might go some way to explain why I feel so awake, so sprightly - filled with a new sort of energy? Apart from intermittent fasting I’ve done nothing else that could explain why I feel the way I do.
2 Likes
I suspect the Phage that Vero was referring to looks more like this ‘cartoon’:
It’s a type of virus that delivers its genetic material by punching through a cell wall. They are natural despite the scifi appearance, and widely used in science for genetic engineering and making recombinant materials. Phage is usually short for bacteriophage, and somewhat different from autophagy.
2 Likes
Yes I believe so, it could be the future of some medical treatment is fasting. On some tests trials it allows chemo drugs to be more effective also reducing doses.
The grazing is best was invented by the food companies as is breakfast. The French coffee for the morning, allowingthe overnight fast to continue seems a good thing.
The Russians have been using phages for many years and have isolated ones for specific problems.
1 Like
Any applications you have in mind? Replacement for antibiotics?
I may do some reading (OTOH might not).
1 Like
I like the sound of phage cocktails! Lovely with a slice of lime over ice 
Livescience.com: Viruses unleashed into a woman’s wound to slay superbug in her leg.
Viruses unleashed into a woman's wound to slay superbug in her leg | Live Science
Get yourself checked out for sleep apnoea. I didn’t know I had apnoea, I just had a troublesome cough, but Pulmologue asked me to wear a test kit one night and the next day my apnoea machine arrived. I have a machine generating oxygen, with the apnoea machine attached, and I wear a mask over my nose. Instead of waking up 5+ times during the night to use the loo, I can now sleep through from 10 pm to 7 am, or maybe need the loo once. I feel far more energetic, apparently I was having dozens of apnoea episodes each night and now have one or two. Nothing to do with coffee, fluid intake or any of the usual suspects. That said, the need to pee during the night is something all my relatives and friends complain of, so maybe we all have to put up with it sometimes.
Just updating on saw palmetto, I have been taking it since the February posts. Possibly a small reduction in getting up but probably more noticable would be stronger flow from reduced inflamation of the prostate.
Bigger plus, hair regrowth on the small but previously increasing bald patch on my head!
Anywhere else 
1 Like
Not that I’ve noticed