Avian Flu and Green tea math

[jtollison78]

Recently, I decided to review my Avian Flu strategy. My total time spent on H5N1 specific prep was about 2 weeks I believe, and now it's headed toward 3 weeks. Hopefully, it won't go beyond 3 weeks.

A range of readily available substances have been shown to have some effectiveness against various flus. The most well known is Elderberry extract with Sambucol brand showing the best effect with their patented proccess. Of course, Avian flu watchers know of the potential dangers of generic immune stimulation and know that Elderberry extract might have some risks in this case. Still, some, including one guy that seems to be very well informed, are planning on using Elderberry, mostly as a prophalactic I think. I don't know of anyone who plans to begin elderberry use after getting sick as is suggested with common flus.

Now, it being the case that elderberry has been shown to cut the duration of common flus in half, and that many other substances have recently been shown effective against the flu, it seems reasonable to evaluate how effective. Unfortunately, I am not a scientist, so the evaluation is going quite slow as I attempt to decode research papers.

I spent the morning looking over green tea and EGCG. First, here's a paper showing the effectiveness of EGCG: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16137775

Also of interest, from: http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=127028  ,

note that: "Recently, researchers began to pay attention to the effects of the pharmacokinetics of EGCg and tea catechins on their absorption, distribution, and elimination in animals and humans (3, 4, 7, 9, 10, 13, 17). Usually the EGCg concentration in tea is 2 to 3 mg/ml. EGCg is absorbed through the digestive tract and distributed to many organs in both animals and humans. EGCg at 5.6 μg/ml in rat blood plasma was detected after the administration of EGCg at 500 mg/kg of body weight (9). Total catechins, including epicatechin, epicatechin gallate, and EGCg, were detected in rat blood plasma at 15 to 112 μg/ml at 2 h after oral administration of catechins at 5,000 mg/kg (17). EGCg was detected at 2 μg/ml in human blood plasma 90 min after 525 mg of EGCg in capsule form had been ingested (10). "

Finally from wiki: EGCG: Molar mass, 458.372 g/mol,  and  Molarity (mol/L, molar, or M) or molar concentration denotes the number of moles of a given substance per liter of solution. M = mol/L   (I had to look it up. It's been a long time since chemistry.)

So, if I'm reading this right 2 capsules of my 45% EGCG extract gives me just under 2 micro-g/ml in the blood. To make it easier on my brain, I'm going to make that 2000ng/ml = about 4 nmoles/ml = .004micro-moles/ml. Now, the report uses microM and M=molarity or moles/L, so we have 4 microM.

We need several times this amount, but it's in the same ballpark, enough so that you can just up the pills to get to the 20-40 microM dose you want.

further notes:
1) it is said that the tea has activity beyond the component parts, so I plan to split the difference and use both.
2) peperine enhances the bioavailability of EGCG: http://jn.nutrition.org/cgi/content/full/134/8/1948
3) I've seen the half-life of EGCG put at 4hrs and at 1.9-4.6hrs. I plan on loading in the morning with a double dose, and dosing every 4 hours there after. I will probably use 2 cups of decaffienated tea and 4 500mg/45% from NSI capsule to load. I will take piperine with every dose.

Finally, I plan to do some stress test in the near future. I have no idea how this much green tea effects a person over time, and I am concerned that I may not tolerate it well. It is thermogenic and increases calorie usage. Also, it interferes with iron absorption, so you might want to take iron supplements in the middle of the night. Finally, one study mentioned a reduction in effectiveness after a period of time, but I think that the study was focused on the thermogenic properties, so I have no idea if this was a case of changes in receptor regulation or if the body was proccessing it more quickly. In that study, they doubled the dose after a week.


Please check over my math. If there are any non-mathematical conclusions that I got wrong, please point them out. As it is, Green tea/EGCG is going to be a staple in my flu prep box.

Next up... I'm not sure yet. Maybe Scullcap?


Hoep this was helpful,
John

[justanouveaufarmer]

**

[FishsurferII]

I live by green tea J.  I was on a flight from Tokyo and really discovered it as a true replacement for my morning coffee, afternoon water etc...  I rarely get simple flus anymore and colds.  I think the regimen has something to do with that.  I by stash green tea by the 200 ct.  Its inly like 14 dollars and nearly lasts me a month.  Much cheaper than daily coffee runs or water juice made at the coke plant in atlanta for 2 bucks.  I still do coffee at home, just to change things up, but green tea has really become a staple for me.  Its also a great way to lose some weight.   

[jtollison78]

Justy,

I'm interested in colloidal silver, but not so much for the flu. Not that I'm saying it wouldn't work, I just haven't read enough to know, most alternative med flu people haven't shown it any consideration, and I have other answers that look promising; so, for now, I'm sticking with what I know.



Fishsurfer,

Nice. Just don't underestimate how quickly all the green tea might disappear during an outbreak. I'm stocking at least 4 months worth, hopefully twice that for 2 years. I would like to have some spare for barter.





I was hoping to followup with other supplements in a similar manner, but it's taking a lot of energy that I feel would be better spent elsewhere, not to mention that the dosages of Green tea required are going to eat up the avian flu budget, so instead I'm going to give a very breif overview of the other supplements I'm considering. I probably have more info than I list here, but less than the amount I had for green tea above.

I'm looking hard at useing scullcap for the avian flu. But first, if you order scullcap, make sure it's the Chinese/Bailkal variety and not the American variety. I have more than a dozen bottles of the wrong stuff here now (and that's not to mention the chinese knotweed I bought which should've been japanese). From what I read the american version still does some good ( http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18257272 ), just not as much, as it shares some relavant active ingrediants, but not others. Unfortunately, the abstract cited above doesn't give doses fo baicalin, and the article is in Chinese. I'm concerned about the poor bioavailability of baicilin and Also, I'm a little concerned about the MAOI properties although without knowing the dosages used, I don't know if those would be a problem in quantities used to combat the flu (given the quantities quote and the problems with absorption, I'm not sure these are amounts that could be shoved into your mouth in one sitting). I may or may not actually order any Baikal scullcap. I probably will use the american scullcap that I have on hand.

Resveratrol is another agent I'm interested in for flu fighting. It has been popularized recently as a cholesterol lowering agent. It's interesting in this case because it doesn't seem to directly attack the flu. The mechanism here may be that it primes the cell for programmed death which, as I remember it, this flu is thought to be very good at blocking (cell death is a generic tactic your body uses against viruses). Who knows how things balance out. Like so many of these supplements, poor bioavailability is an issue here. On the good side, I believe I know what dosages are relavant with resveratrol, something on the order of 5-10x a normal dose where a normal dose = 100mg, but you might not want to quote me on that. I didn't remember seeing any side effects at this dose, but as always, you should do your own homework.  The half life is longer than for green tea, and I'm thinking of using this for nighttime coverage and to let the green tea clear out of the system at least once a day(overnight).

Then there's tumeric which is a mapk p38 inhibitor. This is the immune subsystem targeted by H5N1. I'm not sure that I would want to take this everyday. Given the vomiting that is associated with H5N1, I'm not sure that you can get it into you system when you really need it. Ginger might help with this and is itself a potential anti-storm supplement, but this would need more research. Bioavailability is a real problem and you must take it with peperine to get a reasonable dose. Also, it should be taken with food, which again, may be difficult when sick with H5N1. Finally, I found one guy who seems to have a grip on things and says that the most important thing is to reduce viral load, not stop the feedback loop. This was one of my top choices before, but now I'm considering it to be a second stringer.

I've seen black currant berry extract suggested as an anthocydinin source. These are thought to contribute to elderberry's effect, and they do share a major anthocydinin, but one of the major anthocydinin's in elderberry extract is not present in BCBE, so I'm not getting my hopes up.

Speaking of elderberry extract, it is promising and I would probably use it if I had nothing else. Like I said before, there is the immune stim risk, so if I were to use it, I would try to maintain consistent coverage to try to keep the flu from getting a foothold.

Selenium, Magnesium, zinc. Zinc is a mild NA inhibitor. I believe the group is suggested as a storm dampener. These are minor supporting supplements.

The list goes on, but the ones I've listed are one's I have on hand and I'm likely to use.

Beyond this, I just ordered 40 N95's, and I'm considering finding some materials for isolating my room better.

If it's not obvious, I think H5N1 is a major threat. It's one of my Big 4 (besides economic collapse, PO, and environmental collapse).

John

[FishsurferII]

Theres a reason why Pandemic planning has essentially taken over terrorism planning.  They are keeping it hush hush, so dont tell anyone. 

[jtollison78]

I have started stress testing the green tea. The recommended dose is 1 capsule at 500mg. I took 2x 500mg ealier today and another 2 capsules a few hours later. A bit after the second dose I notice a sumewhat subtle, difficult to explain, mental shift. I wasn't thinking about the experiment at the time, so the change was enough to make me think of the green tea experiment when it wasn't on my mind. Just now I noticed a hint of a headache. I never get headaches and this feeling was very uncommon. Again, it was enough to bring the experiment to mind when I wasn't thinking of it. Finally, I believe that I am a little warmer than usual, but I did not notice this before the other two effects brought my mind back to the test.

I just took a third dose, and I will probably take a double dose at some time tomorrow, possibly with the liquid tea as well.

[rbrgs]

My son just moved into a place with two tea bushes; I better go pick some.

[JurisDoctorOfDoom]

I take a green tea pill and a turmeric pill each morning with breakfast, mostly for preventative purposes.

As far as resveratrol, my understanding is that it is only absorbable when in alcohol. So most of the supplements being sold are pretty useless as next to none of the stuff is absorbed. You can drink red wine ut the amounts in wine are so miniscule I wonder if the benefits of the resveratrol outweigh the downsides of drinking the alcohol. So what is one to do? I don't know but it would be interesting if somebody ran a study where you take a couple of the supplemental pills but down them with a glass of red wine. Perhaps that would be an effective way of actually getting a substantial amount into one's system.

[keeha]

Colloidal silver is part of my package.

Now I love Green Tea myself but limit myself because of the high amounts of Fluoride.  Are you big GT guys not aware or not concerned?

http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/05/02/22/why_green_tea_would_be_healthy_except_for_this_one_dangerous_issue_004.htm

[justanouveaufarmer]

keeha - my take on the fluoride issue is that there is a big difference between the toxic fluoride that they're poisoning our water with, and the natural organic form. 
I don't worry about it, but I don't drink a huge amount of tea either.  I feel that the tea I drink - puehr - has health benefits that outweigh the fluoride.

I am however, very careful not to eat restaurant food which is prepared with tap water in aluminum cookware.  Google fluoridated aluminum. 

[sdninjabelly]

Green tea is great, I drink at least 1 large cup a day and it makes me feel great always.
If you have some extra $ and are so inclined, I strongly recommend this one specifically:
http://www.adagio.com/green/gyokuro.html?SID=01d25634fbe0a428c23e78e8b5af46c9
Expensive yes, but by far the best I've ever had.

Colloidal silver is a different story.  I ordered some of this a couple weeks back:
http://www.purestcolloids.com/mesosilver.htm
I had no real need for it per say, I just wanted to stock up since I'd heard good things about it.
I figured I'd try it just to see what it was like so I took a tablespoon.  In about 1 hour I was light headed so I meditated and was able to regain my composure.  The next morning I tried another tablespoon and by the afternoon I thought I was going to die.  I've read that you can actually feel worse if you've got a lot of toxins that need to be worked out but I think I may be allergic to silver or something because I was having trouble focusing my thoughts and my energy levels were totally wacked.  I'm good now but I've had time to work it out of my system.
I may keep it around for topical applications like disinfecting cuts but I'll never ingest it again.  Be careful with this stuff...

[jtollison78]

I just started a seoncd green tea test, mostly because I was doing a lot of pacing and I wanted to actually get something done.

I took 3x500mg capsule and I'm working on the first of 2 cups of tea. The actual morning dose I want to be able to handle include 4x500mg capsule and 2 cups along with Peperine which enhances the absorption of egcg, so I will probably expand further on this test dose, but I don't actually plan on maintaining a high dose over any preiod of time. If I can handle it over the short term, I'm just going to assume that under the worst of circumstances, I'll be able to make it through. I mean, what's the worst that'll happen, it somehow tears my system up and compromises my immune system... I (probably) still win inthe case of avian flu.


JDD,

On my first pass I could've sworn that I saw that resveratrol has a 5% absorption rate. This is low, but, after looking at specific numbers, is enough to work with. But I made a second pass after your post, and I didn't see the 5% rate I remembered, so I might've been confusing it with something else. What I did find on the second pass was that large doses aren't tolerated well, so it's kindof mute.

Are you using a tumeric formulation with pepperine? From what I understand, curcumin absorption is almost undetectable without pepperine. More generally, I don't understand taking an immune/inflammation inhibitor this far out. Do you have a specific reason for doing so?


As for the flouride content, I'm not really a big green tea drinker in general, but if I were, I might consider white tea. From what I read, white tea is simply made from younger leaves and doesn't have the same degree of flouride accumulation.

[jtollison78]

4.5 hrs after the first dose, I took another 3xcapsules +1cup. I didn't drink a second cup because it's getting late and I'm not using decaf. I'm not sure what happened. I thought I had decaf. I'm pretty sure that all the boxes I have stored are decaf.

Test has been uneventful. I think I actually feel a little more relaxed. I just had a very nice, satisfying, yawn, which I don't get all that often. I may have to add occasional GT megadosing to my diet.



 

[rbrgs]

I got 9 tea seedlings yesterday, and a bunch of seeds.  My son's new place has a long row of mature tea shrubs.  Now I just have to plant tumeric.

[jtollison78]

Very nice. I need to put out some tea plants. One nice thing about the NSI tumeric is that it already contains pepperine, Though I don't know if it's enough to enhance all that GT absorption or not.

That being said, I'm also very interested in ginger as a MAPK inhibitor [ http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6882/8/1 ;note the "almost 10 fold" decrease in TNF-a(the real killer with H5N1) in treated macrophages]. Also, ginger is known for it's ability to calm an upset stomach and from what I understand H5N1(unlike the spanish flu) comes with a lot of vomiting which is likely to make it hard to treat orally, and increases the need for continuous preventative action.

Of course, both tumeric and ginger are inhibiting your immune system, and your immune system does eventually play a part in eliminating even the avian flu, so I don't know how it all balances out. I'm not nearly as excited about mapk inhibitors as I awas a couple months ago. One guy on the fluwiki forums who seemed to know his stuff says that the only known way to decrease mortality is to lower the viral load. I think that's going to be my focus, though I might still use ginger as a combo stomach calmer/mapk inhibitor. I also still haven't discarded the idea of using elderberry preventatively. I mean, it's just so damn effective against the normal flu, and depending on the half life and a body's TNF strage capacity, you might be able to let it cycle out after the first day (although the hope is to prevent the first day).

Even though Avian Flu is one of my big4 fears, I'm having a hard time spending much money on it because its all so specific, not to mention that if it takes a few years to hit, shelf lives might run out.


John