Stanislaw Rajmund Burzynski, Stanislaw R. Burzynski, Stanislaw Burzynski, Stan R. Burzynski, Stan Burzynski, S. R. BURZYNSKI, S. Burzynski, Arthur Burzynski, Hippocrates Hypocrite Hypocrites Critic Critics Critical HipoCritical
Traditionally, Thanksgiving is best known as the Holiday that the Detroit Lions get the “stuffing” knocked out of them
However, this year, it’s time to tender the tainted twisted trophy of ThanksgivingTurkey-Lurkey to Detroit’s toasted triumvirate treat of two-faced twerk-salad troll turpitude, and I have the temerity to tinker and tamper until I pay tribute with therapeutic levels of Thoreauness in response to GorskGeek’smisinformation, disinformation, and MisDisInformation (Missed ‘Dis Information)
Wednesday, 12/21/2005, Indianapolis, Indiana-based Eli Lilly and Company was treated to truthification, in connection with their illegal promotion (misbranding) of pharmaceutical drug EVISTA; (FDA approved for prevention and treatment of osteoporosis in post-menopausal women), in the:
a. prevention in risk of breast cancer
b. reduction in risk of breast cancer
Alleged in information, promoted drug as effective for reducing risk of breast cancerEVEN AFTER PROPOSED LABELING FOR THIS USE SPECIFICALLY REJECTED by FDA [1]
GorskGeek, being the breast cancer oncology specialist he claims to be, and so concerned about breast cancer patients that he is that “guy” who speaks out passionately about issues like the 10-yearAmerican Cancer Society Cancer Facts & Figures, “Estimated Breast Cancer Deaths for Women”, which reflect that in 2002, 39,600 (15%) women were estimated to die from breast cancer, and this year, 2013, the estimate is 39,620 (14%), which is 20 women MORE than 10-years ago, and who rails tirelessly about the ACS’s“Estimated New Breast Cancer cases in Women”, which 10-years ago was 203,500 (31%) in 2002, and now, in 2013 is 232,340 (29%), which is ONLY
28,840 MORE than 10-years ago [2]
Now THAT’s progress !
GorskGeek, of course, must accomplish all this under his breath
But I’m sure you’re wondering, dear reader, what was GorskGeek’soutraged blog about this American pharmaceutical manufacturer coughing up $36 MILLION ?
Well, let me tell you … just as soon as I find it
Wait for it
Wait for it
Wait for it
GorskGeek was unable to bring himself to blog about Evista until exactly one year later, on 12/21/2006, and even then, he was “mum’s the word” about the breast cancer claims [3]
Perhaps GorskGeek just “knew” that eventually Evista would finally be approved by the FDA for Eli Lilly’spreventing or reducing risk of breast cancer claims on 9/13/2007, and who were those paper-pushing FDA apparatchiks to prevent Lilly from implementing their “Internal business plan” ? [4-9]
GorskGeek wouldn’t want to damage his slim and non-existent chance of getting some Eli Lilly money for research, by blogging anything that might in any way be possibly construed as him saying anything negatory about the BIG Pharma teat he longs to suck off of
After all, Bob ‘n’ Weave Blaskiewicz (who sees every molehill as a mountain), did say about GorskGeek, 9/28/2013 [10]:
—————————————————————— 1:58:04
—————————————————————— “But he is a, the thing is, the thing is, you thing you have to understand is Gorski, Gorski is a genuine expert, in matters re re regarding on oncology studies“
“I mean, he has a”
“He, He’s able to convince people, he’s able to convince people, on the strength of his record, to give him money to carry out research”
“People who know what they’re talking about”
“To give him money to carry out his research”
“Right ?”
—————————————————————— 1:59:00
——————————————————————
Yeah, right
Bobby 🙂
GorskGeek is hoping for a Happy Thanksgiving Golden Parachute; which is where he helps whistleblow about illegal BIG Pharma activity regarding some drug(s), which leaves him as the beneficiary of some funds like Mr. H. Dean Steinke, former Merck employee and his $68,190,000 MILLION from the federal government and states share of settlement amounts:
—————————————————————— $44,690,000 MILLION – Mr. H. Dean Steinke, former Merck employee from federal share of settlement amount(1997 – 2001)
—————————————————————— $23.5 MILLION – Mr. H. Dean Steinke, former Merck employee from the states share of settlement amount(1997 – 2001) ——————————————————————
Next, GorskGeek goes off on his fave autism prescription antipsychotic drug Risperdal, and the 11/4/2013, Monday, allegations concerning Global health care giantJohnson & Johnson (J&J) and its subsidiaries, $2.2 BILLION + fine regarding J&J Subsidiary Janssen(1999 – 2005) actions [11]
====================================== REFERENCES:
====================================== [1] – 12/21/2005
—————————————————————— EVISTA (FDA approved for prevention and treatment of osteoporosis in post-menopausal women)
—————————————————————— Eli Lilly and Company, Indianapolis, Indiana-based company
—————————————————————— 12/21/2005, Wednesday
—————————————————————— $36 MILLION
——————————————————————
In connection with illegal promotion of pharmaceutical drug
——————————————————————
Pleading guilty to criminal count of violating Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act by misbranding drug
——————————————————————
In addition to criminal plea
agreed to settle civil Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act liabilities by entering into consent decree of permanent injunction
——————————————————————
Charged in criminal information filed with violation of Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, following investigation by Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Office of Criminal Investigations
——————————————————————
Plea agreement signed by Lilly and United States
Complaint for permanent injunction
Consent decree of permanent injunction signed by company and United States
——————————————————————
Information alleges 1st year’s sales of drug in U.S. were disappointing compared to original forecast
——————————————————————
According to information 10/1998 – company reduced forecast of drug’s 1st year’s sales in U.S. from $401 million to $120 million
——————————————————————
Internal business plan noted:
“Disappointing year versus original forecast.”
——————————————————————
Information alleges in order to expand sales of drug, Lilly sought to broaden market for drug by promoting it for unapproved uses
——————————————————————
Information alleges strategic marketing plans and promotion touted drug as effective in preventing and reducing risk of diseases for which drug’s labeling lacked adequate directions for use
——————————————————————
According to information: Evista
1. brand team
2. sales representatives
promoted drug for: a.prevention in risk of breast cancer b.reduction in risk of breast cancer
c. reduction in risk of cardiovascular disease
——————————————————————
Under provisions of Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, drug misbranded when labeling didn’t bear adequate directions for each of intended uses
——————————————————————
Alleged in information, promoted drug as effective for reducing risk of breast cancer even after proposed labeling for this use specifically rejected by FDA
——————————————————————
Information alleges executed illegal conduct using number of tactics, including:
1. One-on-one sales pitches by sales representatives promoting drug to physicians about off-label uses of drug
2. Sales representatives trained to prompt or bait questions by doctors in order to promote drug for unapproved uses
3. Encouraging sales representatives promoting drug to send unsolicited medical letters to promote drug for unapproved use to doctors on their sales routes
4. Organizing “market research summit’ during which drug was discussed with physicians for unapproved uses, including reducing risk of breast cancer
5.
a. Creating
b. distributing
to sales representatives “Evista Best Practices” videotape, in which sales representative states “Evista truly is the best drug for the prevention of all these diseases” referring to:
1). osteoporosis 2). breast cancer
3). cardiovascular disease
——————————————————————
Complaint for permanent injunction alleges executed illegal conduct using number of tactics, including:
1. Training sales representatives to promote drug for prevention and reduction in risk of breast cancer by use of medical reprint in way that highlighted key results of drug and thereby promoted drug to doctors for unapproved use
2. Some sales representatives were instructed to hide disclosure page of reprint which noted:
a. “All of the authors were either employees or paid consultants of Eli Lilly at the time this article was written,”
b. “The prescribing information provides that “The effectiveness of [Evista] in reducing the risk of breast cancer has not yet been established.””
3. Organizing “consultant meetings” for physicians who prescribed drug during which unapproved uses of drug discussed
4. Calculating incremental new prescriptions for doctors who attended Evista advisory board meetings in 1998
5. advisory board meetings included discussion of unapproved uses for drug
6. By measuring and analyzing incremental new prescriptions for doctors who attended advisory board meetings, Lilly was using this intervention as tool to promote and sell drug
——————————————————————
In addition to agreeing to plead guilty to criminal information and plea agreement signed by Lilly, settlement with United States includes following components:
(a) agreed to settle civil Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act liabilities by entering into consent decree of permanent injunction
(1). As part of consent decree, agreed to comply with terms of permanent injunction, which will require company to implement effective training and supervision of marketing and sales staff for drug, and ensure any future off-label marketing conduct is detected and corrected
(2). agreed to be permanently enjoined from directly or indirectly promoting drug for use in:
a.preventing or reducing risk of breast cancer
b. reducing risk of cardiovascular disease
c. or for any other unapproved use in manner that violates Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act unless and until FDA approves drug for additional use or uses
——————————————————————
(b) as part of consent decree, agreed to hire and utilize independent organization to conduct reviews to assist Lilly in assessing and evaluating Lilly’s
1. systems
2. processes
3. policies
4. procedures
relating to promotion of drug and company’s compliance with consent decree
—————————————————————— FDA made following announcement to postmenopausal women who have taken drug for prevention or treatment of osteoporosis:
—————————————————————— “No postmenopausal woman who has taken Evista for the prevention or treatment of osteoporosis is affected by this action, as this matter today relates only to unapproved uses of Evista.”
——————————————————————
Defendant agreed to plead guilty to charge in information
——————————————————————
Defendant agreed to resolve complaint for permanent injunction by agreeing to consent decree of permanent injunction
—————————————————————— http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2005/December/05_civ_685.html
====================================== [2] – 11/13/2013 – The War on Cancer (I don’t think it means, what you think it says it means) #Winning?:
—————————————————————— https://stanislawrajmundburzynski.wordpress.com/2013/11/13/httpcancer-orgacsgroupscontentepidemiologysurveilancedocumentsdocumentacspc-036845-pdf/
====================================== [3] – 12/21/2006 – On the messiness of evidence-based medicine
—————————————————————— http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2006/12/21/the-messiness-of-evidencebased-medicine/
====================================== [4] – 9/13/2007 – FDA Approval for Raloxifene Hydrochloride (Brand name(s): Evista®): Approved for breast cancer risk reduction:
—————————————————————— http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/druginfo/fda-raloxifene-hydrochloride
====================================== [5] – 9/14/2007 – FDA Approves New Uses for Evista: Drug Reduces Risk of Invasive Breast Cancer in Postmenopausal Women:
—————————————————————— http://www.fda.gov/newsevents/newsroom/pressannouncements/2007/ucm108981.htm
====================================== [6] – 9/17/2007 – EvistaApproved for Reducing Breast Cancer Risk:
—————————————————————— http://www.fda.gov/ForConsumers/ConsumerUpdates/ucm048474.htm
====================================== [7] – 2007
——————————————————————
====================================== Pete talks with Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski
—————————————————————— December 2011 (1:02:30)
======================================
How did you kind of get into this, into this field in the 1st place ?
Uh well, it was a coincidence, ’cause obviously I made discovery of new chemicals, peptides which is in blood, and I noticed that they were deficient in patients with cancer, and there was a curiosity, why there was such deficiency, and I was interested what these peptides that I discovered, are doing in the body
So the connection with cancer was quite obvious
He, healthy people have abundance of these chemicals in blood Cancer patients have varied to none
So could be that cancer is another deficiency disease
So
So when you found this out
Yes. Mhmm ?
how did you feel ?
I mean, did you not just want to shout from the rooftops, and could you believe that you’d actually discovered something ?
Not yet
Of course I was skeptical, and I found something that was interesting, but obviously, it was just the very beginning and when I shared this news uh with some other guys, who are obviously much older than me, who, other guys who were professors, who ever, so (laugh) they began to laugh so much they almost died from laughing
Ok ?
That (laughing)
Wow, this guy would like to kill cancer
Forget it
Ok ?
That’s just not going to happen
What are you doing ?
Yes sir (laugh)
Well how did that affect you ?
Well it didn’t affect me too much because I knew that uh the science uh requires uh some successes and uh setbacks and I felt, well I still would like to know, what these peptides can do, and I would like to know what they can do, not only regarding cancer but in various aspects of body function
For instance, the activity of the heart, the activity of the uh uh G.I. tract
Whatever
Ok
I needed to expand this knowledge
Suddenly I found some like 119 new peptide fractions
Nobody ever heard of them
So I wanted to know
What do they do ?
And when I was in Poland I couldn’t have really do any further testing, because I didn’t have such possibility to require different group of people who would do the testing, and simply by working in the biochemistry laboratory I did not have such capacity, and obviously the budget for doing uh research was extremely small
Besides, I was continuously harassed by the communists and they were sending me to, eh, the military, so I couldn’t do much
I still did whatever I could
Then I came to U.S.
Oh so you came to U.S.
What, what year was that ?
It was 1970
I heard you came with not very much money in your pocket
Uh well it was better than where I came first to the U.K., because when I came first to U.K., I came practically with nothing, and uh, when I went to British uh Medical Student Association, they were going to give me 7 pounds for one month stay in U.K. (laughing)
You were supposed to get this money in Poland
Yeah
(laughing) Sorry about that
So ultimately they decided to give me 7 pounds, and obviously at that time it was a lot of money, so with 7 pounds I was able to survive a month
(laughing) Good luck (laughing)
But in U.S., I was allowed by the communist government to $15, which again, was equivalent probably to 7 pounds, whatever (laughing)
So you came here with $15
I smuggled another 10
Yeah
So the proper balance was like
So what
So what did you do when you got here ?
Well, ehhh, when I arrived I was uh, uh, uh, trying to get ahold of my relatives
My uncle that lived in Bronx
Yeah
And uh I officially came to visit him and uh I was expecting him to see me at the airport, and surely enough he came to the airport but uh at the time he was an elderly man
He was close to 80, and eh, he probably went to a different part of Kennedy airport, so he couldn’t find me
So I was stuck in the airport
This was Holiday
This was 4th of uh September, which was a Labor Day, and so I couldn’t get uh uh to his apartment
So finally I spent most of this money for the cab, the taxi rides to his apartment
Some, like $13 worth
You had $2 left
Ye, Yeah
Plus the $10
Sure
Well, so then I stay uh I, I was obviously in the family’s, I couldn’t
Yeah
I, I don’t need to worry about it
So obviously I had a food and lodging, and uh, still I was trying to get hold of some of the people whom I knew were doing the research in the area, whi, which I was interested
Mhmm
which was peptide research, and uh trying to see if I can advance my research
And then I thought, well, if I go back to Poland, I didn’t expect to stay
And in the meantime uh my job at the university in Poland was terminated, and I wondered they needed my position for the woman who was the wife of the 3rd Secretary of the communist party
Finally when I was terminated from my job, uh, there was no need for me to go back, because I would not be able to find job anywhere in Poland, because obviously everything was controlled by communist
So that I decided to stay and to look for the possible, possibility for me to find a job in the U.S.
And wha, what job did you find ?
Um
So you were in New York ?
Yes, I was very active, of course since I was involved in the research
I knew the key people who were involved in peptide research
There were not many of them, but at least there was one good team in New York and Columbia
Um, there was another one at, uh, Cleveland Clinic, and there was another one in Houston, and so, uh, I check with all of them and, uh, the place in New York was unavailable because they hired, um, somebody, um, about a week before I came
Uh but uh, uh, I was invited to the interview to Houston
I was surprised but uh, prepared for my trip and I arrived to Houston and had interview with a professor at Baylor College of Medicine and he gave me the employment, and so it was relatively simple
And then what were you doing on like a day-to-day basis ?
Uh, well, uh, when I arrived to Houston I uh, obviously received a job
I received the job as “Research Associate,” and um, obviously this was associated with a reasonable salary, but the salary was paid once a month, so I had to think, what do I do for the 1st half of the month, because I came in the middle of the month, and didn’t have any money (laughing: both), but some good people loaned me some money so I, I have enough money to rent the apartment, and finally after I got my pay, I was able to do quite well, and I was able to advance, uh, in peptide research
So were you able to do your own research or
Absolutely. Absolutely
that they wanted you to do ?
Absolutely, and uh, I was quite lucky to join the team of the famous professor Professor George H
er, uh, who was initially professor of Sorbonne in Paris
Then in World War II he emigrated to U.K. and he was professor at Oxford, and so finally he came to U.S., and, uh, he put together the peptide research team
He needed people who know how to do analysis of peptides, so that’s why he hired me
And uh I uh told him that I have my own project, which is peptides, and if you wouldn’t mind that I do some research of mind, and he agreed
So basically this was gentleman agreement that I will spend 50% of my time working for him, and spend 50% time, working in my area
Uh, the equipment and the instruments were the same, so it wasn’t too difficult
And then you, and then when you had something to show then, when. when you had even more of something to show them, how was that received, because you see, I’ve really got something here ?
Ah
I think I’ve got something here
Absolutely, it was received with great curiosity, and, um, and obviously he needed people who could use, the cutting edge, uh, methods for peptide analysis, and that’s what I knew about, but I couldn’t use this for him because I didn’t have funds to do it, but I knew exactly what needs to be done, and on the other hand, uh, this was great surrounding because just across the corridor, another team receive a Nobel Prize for working on peptides
The only problem is, uh, one of these researchers uh was of Polish origin who received Nobel Prize for peptides (laughing)
Yeah
began, uh, fighting with the other one and finally his job was terminated because he punched (laughing)
Punched him ?
the other guy in the nose (laughing)
Yeah
Huh
So, but the good thing about it is that ultimately I inherited uh, their equipment
Yeah
for peptide research, so
Wow. So that must have been like a, like, a, a child in a sweet shop
Absolutely, so was a great coincidence so
So then you were really able to, to, to, to look at it in more detail, and ?
Absolutely, so then of course I was really out of work uh, and the team of Dr. Unger, and also, uh, I was spending a lot of time, uh, progressing in my research, which was very important uh, of course it means long hours uh, ’cause of, uh, 8 hours I would spending working for Dr. Unger and probably not 8 hours until midnight working on my uh, project, but uh, I enjoy it
In the meantime I need to prepare for exams because I wanted to have a license
So I was lucky because uh, within 3 months I was able to pass exams to uh, to naturalize my diploma, and then uh, just, uh, the day, on the eve of my birthday, on January 22nd, President Nixon had a speech in which he promised American people that by 200th anniversary of America, they would have a cancer cure, and no limits would be set on the funding
So then I thought, well, if that’s the case, perhaps I should apply for the grant also, and I did
It was crazy idea because I could barely understand when the people were talking to me (laughing: both)
Well I decided to put together grant application, in to the National Cancer Institute, and include the project on the peptides which I discovered, and I was surprised when this was approved
So then in uh 1971 I get approved as Principle Investigator, to do the project, which included eh, the top people from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, and from Baylor College of Medicine, um, and I was supervising this
I was at that time 28 years old, but I was supervising the guys who were famous, and who were some like 60 years old (laughing)
Wow
and so the money was coming to me from the National Cancer Institute, and I was uh daily uh, running the project, sharing, obviously with the guys from M.D. Anderson, so, and going ahead with the research, so
and of course at that time I was disappointed to have to (work ?) with M.D. Anderson and Baylor, and then I could move independently what I was doing
So at what point were you actually, able to start testing on people
Mmm
It took a long time because
I mean you couldn’t wait, right ?
Yeah it took a long time because obviously um, initially you have to go through a lot of pre-clinical testing
The 1st time it was uh, around the beginning of ’77, yeah
So then we began phase I clinical trials, and this phase I clinical trials were approved by one of the very good hospitals in Houston, which is part of the hospital chain American Medical International, and they interviewed my project and their Institutional Review Board approved it for clinical trials
Well then I did my 1st clinical trials, phase I clinical trial, with a medication that I am not using at this moment because we made further progress of course, at a hospital, and this hospital at that time was called Twelve Oaks Hospital
At this time it’s called River Oak Hospital
Yep
Yes
And then, at what, at what, was there a time where you realized: This is actually working ?
Well, now this was in 1977, and (laughing) surprisingly, uh, uh, perhaps one of the 1st successful case where you can really, document a clear-cut improvement by doing the scan before and after
It shows tremendous decrease of uh, uh, tumors which corresponded to colon cancer which spread to the liver
(This guy was ?)
(laughing)
(?)
(laughing)
And uh, his case was so interesting, that when I sent it for press, the editors decided to put us on the cover, of the journal, the scan
Yeah
They decided to put on the cover of Science, showing the tumor before, and, after the treatment
Eh, so this was uh , obviously
And then what happened ?
Didn’t that m kinda, didn’t word spread like wildfire and people, more and more people want to come and see you ?
Ah, Absolutely, well the 1st excitement occurred, basically what the President Nixon promised ok
That he would deliver
Yeah
cancer cure uh, by ’70, uh 6, 1976, and we did, ok, and we did deliver cancer cure
Yeah
by 1976, 1977 ok, and um, the um, main uh event was the presentation of uh our theory on our research, on perhaps one of the largest uh scientific (congress ? conference ?) in America, involved 19,000 uh, researchers attended
Eh this was annual meeting of the Federation of the Societies of Experimental Medicine and Biology
It happened that at that time it was in Anaheim, California
Uh, I sent uh, uh, the abstract of my presentation, and I was simply, patiently waiting until this would be shown, which was in ’76
In June ’76 right before 4th of July, and uh, I was surprised when they notified me that um, my abstract was selected out of one of few, which was in great interest of the news media, like Associated Press, for instance, and then when I did my presentation, then Associated Press decided to make a release of this, and then you can read about it in newspapers all over the world
In uh, (laughing) distant places like Buenos Aries, receiving CBS newspaper clips from all corners of the world
And what was that like for you ?
I mean, how did that feel, just to see that your name was, all over the world ?
This was the 2nd time, what (?) this happened to me, because 1st time it made such news, by working on brain peptides with Professor Unger; this was around ’72, and suddenly, this wasn’t so much of my
Yeah, but still it was your (interest ?)
involvement, but I was working together with Professor Unger, and we made a great news, by discovery of, certain peptide in the brain, and then it spread all over the world, and then again, uh, uh, CBS
What was that like ?
I mean, how did you feel when you saw ?
Well, uh, it was surprising because uh suddenly we got uh news people coming, and the TVs from various countries, especially from Europe, for instance, from variety of corners, like from Europe, from New Zealand, from Brazil
You name it ok ?
Eh, so there was a great excitement about it, but 1st time that this excitement happened was, is around ’72, uh, really, eh, is typically what happened after such excitement, is the ? iation ?)
ok
Yeah (laugh)
Well, uh, (laughing) the uh, establishment is and this um will attack you and will try to destroy you
Did you know that was going to happen before ?
I knew it would because in Poland, uh, my father’s, uh, gave me the book of um MIT Professor, uh, Thomas Kuhn
(here’s a guy ? try to translate to (?)
(laughing)
(?) yeah
Yeah, probably
(laughing) sure
and then uh, this was uh, the book which was titled eh, Structures of Scientific Revolutions
It happens that this book was translated to Polish language as couple of years after it was printed, in U.S.; which was around uh, I think 19 uh, 64 probably, ok
So then I read the book, and the book shows uh, how, eh, the paradigm shift occurs, ok, and the, it never fails
It always goes through the same stages
1st it’s short period of excitement, and the a long time of harassment and persecution, and then finally the brief period when uh, uh, if you survive, then uh, the other people say
well it’s obvious
We always knew (laughing) that this
Yeah
was going to happen, ok ?
So I knew what was going to happen, uh, but uh, it was hard for me to believe it uh that, uh, in the 20th century, 21st century it could happen, ok, but then uh, when uh, I began going through this, it was like going to some uh, unpleasant disease
You read about it in the books and
Yeah (?)
then uh, you finding one symptom after another, and it affects you
Yeah
and you know that it could be deadly,
(?) survive
Well you could have ended up in prison, right ?
Yeah
(?)
You may die before uh, you be able to do anything
Mhmm
So the advice of the author of the book, was that you have to start early to make some medical discovery, because you probably have years of harassment in front of you, and probably the best chance that uh, you get accepted if you live longer than your opponent, because some guys will never accept you (laughing)
Yeah
until they die
So that’s what happened
Well then, of course, I witnessed what happened with Professor Unger
Yeah, he made the great news, and obviously I contributed to what he had, but he was uh, my boss, and then obviously I did not much, suffer much from retaliation, but he did, ok
So there was retaliation, and uh, they accused him of everything possible, uh, finally causing for him to move from Houston to Memphis, Tennessee, eh, zzz, about year later he died
So unfortunately his research was never brought to the time when it was accepted, ok
It was great research, ok, and if had really to more resource and time I can bring this to be accepted, because this isn’t a completely different field
This is brain function, memory, and peptides working in the brain
But at that time unfortunately the project was killed, which is great loss for humanity, eh, ’cause the discoverer passed away, and the product was gone together with him
It can be still resurrected, and I think it will be
Eh, so then, for me, eh, it meant only advancement, unfortunately, because, uh, when uh, uh, he was stripped from the funds, I received funding from the National Cancer agency funding from the university, and I was able to support him, because he was stripped of his grants and funds
So he was able to move forward with his research, but finally when he moved, I inherited very large laboratories
My laboratory was located in 3 buildings
So the lab space and uh, uh, some prime location, in the medical school
So then I did very well, then, of course, the publicity occurred, and this publicity was centered around me, not around both of us
Yeah
at that time, in ’76, and then again there was about 1/2 a year when there was a great enthusiasm, uh, good wishes, whatever, and after that, a retaliation occurred, ok
So then obviously
Mhmm
And what was, what, what was at the heart of the retaliation ?
Uh, well,
The fact that their people didn’t want this to come to the fore ?
Initially there was some overtures to take away the discovery from me, and uh, for instance, uh, uh, uh, Baylor College congratulated me
I received diploma, so suddenly became superstar, ok (laughing)
Yeah
and then, of course, uh, the wise people, the business people from the university said: “Look, probably we should talk now about patents, we should talk about pharmaceutical companies, we should try to, somehow, put this to motion,” ok, and that’s what we did
So then uh, we talked to some of the best lawyers in the country
Of course, uh, the university uh, are in control of this
There were visits of uh, pharmaceutical companies
I remember one of them came from the research center in U.K., from High uh, Wycombe , and this was so (encouraging that ?) was very interested, what we do
But then uh, the intention was just to take uh, my, uh, in, invention away from me, and obviously
Mhmm
I would have very little to, to, do to promote this, to develop this any further
So I thought about it and I felt that I’m not going to do it
There then uh, I was offered to join the mainstream cancer research at Baylor cancer medicine, and obviously uh, I would receive much better title, of professor
Yeah
and obviously there would be much better equipped laboratory, but again eh, they wanted me to, completely quit private practice of medicine, ’cause at the same time I was practicing medicine, which many researchers were doing
I was working at Baylor College and then I was practicing medicine uh, outside Baylor College, in the group of the other doctors
So in this way I had some independence, because obviously, I could always practice medicine (laughing)
And did you always want to keep your independence,
Yes
and did you know that was always a good thing ?
That’s right, that’s right
Because I, I did not want to be uh, at the mercy of the university or the government
Uh, but I still wanted to stay in academic surrounding, because obviously I came from a family which has great tradition of academic careers
So that’s something which obviously my father was always telling me that I should be really staying in the university, ok
Eh, uh, uh, but finally I decided that I was not going to accept this offer because uh, why should I resign from my private practice
Mmm
It didn’t hurt my research in any way
So I decided to continue, and uh, then that’s when the retaliation occurred, and uh, I was (crazy ?), harassed, and attacked, and finally
And how were you harassed ?
I mean, letters or (peop ?)
Mmm, well, as I could do the research for such a long time, because really, this was some like 7 years at the university, because uh, very few people in the university knew what I was doing, because I was only responding to the National Cancer Institute, and uh, I was not part of the mainstream cancer research center
What happened is that uh, (laugh) I was employed by the Department of Anesthesiology, which obviously, on the surface has nothing to do with cancer, but, who cares ?
I was receiving grants from the National Cancer Institute, and so Anethesiology was a very wealthy department, and they had a lot of space, but they were doing very little research
So they wanted to do some type of research, and uh, the chairman of the department was supportive of my doing cancer research
So basically I conducted uh, Anethesiology
laboratory into cancer, into cancer research laboratory, and very few people knew about it
They learn about it
when uh, the Associated Press (laughing) broke the news
So then uh, the retaliation happened
Mhmm
and then they wanted me to join the mainstream, but obviously I was enjoying very much (laughing) working, in peace and tranquility, and responding only to the National Cancer Institute
So then uh, what happened at that time was that uh, obviously Dr. Unger, moved to another university, and um, uh, the chairman of the department uh, his uh, uh, employment was terminated, because it uh, he was involved in uh, the war between 2 superstars of (the ?)
One of Dr. DeBakey
and the other one was Dr. Cooley
They were 2 famous, eh, eh, cardiovascular surgeons, who were competing with each other
Ehhh, Dr., eh, the chairman of the department, was on the side of Dr. Cooley, but the boss of, uh, Baylor College was Dr. DeBakey
So after Dr., Dr. DeBakey
learned that, uh, the sympathy of Chairman of the Department; which was Dr. Cooley, his job was terminated
So then they, took another man; very old, professor, who was already retired, to be the chairman of the department
They, he knew nothing about, any type of research (laugh), especially cancer research, and, uh, once I decided to not join the mainstream, Baylor Research Center, eh, the people who are in charge of Baylor Research Center, they put a pressure, on the new chairman of the department, and they frightened him, saying look, you are, uh, in a charge of anesthesiology, but here’s a guy doing cancer research, eh, and see this was a great, uh, like liability to you, and pretty soon he may be sued, uh, without knowing what he’s doing
Ok
So then, uh, they, they, um, brainwashed the old man, and he decided to strip me, slowly from my laboratories, eh, and, and, harass me
Ok, uh, ultimately, he sent me the letter that, uh, in which he informed me that he does not see any connection between, uh, my research and anesthesiology; which was obvious, eh, but obviously I was doing the research which made the university famous, more or less
Yeah
So then one thing to another, and I decided, no, I am not going to work with, in this environment anymore, and I decided to do, try to do on my own, to start my own laboratory
So that’s what happened
Ok
And then you did that ?
You had your own, laboratory ?
Yes, and then I decided, this was just the beginning of 1977, and, uh, e, we put together a laboratory; of course I already had private practice, and, uh, I was still working
In your private practice
Yes
you were still seeing patients ?
Absolutely, absolutely
Seeing any results ?
Yeah, seeing patients, getting results
I began phase I clinical trials
Mhmm
in the hospital where I was seeing patients
I had patients at that time, in about 2 or 3 different hospitals, uh, but the hospital, where I get permission to do clinical trials, was a most supportive, and that’s why I did it this way, and, uh, obviously it was necessary for me to build from scratch, the laboratory, the research laboratory
I decided that I just, uh, I just, uh, make some funds in, our private practice, and at that time, of course, this was just, um, general (?) private practice, internal medicine private practice, em, and, uh, the funds which I produced in private practice I can use to, put together the laboratory, and that’s what we did
Ok
Step by step we build the laboratory, and we expanded our private practice
So basically, I switch from the government and then I found it best to fund the research, just privately funded research, which nothing unusual, thhh, some like 50 years before everyone was doing it
Everyone is doing this
Yes, and there’s still some people, especially in the U.K., who are doing this
Ok
Yeah
Um, the most of the discoveries were made through the, sss, through the research that was funded, by the researchers
Mhmm
There are also some, wealthy people who donated the money to do it
So only after World War II, this was, um, the system was created where, the researchers became, um, really became the slaves so, the government
Mhmm
and pharmaceutical companies, and new companies, and if they do not receive the money, they couldn’t do anything
This way I could have independence, and, uh, do whatever I want
Yes
So at what point did it get to where, action was taken against you, and you knew that you were going to have to go to court ?
The action, um, um, started very soon, and the, and began at the lowest level, which is like, county level, and then you go obviously
Mhmm
higher as you move along, and when, uh, I was leaving, uh, the university, the chairman promised me that (laugh) when I leave, uh, the obviously, quote, unquote, “They will bust my ass”
Ok ?
Yeah
(laughing)
When leaving the university
When I was leaving the university ?
Yeah
Yes
And, uh, he promised me that, uh, they will trigger the action from Harris County’s Medical Society; which is probably the lowest level of harassment and just, the somewhat prestigious society if you are are a good doctor practicing medicine, in Harris County, where Houston is, then you should be a member of the Harris County Medical Society
Uh, if you are not a member of Harris County Medical Socity they won’t grant you privileges to see patients in hospital
So this was important to be a member of the Harris County Medical Society because I was practicing medicine
Why do you think
Why do you think they wanted to stop you ?
Why did’d they wanted me to stop ?
Yeah
Well, probably just for the heck of it
I don’t know
(Laughing: both)
Ok
Well do you think they were threatened by you ?
Well, I doubt it
Their probably some type of revenge
Ehhh, since I didn’t yield to their harassment, and I decided to do whatever I was doing, and decide to do it on my own
Mhmm
and they felt, well, let’s try to kick his behind if we can
Ok
Yeah
Well I don’t think I was, uh, causing any threat to them at all, because this was really, large institution
So it escalated ?
Yes
Just starting at the lowest level
It was, eh, unpleasant because they were dragging me to like, holy inquisition proceeding, explain what I was doing, and basically they’re trying to force me to stop what I was doing by using various ways
Obviously they didn’t have any, uh, reason to do it because, uh, my clinical research; which I was doing in the most, done under the supervision of, Institutional Review Board, and before I started anything I asked, uh, I retained medical lawyers, and I asked them to check, if I can, uh, for instance, do the research to use medicine, and use it, in a patient, and they
checked with this, State authorities, Federal authorities, and at that time it was perfectly alright
So I was doing, everything, legally
So, they really couldn’t do much, but, they were harassing me, asking for me to give them a lot of documents, whatever, and suddenly, all of it stopped
It stopped because they were exposed by news media
Yeah
So, when the article was written about it, they disappeared from, the horizon, and then they never, harass me since then (laugh)
Yeah
I think it’s, lasted probably for, 2 or 3 years, and then it was gone, so
And then, and then how did that end up ?
How did you end up going to court for the 1st time then ?
Oh well, so obviously there was no, uh, issue of going to court at that time, it was only the issue that, I might not be a member of, uh
But you might not have been able to practice medicine
the medical society, and then I would not be able to see patients in the hospital
Ok
So this was deliberate, ok, and at that time, m, most of my patients were treated in the hospital, because I didn’t have yet the system to use treatment outside the hospital, like for instance the pumps that we are using now
They did not exist at that time
So it was necessary to use I.V. posts
Mhmm
and, uh, and heavy pump, heavy treatment
So then, uh, so this was, uh, it started around ’78, it continued for a couple of years, and then nothing happened after that
I was visited by, um, FDA people, but we have pretty constructive meeting
They didn’t bother me, and, uh, the next attack occurred in a 1983, and this was by, uh, Food and Drug Administration
So, suddenly I was sued, and, um, they really wanted to put me out of business
Ok
They didn’t just want to put you out of business
I mean, they wanted you, they wanted you to go to prison
No, in ni, 1983, they wanted me out of business
Right, just out of business
Yeah
Don’t want you practicing
Shut down, what I am doing, and they did it, secretly (laugh)
Most of this actions occurred around, uh, just before say Passover, and Easter
Ok
Yeah
Every year
It never failed
Ok (laughing), a, and a usually they were attacking, uh, uh
Someone
No, no
For instance it happened for instance I was away, and, uh, they were filing papers in court, like, um, around 5 p.m. on Thursday, ok, and Friday was day off, because was big Friday, Good Friday
Ok
So then, obviously, um, they then
realized I’d be away because I participated in some T.V. program, and they want to do it while I was away, but, uh, it so happens that
a one of the friendly lawyers was in court at the time, and he overheard whatever they were doing, ok (laughing),they were going for injunction, ok, and so then, uh, I would be stopped immediately
I wouldn’t be able to do much, ok, until the judge would reverse it, but, uh, he read about it and he prepared immediately temporary restraining order, and filed at the same time (laughs)
Yeah
So then, uh, I could practice without any interruptions, but, uh, then, of course,
So do you think of all the people that were trying to stop you
Yeah
Do you think any of those people actually, really, genuinely believed that you were causing harm to people
Hmmm
or do you think that they were just stopping you because ?
I think some stupid people,was at the lower level, like, uh, uh, some lower level FDA agents, they didn’t know what they were doing
They were manipulated, ok, but the guys who above, they knew very well (laughs) that, I was right
They knew what they were doing
Absolutely
They knew you were doing something
Absolutely, yes
groundbreaking
They knew very well, and that’s the reason why they attack me
Ok
Yeah
It’s obvious
So this 1st encounter, was relatively brief
Uh, we went to court, which was Federal court, and the judge, uh, would rule in our favor, and the judge, uh, uh, in the verdict, uh, cleared me from any, of the charges, and, uh, I found that I could, uh, I could treat anybody, by using my methods, but I cannot really, uh, sell medications outside the State of Texas, and that’s what I was not doing anyway
So really,
the judge
affirmed what I was doing
Right
That I’m free to use my invention, and treat people in the State of Texas, which made, of course, the government, uh, people furious, and they threatened the judge
They send the judge a letter saying that, if the judge will not rule their way, then they will go after me with criminal investigation, uh, with seizures, uh, eh, grand jury investigation
That’s what they did as the next step
When was the next step ?
How many years later was that ?
Well again, there was some like couple of years when it was relative quiet
Of course, in order to be, eh, in, eh, in order to do what I was doing, it was necessary for me to have inspection, by the inspectors, approved by the FDA, who
check our manufacturing facility, and, ah, certify that what ever we do, we do right, and there are no discrepancies
So this was obviously something, very difficult, because obviously we knew that the FDA inspectors
will always find something wrong, you know
Yeah
So these agents are trained to always find something wrong, but anyway, at inspection, uh, found we are doing everything perfect
Ok (laughs)
So we were able to pass the inspection
Uh, we are in full compliance with what is called good manufacturing practices, and then everything was quite until about 3 years later when, uh, there was a raid on our clinic by the FDA, and seizure of, ah, medical records, and then there was another, uh, obviously, ah, another, uh, part of the war began, and then, uh, we file a lawsuit against FDA, and, uh, as a result the judge forced the FDA to give back some, of the documents, and permit us to, uh, be able to copy the rest of the documents, and so then, uh, FDA began a grand jury process, and, uh, there was some, like 4 different grand juries, uh, ah, which did not find me, guilty of anything, and then finally 5th grand jury was able to indict me, which was in ’95
Ok
So when you were, when you were going to court; because I remember seeing in the
Yeah
Burzynski, the movie
Yes
I remember seeing in the photographs
Yeah
around here
Sure
there were lots and lots of people outside there (?)
Yeah
What was that like to see that ?
Oh well, ah, this was, uh, going for ever, going to court, and obviously I was going before this grand jury investigation, whatever, but ultimately, their lawsuit, uh, the trial began, in, ah, January of ’96, and, uh, it took a number of months
Ok
So I was going to court almost every day, and the people realized what was going on, and they were giving us a lot of support
So then you can see people outside the court
What was that like to see your patients ?
Well it was, ah, it was, ah, very good, uh, uh, show of (laughs)
Yeah
patient solidarity
They wanted obviously, to help us, and they knew that, uh, they have the power, and, uh, they knew that they were fighting for their lives
Ok ?
So they, uh, were dedicated people
It wasn’t easy because this was winter, and it was raining, and so it was cold weather, but obviously
Were you prepared to, to face what you could have faced, you know, that you actually could have gone to prison ?
Sure, yes
I, I knew, but I was, convinced that I am going to win
So, should I, obviously, statistically it was, uh, highly unlikely, but, uh (laugh)
Do you think that this will stop one day ?
That people will just get off your back, and (laugh)
(laughs)
you know
(?)
and can see what you’ve done
(?)
and, and see that there’s really something there
Absolutely
This is just the (?)
Absolutely, absolutely
I
That’s what I was convinced was going, to happen, and, uh, I was convinced that we are going to win, with FDA
Good, ’cause I mean, anyone does any research
Yeah
you know
I had this on here
Yeah, sure
which I’m sure you’ve seen, like on Wikipedia
Yeah
and what it says
That there’s no convincing evidence
Yeah, sure
that a randomized controlled trial has, you know
That your work, that, that there’s nothing there
Yeah
What’s that like when you come across that stuff
Do you just not read it, and just
So (laughs)
Simply don’t pay attention to it, because it, it’s not true
Ok
Yeah
You won’t be able to, do any, clinical research which we do, without convincing evidence, especially when you have the most powerful agency in the government which is against you
They’re against you, but you’ve been working with them for, for
Yes, so since 1997
Yes, but you see
Yeah
Obviously they didn’t have any sympathy to us because they lost
So they would love to find something which is wrong with what we are doing
They would love to prove that the treatment doesn’t
Yeah
So this is, very difficult
Ah, so the fact that they’ve, um, agreed that what we have has value, and they allow us to do phase 3 clinical trials, it means that we are right
Ok ?
Yeah
Because, uh, uh, nobody who didn’t have any, concrete evidence that it works, would be able to go as far
Ok
Yeah
So whatever Wikipedia says, well, I don’t care for them (laughing)
Ok, so, we, we talked a little bit about, what you, where you’ve come from, and what you’ve been through
As far as your treatment, um, to cancer, and this I’m very interested in, and why you don’t think high doses of chemotherapy is, is particularly helpful for the body, and what
Well it is generally wrong approach
It can help, some patients, wi, with a rare form of cancer, but only, eh, in limited capacity
Those who, are quote, unquote “cured”, usually die later on from adverse reactions, of chronic adverse reactions from chemotherapy or radiation, or they develop secondary cancer
So certainly, there is, this is not such a cure which you have in mind, that, use the treatment, patient recovers and lives normal life
Such cure does not exist for patients who are taking chemotherapy or radiation
They will always suffer, some problems
Either from cancer, or radiation, chemotherapy, and there is only small minority of patients who have advanced cancer who can, have long term responses
So obviously, this is unacceptable treatment
Of course, it was important at certain stage of development, but now, of course, uh, when we know more about cancer, it’s becoming, uh, unacceptable, and I think it will disappear, from the surface of the earth, in another 10 years, or 15 years, and, uh, in the medical textbook, this will be described as strange period of time, when people were using some barbaric treatment
Ok
Mmm
You have a number of different ways of treating cancer
So, one of them is the antineoplastons
Yes
This, this, this is the peptides
Mhmm
The, the this is the thing that my partner is on at the moment
Sure
in the clinical trial, and, uh, you’ve had some real great success
Mhmm
using that
Right ?
Yes
But you also have
Mhmm
another way, of, of, of treating, which is, using, it’s using some sort of chemotherapy, but in low doses
Well, um, um, whatever we are using we are using treatment which works on the genes
Antineoplastonswork on the genes, and they work on about 100 different genes
So what are they doing to the genes ?
Well, they work as molecular switches
They turn off the genes which are causing cancer, and turn on the genes which are fighting cancer
So, that’s what they do, and they produce this in about 100 different genes
It’s not enough, to control all cancer
Actually you can control some cancers, but not all of them, because you may have, numerous genes involved, in cancer
Well, for instance, in average case of breast cancer may have 50 abnormal genes involved
Uh, in, uh, like grade 3 brain tumors, for instance, anaplastic astrocytoma you might 80, or might be 100, but if, uh, you go to highly malignant tumors like, glioblastoma, you have, probably about 550
Eh, if you don’t cover such a spectrum of genes, you won’t, you’re not going to have good results
So that’s why, we know from the very beginning that we have some limitations
We can help some patients but not all of them, because, they have involvement of different genes which are causing, their cancer
So then you can still have these patients who are combining the treatmentof antineoplastons,with different medications which are in existence, which work on different genes, and this includes also some chemotherapy drugs, which are available
Eh, so this means that, um, for the patients for whom we, cannot use antineoplastons, because they are not in clinical trials, then we are using combination treatment, which consists of medication which already, approved as prescription medications, and, uh, by using the right combination by knowing which genes we need to attack, we get much better results
Now this also includes chemotherapy, but we never use, high-dose chemotherapy If necessary, we use low-dose chemotherapy, and when you use low-dose chemotherapy you don’t have, uh, toxicity, which is, bad
We use this for patients continuously, without much problem
So, so one of the main reasons of using low-dose chemotherapy is to try and keep your immune system strong, as well ?
No, to try to quickly decrease the size of the tumor, in combination with the other medications
We can use, for instance, low-dose chemotherapy and another medication which will increase activity,of chemotherapy, and as a result, you can have, as good, uh, uh, decrease of the tumor, with the low-doses
when you use heavy-dose
Well, there’s nothing unusual about it
For instance, uh, many doctors are using medications which are quite toxic
Mmm
And they, if they use the dosages, it’s helpful to the patient
The question is, what dosage will you use ?
If you use the dosages which are not toxic, it may still help the results, for instance, eh, the medication which was introduced, in mid, uh, 18th century for a particle for heart failure, in U.K. by Dr. Withering, which was digitalis extract
Obviously it was highly toxic medication
It can kill people, in dosages much smaller than chemotherapy, but if you use the right dosage, it can help people
It was helping people for over 200 years
So those are the question
What kind of dosage do you use, and what combination do you use, and then, it can be useful
How did work that out then ?
I mean, how did you work out
Mhmm
that using small dosages of chemotherapy, could be effective ?
Uh, well, uh, it’s not only based on, uh, our research, it’s based on the research of the other, doctors
There are numerous publications on the subject, and in many cases the low-dosages can be used more effective than high-dosages, and, uh, on the other hand, by doing genetic testing, we can identify, which, uh, medications are the best for the patient
‘Cause you use
(?)
’cause you use a lab, in Phoenix
Right ?
Correct, yes
And, and how did you find out about them ?
Um, how did you ?
Yeah
Well, uh, uh, frankly speaking (laughs), 1st time I find about it by, treating patients who’s referred to us by one of the best oncologists in the country
He was usually treating some movie stars (laughs)
Yeah
and I found that this patient had, uh, genetic testing done, and I got interested in this, and I found about this laboratory
It was some time ago, but anyway, while we were doing genetic testing before, but, uh, we didn’t use this laboratory yet, we did it, through some other laboratories, and such testing was much, much simpler
So, we are using such testing, for a number of years, but in the capacity we are using now, this is really the last 2 to 3 years
So what happens is someone’s, bit of their tissue gets sent off to this lab ?
Yeah, the tissue is sent to the laboratory, and, uh, they do, testing on the entire genome of 24,000 genes
They identify the abnormal genes, and they go in-depth, by studying what happened to these genes?
Are they mutated ?
Are they amplified ?
And then from this, we have, a lot of information, and ultimately we like to know, which medications we can use to treat genes
What we are doing, we are treating genes, rather than, the tumor, as such
Mhmm
And, uh, if you identify all the genes that are involved, and find out which medications we can use, we can have very good results
And that’s what you found ?
That’s right
So in some case you’re treating people that might have a certain type of cancer
Yes, mhmm
with a drug that was designed for a different type of cancer
Uh, that’s right, because we are treating the genes, and, uh, if you find out that, this particular patient has, uh, an abnormal gene, which is not typical for this cancer but we have medication
Hmmm
that works on this gene, that’s what we use
So I would imagine that to treat, uh, that to treat people, this way, is obviously the future
Everyone’s different
Everyone’s genetics are d, d, different
That’s right
genetic markers, but to treat them that way, would require a bit more work
That’s, uh, obviously (laughs) (a life’s ?) work
Uh, uh, we’ll, like, uh, not just simply for, eh, uh, 4 different types of lung cancer
Yeah
Maybe 100,000 different types of lung cancer, each with, different, uh, genetic signature, ok, and once you identify this, then you can treat, such patients logically, and have good results, and if you do it on the scale of, uh, the entire country, this would, uh, give you much better results, and, uh, great savings, because
Mmm
you won’t use expensive medications for everybody, but perhaps for 10% of the population, and then for this 10% of population is going to work
Yeah
Which means that these people will avoid disability
They won’t spend time in the hospital
Uh, they will have short course of treatment, and then they go back to work
So the government would understand, uh, that’s something that can give them a lot of savings
I think they will go for it
Eh, gene testing, eh, at this time is still, uh, relatively expensive
It’s covered by, uh, the insurance of the United States, but for people outside, may cost 5500 euros, for instance, but I think it will be substantially less expensive in the near future
I think it will be below $1,000 for complete testing
So for running the test, uh, uh, eh, and, uh, finding out which treatment, has the best chance, you can save, 100’s of 1,000’s of dollars for individual patients
Yeah, but obviously pharmaceutical companies probably wouldn’t be too happy about that
No, no
People aren’t going to be taking their medications anymore
Well obviously be mostly happy that they can sell a lot of medications, but some of them are beginning to pay the attention, because they have to, because if they don’t, their competitors, will pay the attention
Mmm
Obviously, they would like to have, possibly, the best possible results, in clinical trials, so now they begin to screen population of patients for clinical trials, and do some limited, genetic testing, but, so, of course, they do it, uh, for the better of clinical trials so have best results
Yeah
Doesn’t mean that they’ll do, do it when they sell medicine, to millions of people commercially
They may forget about mentioning this medicine works the best for
Yes
this population of patient (laughs)
So what’s your, your vision ?
Wha, wha, what do you, striving to achieve ?
Well what I am trying to achieve is to introduce the way we treat patients, in, in various countries in the world, and, uh, what this would accomplish is, 1st of all, much better results of the treatment, much simpler treatment where perhaps only 1% of patient would need hospitalization, which would, uh, result in great savings
Uh, the treatment, uh, will be done for shorter period of time
For instance, few months to get rid of the tumors, then, uh, perhaps a year, to stabilize the results, and then go back, working and living, ok, without cancer
This, uh, genetic, genomic testing would be absolutely done for every patient who will come for treatment, to identify, what is the best treatment combination indication
So that’s what I would like to foresee, and then, of course, um, immediately, you substantially reduce, the expenditures for medical
For instance, if, you assume that in the mid, medium-sized country, will spend, for instance, a billion dollar, for, socialized medical treatment which will coincide with hospitalization
Ok
Uh, then, uh, most of the cost is for hospitalization, and services necessary for keeping the patient in hospital, then treating adverse reactions, which are, occurring because of the poor selection of medications
Eh, then if you switch to the outpatient treatment because you use medications which are not going to give such bad, side-effects, because you select this medication based on genomic testing, ok, and then immediately instead of a billion dollars a year, you cut down your expenditures to about $100,000
Yeah
100 million dollars
Ok ?
Probably slash it 10 times
Ok ?
And then people will be happy because, ah, the don’t need to stay in the hospital for a long time
They have less adverse reactions
They can go to back to work, much sooner
Ok
So that’s what I, can foresee as, the treatmentin the future
Not really hospital-based treatment
Mhmm
for patients, and most hospitalization is required because of adverse reactions from chemotherapy, radiation, but outpatient treatment, much easier treatment, also medication given in tablet forms, for instince
And that’s what you’re doing here, right ?
I mean
Correct, yes correct
Usually in hospital, only, perhaps, for, one or two percent of patients, and, we would like to avoid it because when the patient goes to the hospital, he can pick up, some in-opportunistic infection, and then we are talking about more problem
Of course, I believe detection of cancer will be very important, because you don’t want to, uh, have a patient who is so advanced that he is fighting for, life, and he needs to be in the hospital
Ok
Yeah
If you had diagnosis in the early stages, then the patient does not need hospitalization
He can be treated very easily, then go back to work
So that’s the issue
And of course prevention is another important issue to us
To identify, changes in the body, which may indicate that the patient has already, early stages of cancer, also based on genetic tests, and get rid of this by using, behavior modification, by using proper diet, by using supplements, whatever, even without any medications
So, you’re obviously very passionate about what you do
Right ?
That, that’s my question about that
Well, I think it can help s, people in a great way, and, uh,
Well it can, I mean
Yeah
You have had so many su
Yes
I mean, I was talking to my girlfriend
Yeah
the other day,
Yeah
I mean, people, you know, you hear people say, this is a scam, and I was thinking, well the, if it is a scam
Yeah
it has to be one of the biggest scams ever
(laughing)
because all you’ve gotta do, is look on the walls
Yeah
and you look at those photographs
Yeah
Perhaps, this won’t surprise you
I’ve spoken to some oncologists just in the U.K., and they say, all of these people that you have helped, they either ever had cancer in the 1st place
Mhmm
or they were misdiagnosed
Yeah
or, uh, they went into spontaneous remission
Yeah, well
or they, it was the chemotherapy or radiation
These people, they don’t know what they do
They never, have never seen our results, and obviously they can’t believe that something like this could happen, but suddenly (laughs), in this room we are in now, we have some of
the top experts in the country, like people from FDA, who are expert oncologists, specialists
They’re working with you
Oh, they came here to inspect what we have
Yeah
They look at every scan of the people who are in clinical trials, and they decided that we have very good results
And is that stuff going to be published at some point ?
Ah, yes, we are publi, we are preparing this for publication, but, uh, obviously, in order to have the right results, you need, time, and most of our clinical trials began, approximately 10 years ago
So then we, if you would like to know what happen after, 10 years with these people
Mhmm
then you need to have a little time
So now we are preparing a number of, uh, publications, uh, and so this year we should have a number of publications, which will show final results
So far we didn’t have, final results, so were only interim reports, during the course of clinical trials
And with, uh, with brain tumors; because obviously, that’s an area that you’ve had
Yeah
huge suc, success rate
Yeah
What, why has that, do you think, as opposed to the other, types ?
Because that’s where we selected
Mhmm
We wanted to have something difficult
Ok (laughs)
Yeah
Because, uh, for the same reason that you mentioned
If you’d had something easier then, the doctors could say: “Well, this cancer usually disappears in its own”
And they are right
Some cancers may disappear on its own, in some higher percent than the others
Mhmm
But you know, brain tumors, you read, they never disappear on their own
Yeah
So that’s why we, decided to select such type of malignancies which are the most difficult
So what’s that been like when you’ve seen, I mean, I’ve seen obviously Jodi Fenton’s story
Yeah
Whe, whe, when you see these people’s
Yes
uh, scans
Yeah
and you see that that tumor has shrunk
Yeah
or broken down
Yeah
wha, what does that feel like ? (laughing)
Well, we see this all the time
(?) it just happens almost every day
Even today that we saw the patient, uh, who has pancreatic cancer, and after a few months of treatment it’s practically gone, and she is the wife of a doctor (laughs)
They came together, and that’s, that’s what we see practically every day
Ok
That must give you great strength to
Absolutely
continue
Absolutely, yes
So that’s something which is gratifying (laughs)
Yeah
What do you think the future is as far as drugs for cancer are concerned ?
I believe that, we are still at a very early stages of development in this area, but the future will be, with medications which are, highly specific, they will work on the genes that are involved in cancer
So, they will not harm normal part of the body, and, du, du, how to combine this medications will be established by, the special software, which will guide the doctors how to use proper medication for individual patient
I think this will be the, um, treatment that will be designed for, individual patient, and such design, it is not necessary to be done by the doctor
I think it should be, uh, certain computerized system which will put together, the best possible treatment plan, for a patient; which obviously needs to be checked and approved by the doctor
So I believe that this will be the future of medicine for the next, say, 40, and 50 years, coming up with better and better medications, which will be genomic switches, which will turn off, the cancerous process by regulating the genes which are involved; they simply will bring, the activity of these genes to normal levels, and finally, the new generation of medication which should work on cancerous stem cells, and, the medications which can kill cancerous stem cells without, uh, producing any harm to normal stem cells
So this will be the clue for, long-term control of cancer, because if you don’t eliminate, cancerous stem cells then the cancer will come back
Yeah
And that’s why chemotherapy, usually is unable to control cancer for a long time because, it’s pretty much powerless, ah, uh, regarding action on cancerous stem cells
But then after that, I think that we will make another, jump, and there will be, uh, procedures that will based on biophysics
Mmm
and by trying to get rid of, uh, the cancer and some of the diseases by effecting the body by using various, uh, wipes, which will be like magnetic wipes, it will be some other types of wipes, but using proper frequencies to, normalize all the cells in the body to normalize the activity of the genes
I think this will be a
Mmm
probably the next, uh, say 50 years of, uh, the end of this century when such (?)
So no one’s getting funding really, unless they’re doing it privately to,
being able to, isn’t that being able to research these areas, because funding really comes from pharmaceutical companies ?
Ah, well, most of this funding is from pharmaceutical companies, and also it is coming from the National Cancer Institute but, I think it’s regulated behind the scenes by the pharmaceutical companies
Eh, but they are still some researchers who are trying to do it on their own
Very few of them
I think there’s articles, in the Science magazine, some time ago which was talking about, uh, few of these researchers who are still trying to do, research on their own, and, I think, uh, I think there were probably some 4 or 5 of them in U.K. (laugh)
Yeah
still involved in research on their own
So what ah, what about the role of the mind ?
Do you think that, if someone has cancer and they wanna be well, do you think the way that someone thinks is important ?
Absolutely, that’s very important because, this, uh, can be translated, ah, to various biochemicals which can influence cancer
So obviously this is very important but, the question is how to, ah, direct this in the proper way
Ok
How to quantify this
So that’s something that should be done in the future
And nutrition as well
Yes, absolutely, yes
Why all have a lot of important chemicals in nutrition which can effectuate cancer, but regarding the mind you have to translate, uh, for instance, biophysical factors, in the brain, into biochemical factors, and certainly, that’s what the body’s doing all the time, but how to mobilize it, that’s a different story
Yeah
So if someone wants, if someone came to the Burzynski Clinic, wh, wh, what could they expect, to happen here?
Well 1st of all, we would like to give a selection, and we don’t want the people who we cannot treat to come
Uh, at this time we rather avoid, uh, patients in early stages of cancer, because with such patients, uh, what is used is standard of care treatment, and we prefer to refer them to, ah, different doctors
So we prefer to treat it once cancer patient, because, uh, they cannot be helped by the other doctors, and, uh, when they come to our clinic, we try to find out 1st, see if we can really help them or not, and, uh, once they come to the clinic, in most of the cases we can try to, help them, of course, and, uh, we put together, the personalized treatment plan, which is (?)
But all of those go through you
You look at every single one of those
Yes
I’m seeing every patient, who’s coming, if I’m
Yeah
if I’m around here, but, after that all the patients are really assigned to different senior physician and they’re responsible for daily care of patient here
How many people do you have, working here now ?
About 150 people here, yes
And you started with, well, just one (?)
Eh, I think really when we moved from Baylor College I had about 7 people at that time
Yeah
Yes, because, some of these doctors who are working together at Baylor College decided to leave together with me, including my wife, because she was also working at Baylor College
Yeah
Ok
Thank you
You’re welcome
My pleasure
Thank you so much
Thank you very much
Ok
======================================
Are you there ?
Okay, we might as well get started if were going to do this
Alright, so ummm I guess we can start with uhhh bit of a conversation
Uhhh
You’ve been on the Burzynski Hashtag for a long time – what’s you’re motivation ?
Okay
So what information have Skeptics posted that they uhhh that they missed that demonstrates that Burzynski’s uhhh treatments are effective ?
What, what have we missed ? Well okay, uh one of the issues that Skeptics have with Burzynski is that in order to, let’s say, elevate uh the profile of his drug, in order to make sure that everybody who needs it can get, is to complete a phase 3 uh trial uh he started uh I believe was it just the one, right ?
Uhmmm, and that’s gone nowhere
In fact, it was withdrawn this I think within the last week
It doesn’t look like its going to happen, and this is, you know, for all the the phase 1 and phase 2 trials, those are very preliminary trials
Uhmmm, the phase 3 is is will be the gold standard, and also the bare minimum that that the larger medical community will accept uhhh as evidence, so it’s like you’ve lowered the bar for for evidence in a way that that you know oncologists don’t
The the
Right
So, do you think that there is a uh uh conspiracy to keep Burzynski from publishing ?
Right
Right
So, uhmmm, as far as I understand it The Lancet, uhhh the the question of The Lancet publication ehhh is par for the course, that most people are, when they get a speedy rejection from a uh uh, uh journal, are actually uh grateful, because that means there allowed to go ahead and submit their material to another journal more quickly and get it out there
Uhm, but the reaction that we saw on the side of the Burzynski camp was that, see, they’ll never publish us
Uhm, which is, eg, taken as far as I can tell as evidence of a conspiracy or that his name is is poison uh I mean, I think it is, but uhmmm, that wasn’t indicated in the in the rejection letter in order to uh claim that it is is to go beyond the evidence which again we’re not really willing to do
So, uhmmm what is the the ration the the something that I think a lot of of a lot of The Skeptics have been curious about when it comes to your your your blog and your behavior on-line uhhh is that that that, that the format of your blog does not make sense to us, we don’t understand exactly what you’re trying to do with it
Could you kind of clarify that for us because it’s uhhh long and it’s it’s intense and there’s a lot of emotion behind it but we don’t understand exactly, what it’s supposed to mean
Alright, ah have you read The Other Burzynski Patient Group ?
So, ahmmm what is your response say to the story of Amelia Saunders ?
Okay, what part of, what did I get wrong ?
Uh was that Amelia and Luna ?
Luna was the other one, correct
Oh, I, you’re talking, oh this is one of the very 1st ones that we did on the, on the site
Uhmmm, oh, her name is, her name escapes me at the moment
Um, but she wasn’t there for for very long but uh her condition deteriorated very rapidly
Uhmmm, and one of the questions that we had, we raised, is is, you know, you you don’t need to reach full dosage ’cause the the full dosage for these ANP seem to be pretty high, at least the sodium load that that that patients are asked to to carry, or required to carry if they they go on it
And we wondered if the sodium load was ah to great for someone who has a brain tumor, I mean uh, you know uh sodium load will increase your blood pressure, and these people have extra things in their brains that probably won’t react well to swelling, right, and and wont react well to pressure, so we were wondering, if in fact you don’t have to reach the full dosage in order to have uh severe side effects
Ummm, you know maybe you haven’t reached a therapeutic dose level, but that doesn’t mean that it didn’t have an effect on her
And you can clearly tell, that, you know in the videos, well at least the videos before the family took it down, that she was lethargic and a little bit out of it, she uh the the difference in her conscious state was no noticeable for anyone to see
Ummm, to, you know where she had been up and about to in her bed kind of slurring and and, and and and, in fact just disoriented, just looked like someone had taken the piss out of her I mean, ummm, so that’s, that one, ummm, you know the critique that, reaching therapeutic levels and having a biological effect on someone are are clearly different things in her case
Uhmmm, now I never went on you know on to say ummm that uh she had uh reached therapeutic levels
Uhmmm, I I think as far as I went was that she went, she paid her $30,000 dollars and then she died
Uhmmm, and and and what part of that’s not true
Okay, so, um, going back to Amelia, um, some of the the most um I think the most serious charges is that we see a uh repeatedly in his uh uh stories of his patients, um those are all cited, those are all backed uh by, you know, um at least as good as anything the Burzynski Patient Group has ever done
Uhmmm, something that we see over and over are patients reporting over and over that signs of getting worse are signs if getting better
Um, in particular a, uh report that’s very common from from patients is that the center of their solid tumors are breaking up
One of the problems that we we we see is that that is more frequently a sign of ischemic necrosis that the tumor has outgrown its blood supply and that it’s dying on the inside
And when you see something like a 5th of the patients who we’ve been able to to document, reporting this excitedly, we get extremely concerned about what’s happening
Uhmmm, what part of that is not absolutely terrifying to you Well, the the yeah I’ve never seen anyone say that the purpose of the antineoplastons is to cause uhhh, you know, to restrict the blood flow to the tumor and and and uh cause it to die that way, which is certainly one therapeutic approach that’s been, that’s been floated and research has been done on uh and might even be promising and uh what he’s saying is that cancer is caused by a lack of antineoplastons in the system and that basically what he is doing is antineoplaston uh uh supplement therapy uh rath, what’s the word I’m looking for, uhm uh, replacement therapy
Uh and there isn’t a doctor on the planet, uh not a medical specialist on the planet, who, I, who has identified at at as a contributing factor as a contributor to cancer or antineo or lack of antineoplastons
So
Why isn’t he, you know, you understand that these doctors, ummm like nothing is true or false because a doctor says it is true or false
Uhmmm it’s it’s it but when the entire medical community uhhh who are des are desperately are are every bit as tired of seeing patients die uhmmm and seeing patients suffer or as anyone else’s families are you you imagine what an oncologist sees in that office over the course of of a year and there’s going to be unimaginable suffering
I’m sure that they’re tired of that
And that they would, you know, that if there was the slightest hint that antineoplaston deficiency was a cause of cancer that it would make it into the literature, with or without Burzynski
Uhhh ummm, why should we trust him when he has uh the sole uh the only person who had identified antineoplastons as a contributor to cancer when he is the sole manufacturer of the of the therapy uh when he is the uh sole prescriber of the therapy and when he is, where the sole distributor of the therapy from his pharmacy
He’s read everything
I think
Can you go ahead and send me that link that that I saw in the chat that you had uh posted a couple of times in the chat
Could you send me that link, to that publication
I can give you a minute to to go find it if that’s
That would be good
Uhmmm Well, yeah that’s a, that’s you know one of the major problems that this this cancer has is the location is such a pain to get to
Uhm, and often when we are talking about these cancers, the thing that gets me over and over and over, and this is something that I’ve learned from from working uh with others on the Burzynski Patient Group is what’s it like to be a cancer patient, only by proxy, man I couldn’t imagine really going through this myself, and, you know I’d hate to see my family go through this
That these people are at what could be described as a low point, they’re um uhhh, you get a diagnosis of uh brainstem glioma the prognosis is very bad
Uhmmm, there are only a few cases of people recovering from that, I mean they’re there uhm uhhh but, you know that it’s an, it’s an extremely grim prognosis
Uhhh and I worry that when they’re in that desperate state and especially let’s talk about the children, you have these kids who are uh you know 2 and 3 and have had this, you know uh awful diagnosis and the parents are willing to do literally anything to keep their kids alive
What protections are in place for patients as far as that these kids are and and their parents are protected
Who had the better results ?
Okay
Hmmm, yeah, the, Guy Chapman has just um uh tossed in a a, a comment
I guess uh that there are a lot of people who wanna talk to you (laughter)
Uh, Guy Chapman has just jumped in and said it looks like you forgot the phase 3 trial is withdrawn and none of the phase 2 trials were published
Uhmmm, this, this is not a minor thing for for for Skeptics
This, this is exactly what will convince us to get on board the Burzynski train is the publication of these trials
But even the preliminary trials, one has been finished, and none has been published in its entirety for over 15 years
When you consider that this is a, as you just pointed out, this is a a cancer, the, especially the brainstem gliomas
That these cancers uh the cases resolved fairly quickly, we know what the outcome are fairly quickly
Ummm, do you have any sense of when these trials are going to be published ?
From Laura ?
Right
When you, when you think about a major, sorry, go ahead
Yeah, right, uh
Antineoplastons has a better rate ?
Right
Right, one of the things that that there there are 2 points to be made here
Uhm, the 1st one is that major pharmaceutical companies that are getting this accelerated approval have a track record of producing results which Burzynski does not have
Secondly, when it comes to ummm the rates of antineoplastons, how can we possibly say without a single published trial he, that he has an improved rate over Temodar or anything like that, and that’s exactly what would show to us whether or not his rate is better, the the types of publications that he’s done, that look really good on paper, ummm, to the to the, the common persons eye are these case series where he goes through and picks out people who have happened to have survived
But what that doesn’t tell us is whether or not the antineoplaston had anything to do with it
What you need to do is go and separate the background noise, the random weird rare but very real survive, unexpected survivals that occur, and separate those, uhhh, from any effect of antineoplaston, he’s never done that
But if you think about that, I mean that if it does have a a an improvement rate above uh other treatments
That still has an improvement rate, you know, that, that would give another option to people, ummm, even if in the aggregate their rates aren’t better
It might work on some individuals tumors rather than on, you know, you you it it is it taken as a, as a lump but extend life by uh quality of life for 3 months or something um in some cases but, you know, it it still has an effect, a real effect, and deserves to be out there
That’s a long time when someone is dying Well, one of
One of the problems that that doctors have in in this country when it comes to doing ummm antineoplastons studies to verify any any effect that uh Burzynski has uhhh I i think back to the one where people say well that the FDA sabotaged his trials, and Well, if if you think about it though, um, the, the proposed action as I understand it of the antineoplaston is that it’s a deacetylase inhibitor, which slightly unspools DNA, that allows uh, which would allow uh proteins to get into a pair of damaged DNA
And we have drugs that do that which carry a much lower sodium load
Uh, um, it, that would have a therapeutic effect on and that the risks outweigh the possible benefits of using this one particular drug
Um, I’ve seen any number of people looking at um, if you look at the Luna ah Pettiguine uh uh story on The Other Burzynski Patient Group um you see that the doctor is absolutely horrified by the insane sodium load that that Burzynski’s patients are carrying
Um in in some ways that that sodium load is uh leading people to constantly drinking up to I’ve seen 12 liters of water a day
That’s not necessary for other deactsylace inhibitors
Um the, why would you prefer that to to another drug if it did essentially the same thing, that didnt have this massive side effect ?
thats not necessary for other deactsylace inhibitors Well that sss I believe that that’s proposed by the researchers, the design trial, you know they they sign off on it but that is is, is up to uh Burzynski uh my uh David James @StortSkeptic on the
ah he has asked everything that Burzynski does looks sort of like the behaviors of pseudo-science
So what we’re saying uhhh he does uh uhhh Burzynski like for instance like I said he has vertically integrated, ah, he controls all parts from identification to the creation of the drug uh to the diagnosing uh well he doesn’t do the diagnosing but he does um um prescribe and distribute, he does all that vertically, which is actually something that snake oil salesmen do
Another thing that that’s a red flag in Skeptic circles is that his one compound seems to be a sort of panacea for all sorts of different types of, of of cancers, um where we know that cancer has a a varied uh, uh, ideology and and the uh panaceas are are are to be and a variety of different types of causes um, in fact in any one tumor you would, you could say that these, these tumors are are completely uh heterogenous
The idea that there’s gonna be one knockout, it seems rather unrealistic
Um, additionally he charges immense amounts of money for this drug, um, even though the components cost pennies
Um, on top of that, um, there’s something that he asks for a a huge payment up front
That’s something that’s been warned against for generations of uh by anti-quack um uh crusaders if if they’re asking for everything up front, then be afraid
Ummm, another thing is that uh the kind of cult that’s sprung up around Burzynski, uh, one that is immune to uh criticism, reason, and pits people who are doing standard cancer research, as enemies, um, creating a black and white version of the world where there are good people and there are bad people
There are people who are fighting the disease, and then there are people who are really helping the disease
I mean, if you look at the, the new web-site by the Burzynski patients fighting back group, they say support the cure not the cancer
That’s a manikin world-view of black and white
Um, these are all huge red flags, that you’re dealing with a quack
Um, why hasn’t Burzynski done anything to change that ?
Right Well, there, this is important
This is really important though
Wha, when she’s talking about, that’s Luna Pettiguine’s mother, is is talking about the costs there
Uhmmm, you, when someone is not insured in in this country,
Ahm, the, the the base cost that that’s calculated is, is the hospital only expects to get a fraction, a tiny fraction of that back from the insurance companies, and that’s why the costs are so inflated
Um, usually, when a patient is self-pay there is a self-pay price which is a more reasonable price
Additionally, all of those therapies, have demonstrated efficacy, and if Burzynski were to demonstrate his efficacy, $30,000 dollars to start on a life-saving treatment for a child would be a steal, and he would earn every nickel of it
Um, so, those arguments hold very little weight with us
He has a a an enormous house that’s valued in the tens of millions of dollars, he could do that if if the other, the other thing he could do, and this, we would love to see him do this, wousa, would be apply to Federal grant
That, that would be amazing, if he could get a grant to study this stuff
But, you know, um, I I don’t think he’d be able to get one, I don’t think he’s shown uh that he can carry off a uh a research program responsibly
Uhmmm Well
Oh he, have you noticed the the, the thing on his web-site where if you make a donation to the clinic it goes directly to him ?
Right You know, you know
Ummm, o-kay
Uh, I want to turn this over to the people who are watching
Um, I want to give them a a chance to address you as well
Uhmmm, hi everyone
Uhmmm, so, um, let’s, let’s wait for for that to roll in, and I do wait to go back to the, the the, the and let’s be very specific about this, the the things that you see on The Other Burzynski Patent Group, a patient reporting that um uh getting worse is getting better
How do you explain that ? Well that’s just a known side-effect, your going to know that going in, but we actually have people say
Are there, why why why not, these people, see this is the thing though
The reason that site was started was because the people that don’t make it don’t have a voice
And when you, when you whittle away, when you only look at the at the, the positive outcomes, which is exactly in Burzynski’s favor to only look at the positive outcomes, and to have no sense of how other people’s diseases progressed, right, you’re gonna get a skewed and inaccurate version of the efficacy of this particular drug Now lets lets lets go back and not talk about Laura, lets talk about these patients who report symptoms of getting worse, as if they were signs of getting better
Some people say that oh it’s a healing crisis or it’s progression of the disease
Or other people say it’s breaking up in the middle, hurrah
No, it’s actually a tumor that’s growing
That record there, that’s being left by patients, whose stories are every bit as important as the as the stories of the patients who have lived, are painting a completely different picture
How do you explain that ?
Are they feeding these people their stories ?
Are they feeding these people their stories
Okay I’m going to go back, I want to point something else out to you
Um, I have to, I don’t remember the exact patient so I have to go back to my web-site to take a look at it
Um
Because we are, because we’re on a Google+ stream that that’s a lot of data it takes awhile to bring up my, my site
Let me
Uhmmm Well, that seems to give him an instant out, no matter what happens
That turns his claims into something that’s unfalsifiable
If I could give you an example of what unfalsifiable is
Um, and I’ll I’ll draw an uh, uh, case, uh hypothetical case of um uh proposed by Carl Sagan as the invisible dragon in your garage
If you say you have have a dragon in your garage, um, you know, you should be able to go over and verify that there’s a dragon in the garage
So let’s say we go over to Carl Sagan’s garage and, you know Well, I don’t see anything Well it’s an invisible dragon Well okay, well then, let’s uh spray paint it Well, it’s incorporeal Well, uh, let’s measure for the heat of the breath Well it’s heatless flame that it breathes
And, you know, okay, well then we’ll put flour down on the ground to see that it’s it it’s standing there
And, oh no it’s ah it’s floating Well, you know, at some point, when you can’t falsify something
When you cannot, even in principle, prove something false, it’s indistinguishable from something that’s not there
And that kind of out, that oh well the tumor can keep on growing
Th (laugh) that that that’s an invisible dragon, as far as I can tell
A every time that I and and and and , and David points this out, that um, you you know your not going to speculate about the the FDA but then at every turn your invoking the FDA as being obstructionist
I, I just find that to be contradictory and and self-defeating
Um, let me see Well, that’s not necessarily true
I mean uh when it when it comes to the case um I’ve i’ve talked to oncologists about this
And when it comes to uh for instance in in this case it sounds like it was a pediatric patient who was dying, ummm, who had died, ummm, the,
the 1st inclination is to ascribe the death to, um, to the tumor, which actually, would be to Burzynski’s benefit if there were other cases, I’m not saying there were, but if there were other cases where this type of complication arose, and it was ascribed to the tumor they might well not do it, uh, do an autopsy
Um, it’s ah as you could imagine it could be very difficult for the families to do that especially when they have ooh ah, a possibility of what, you know, led to the ultimate demise, that didn’t involve them ultimately somehow being responsible for it, right ?
So, it it it doesn’t seem to me that necessarily an autopsy would be um a a done deal
Um, let me see
No we don’t and it would be irresponsible to completely speculate on on, on, the outcome of that uh, uh, uh, individual patient, I am still scrolling through looking for this story that I wanted to talk about
Uh, and, I guess I’ll
It should be in Amelia’s I I, I packed Amelia’s story with all the stories, um, that I could find um in what we’d written up already
Um
Hold on a sec
She is a cute kid though
Um, alright
Now, our favorite oncologist (laugh), as you keep putting it, um, uh, with with the Amelia story, um, uh, was able to correctly determine that the Saunders family, had a, did not understand the significance of this cyst that had opened up in, uh, that had opened up in the center of the tumor, in fact they were ecstatic
They were delighted
Um, the family, of Haley, um, S, also
Uh, the the family of Haley S., also, had the same reading given to them
Um, the same diagnosis uh same prognosis was to, was given to Justin B in 2006
A similar cyst in Lesley S’s story uh ah, was in 2006
Um, and that kept her on uh treatment for a a another month so that could be another $7,000 some odd dollars
We same thing in the, in the case of, uh, Samantha T in 2005
We see it again as far back as 1994, in Cody G’s story
And then lastly and and the worst uh thing that we’ve seen, the patients report that Burzynski himself told Chase uh Sammut
The exact same thing
Um, and that was a
Have you read Chase’s story
It would stick with you, because that case is grotesque
The parents, uh, there was even a uh, uh, a fight over whether or not the parents should be allowed to continue treating this kid
He was basically lying, uh, in a uh uh brain dead uh for all intents and purposes, uh, in a in a coma uh without possibility of reversal, in his parents living room for months
Um, eh, all the while, he’s still on the, uh, well I don’t actually, I can’t say that, I don’t exactly know if he was on the treatment the whole time
Um, but, we do have this pattern, that is there, of people believing, that this particular pattern is, uh, progress, a a is not progression of disease but is is inducement to to stay on, um, eh, and this has been going on for decades
Eh, eh just based on what we’ve been able to find that patients have been reporting this for decades
At some point, you would think that a doctor would realize that perhaps what these patients are walking away with is inaccurate
Why hasn’t that changed ?
E wel that that that that’s not it
This is this is like the 2nd day of oncology class, that that’s what the tumor looks like
People are reporting that the tumor is no longer growing, um, or that the growing has slowed after they’ve started Well, okay
There, there is an explanation for that, and why you can’t take that as necessarily being evidence of efficacy
Ah, the tumor grows exponentially while the resources are available to it, but then it reaches a point where it’s a self-limited growth, so it, the time between uh doublings in size decreases logarithmically
Um, so this is, this is like basic tumor physiology that we’re talking about, and his patients don’t leave his office, knowing these facts, for decades
This doesn’t have anything to do with the, do with the drug
This this
But, but when it’s, this treatment is working or this is not evidence that the treatment is working
That’s pretty basic
I mean we’re not, we’re not talking about deactsylace inhibitors or anything like that were you’d really need to know something about
This is, whether or not, you’re getting the outcome that you want
This is the whole reason for going
And it has nothing to do with the with the with the drugs
Which is, which is like which we just pointed out was a was an invisible dragon
you’re you’re you’re assuming
You’re you’re you’re assuming that
You’re assuming that
Um, I’m not assuming that
Ultimately it would, but whether or not it it it had a genuine therapeutic effect is a different matter all together
Um, this, what would, what would convince you that you’re wrong
So you’re saying because the Orphan Drug Designation and the face that there’s a phase 3, therefor it works ?
So what you’re saying is there’s nothing that would convince you now, that it doesn’t work
O-kay
Um, it’s it’s it’s not the FDA’s, but you understand it’s not the FDA’s job to tell someone that their drug doesn’t work
it’s it’s it’s up to Burzynski
It’s up to Burzynski to show that his drug does work
And it’s always been his burden of proof
He’s the one that’s been claiming this miracle cancer cure, forever
Um, I don’t know if you’ve read Jaffe’s book
There seems to have been a lot going on there you really should look at it because it’s it’s it’s kind of revealing
Um, that that that it seems that there was a lot of political pressure applied to the FDA which may have been, uh, uh, have influenced the way in which these these trials were approved
I I would say that it is a genuine con uh uh bit of confusion on the parts of Skeptics
We don’t know why the phase 3 trial was approved
I don’t know that we’ve seen even the phase 1 trials, we don’t know why he’s getting a phase 3
And there’s a real story in that, we think
Um, that we’d love to see, however we can’t see, however we can’t see it because of proti protri proprietary uh protections that the FDA is giving to Burzynski, right ?
They’re not sharing his trial designs because they are his trial designs, right?
That the makeup of his drug that he’s distributing are his, uh design, and his intellectual property
So the FDA is protecting him, uh from outside scrutiny
While you may imagine that that, that that the FDA is is somehow antagonistic toward him
They’ve given him every opportunity, over 60 opportunities to prove himself worth uh their confidence and hasn’t
Um, but I definitely recommend that you look at Jaffe’s book and you will see, I think, um that um it’s called um, uh Galileo’s
You know what it’s called, okay, yeah
Um, definitely look at that
Um, you, you will see, the ways in which, the way that we got to this point, isn’t necessarily having anything to do with the efficacy of the drug
That comes across very clearly
Um, you, you mentioned it yourself, he he’s done well to listen to Jaffe’s advice, right ?
So, there there’s a lot to that
Um, uh, but yeah, let me go back to the Twitter feed
Um
Well it sounds to me like they’re they’re not um, the the the you know, they’ve put the clinical hold on now because they now have evidence that somebody may have died because of the treatment
Um, I don’t know what the state of that is right now
Um, uh, oh my gosh, um, let me see
Someone has just sent me a, a ah a link to, are you following the Hashtag, as this is going on
Okay
I’m doing, I’m doing the 2 things at once and it’s um, ok ok well it’s well ok I can’t I can’t go in and read that right now
Um, I would, ok let me tell you exactly what it will take, for me to come around and promote Burzynski
Um, for me, he needs to get a publication in a uh, yeah, uh uh uh publication in a peer-reviewed journal, a respected peer-reviewed journal, not like the the Journal of Medical Hypothesis or things we just made up
Um, something, you know, a a good, respectable journal that oncologists would read, that research oncologists would read
I would need an completely independent group to replicate his findings, and then I’d be all for it
I would say that right now, the business model that the Burzynski Clinic seems to depend on, as best as I can tell from an outsider, that, um, uh, that it depends on people paying money up front
It doesn’t depend on him developing and taking away a viable drug, that he can market to the entire world
His business model as best I can tell, is to keep it in house
That seems, if it works, if his drug genuinely works, and he hasn’t sent it along to mass approval, where he gets, for a couple of years at least, you know, exclusive rights to produce and sell this stuff, for one of the most intractable diseases, uh that man eh can can can, you know, can get, um, that suggests to me that there’s something else going on here
Now, someone has just sent a a note, uh that he has failed 3 different Institutional Review Board audits; this is Guy Chapman, uh no other institution has a 3 for 3 fail, according to to Guy iye he knows no other one
Um, that 45% of phase 3 clinical trials fail due to deficient phase 2 design
Um, he has an approved phase 3, but phase 2 was deficient so phase 3 fails
Do you think that that could possibly have anything to do with why we’re not seeing the phase 3 advance
He’s claimed
He’s claimed
That’s a different thing altogether
And in fact
Well, you understand why they do that, because in order to, it’s
No, they do do this with other drugs, well, it depends on the type
Some drugs it’s ethical to give something completely questionable, what they want to make sure that they at least get the standard care, you know which includes radiation
Um, and radiation does seem to extend life, reduce the size of some tumors some times
Um, do you concede, that in order to have a phase 3, you do not need to have a successful phase 2 ?
When 45% of phase 3 fail because they have a deficient phase 2 design, do you concede that ? Well, ok
It doesn’t matter where
It doesn’t matter where it comes from uh, um
So-kay, um that would be shooting the messenger as opposed to dealing with the question, but
the idea, the best, well, the best, well in that case the best response is “I don’t know”
There’s something that that we don’t know, you’re coming, honestly we didn’t know what to expect when we talked to you
We, were looking at the design, of your web-site and wondering whether or not we would be able to get a a coherent sentence out of you, because the web-site is disorganized, uh
Um, at at at at least it’s the organization is not apparent to the readers
Um, and um according to
No, that is tied together
But let me, we know that that the the, the central concern is Burzynski
Ah, the source of this ah of of those #’s that I just gave you, Chapman has just updated me and he says um that it is, and I’ll go back to the, the ADR research . com issues in clinical research, so it’s the question, Bay Clinical uh Research and Clinical Development, a white paper called “Why do so many pase 3 clinical trials fail ?
Uh, it’s prepared by Anastassios Retzios, Ph.D
Is Anastassios Retzios reliable ?
There is a correct here
Exactly
That’s the right answer
You don’t know
You don’t know
You need to look into it
Alright ?
Before you dismiss it you have to look into it
Everytime somebody throws uh uh something to me, I have to look into it
That’s just, it’s my responsibility as a reader
Um
What, what stuff would you like
What stuff would you like me to do ?
I generally, I don’t read your blog
Uh um, alright
Okay, I’ll look at that, and I will respond to it once I’ve taken a look at that, okay ?
Um, and I’ll respond on your web-site
Um, seems only fair
Um, one question I’d wondered, what is the Didymus Judas Thomas reference to
Oh, so this is the Doubting Thomas
This is the Doubting Thomas
Okay, so this is the one, you show me the, you put your your, the, your hand inside the wound You know, Jesus says, basically, ok, bring it on, check me out, right ?
Okay
Alright
That that, I didn’t, I didn’t realize that he was also, that that was the same guy
So, it’s it’s the Doubting Thomas
Um, what we would say, um, is that if Burzynski is the savior that he claims to be, that he should, open up his trials, he should open up his uh research uh protocols um and just say, “Look, bring it on”
Check out these wounds
But he’s never done that
Instead he he he wants us to just take the words of of of of his apostles
I don’t necessarily trust his apostles
I don’t think that they’re unbiased
I wanna see the data
I wanna see the the wounds in his hands and the the mark on his side
Oh, hey when when we talk about The Other Burzynski Patient Group, I don’t make any pretensions to make that my site proves anything
I I I really don’t
It’s not my job to prove anything
It’s Burzynski’s job
It is a researchers job to prove these things
But we just pointed out, we just pointed out, that the FDA, often approves, phase 3 trials, based on flawed phase 2 clinical trials
That is therefor a real possibility in this case
Yes you would
T t and what I would honestly expect and hope, is that you would be honest about this, to yourself, and and and that’s the thing we don’t, we often don’t realize that we’re not being honest with ourself
I try to fight against it, constantly
But, um, uh but the way that you’d earlier phrased your uh your response to “could you possibly be proved wrong ?”, . . really did exclude other possibilities of of of of yourself being wrong
So if the FDA Well I’m not talking about the Guy Chapman
What you off, when I asked you, yourself, you know, what would prove you wrong, you said that the FDA hasn’t approved a phase 3 Well, ok
Let’s let’s back, let’s back up
What would the FDA, what happens if the FDA occasionally op op opposes, approves uh phase 3 trials, based on bad phase 2 trials
Would that be, would that cause any doubt in your mind ?
About the efficacy of ANP
Yeah, hello, yeah, you’re back
Yeah Google+ is a little wonky sometimes
But, would, does, if you were to learn, that sometimes phase 3 trials, uh, are approved, and failed, based on flawed phase 2, would, would that make you reconsider your position of the phase 3 being evidence that it works
Uh um could you send me that link, the, the, um . me see
I’m just looking at other things that are coming in on the Hashtag right now
Um, so the ANP is Orphan Drug status but is it Orphan Drug for glioma ?
Is it sodium phenylbutyrate or is it the the versions of the drug, the AS10 stuff or A1 or whatever it’s called ?
Okay, that’s what has Orphan Drug status
Alright, I’ll look into that I hope somebody is writing all this down out there, so that we can go back and look at these claims later, right ?
So, oh, um
Do you have any questions for me ?
I’ve spent a lot of times asking questions of you
Mhmm
Guy Chapman, throws up the the, the comment, permission to investigate is not evidence of anything other than evidence of a valid protocol, not a uh, evidence of efficacy, in and of itself
That’s another comment
Um, alright then, this is your chance t, there are lots of people have lots of questions about me out there
Uh, about what my motivations are and such
I might as well put that out on the table just so it’s on the record, is that I am taking exactly no money from anyone for this, and have gotten nothin’ but grief from a lot of people, even people who, even people who support me have given me grief for this
Um, just so that you know, um, there have been, some of the things that have happened, oh, this is an important point too
Um, that when we have criticized this, uh, a # of us, especially Gorski, uh myself, uh Rhys Morgan, uh, um, and and uh Popehat, the the lawyer, blog, uh, um, who else was on there, um, oh, the Merritts, uh, t, uh Wayne Merritt, and his family, people have been critical of of of Burzynski have faced retaliation for opposing him ah and intimidation, and including, um, I had my uh a couple weeks before Christmas my, my, the Chancellor of my University was contacted via e-mail, and uh Eric Merola said that I had been um, uh, been spreading mis truths about Burzynski, that I had been a be, on my my show um had said things that were demonstratively untrue, and he also said that the drug was FDA approved, which it, you know, that’s not right
But um, he said that he was gonna do, talk about me in his new movie, in, uh, relat, in millions of homes, um, and he wanted to get a statement from the University
The University of course ignored him, and immediately let me know that I was going to get smeared
Um, I consulted my lawyer and uh uh, you know, the best course of action was figured out, and um uh a Gorski has had his accreditation board contacted, he’s had his bosses contacted, Rhys Morgan received threats of liable suits from somebody who had been hired, by the clinic, to clean up his on-line reputation if he didn’t take down his on-line review of Burzynski, uh, had his a picture of his house sent to him, clearly the message being, “We know where you live kid,” uh, Wayne Merritt; a pancreatic cancer patient, this is something that, that people generally, do not recover from, like generally, die from, received phone calls at home, from, this individual, threatening him with lawsuits; he doesn’t have a law degree so he’s misrepresenting himself
Um, but all of this, was done, to critics
Do you think that is deserved ?
Do you think that that is right ?
Mhmm Well to be fair
It it it doesn’t strike me as necessarily a “Free Speech” issue, you know
Was it down-voted ?
No
Mhmm
Mhmm Well we do have for for for for one thing, um, I guess to understand is that we are uh motivated by um uh a respect, this is the one thing that that all Skeptics I think um are uh respect critical thinking, um, and um respect scientific uh a we we’re mostly scientific enthusiasts, there’s some Skeptics who are not um, uh, you know oh u space nerds, or whatever who are um just sc scholars and the humanities but for the most part we all respect scientific consensus and we respect scientific method and have an enthusiasm for living in the real world, this is something that like all of us us are about
And to that end, sometimes that influence is how we run, is how we decide to run our personal web-sites
Um, uh, that whether or not we want our, to give a platform to people who disagree with us, um, you know, uh, when we do, uh . . it it is our sandbox, you know, right ?
This, this, we’re allowed to to let whoever we want into our sandbox if we, you know, uh if we want
Did he, did he leave them up ?
Did he leave them up ?
Right, um, do you think that he is required to answer you
Right
Mhmm
Um so a a question uh why were why do you have so many Twitter and Wikipedia sock-puppets
Wikipedia
You left Wikipedia
Mhmm
Um a
Uh We have uh a response from David James, everyone uh gave you a fair shout
You were a spammer plain and simple
You couldn’t, you couldn’t
work out your questions
Twitter does not
Twitter does not block people for for arguing
Only for spamming and policy violations
Mhmm
Okay
Um, let me see
Each new account was blocked for additional violations of policies
Um, this is a uh uh referring to the Wikipedia rules too
Um, so
Um, Wikipedia, do you know why um they’ve locked the Burzynski page ?
Did you notice the part where he threatened, did you notice the part where he threatened to expose Wikipedia
We have to, well, they they uh are looking that it’s not one-sided information they want to show
Like they discuss, there is controversy about this guy
Yeah, Jaffe’s on there
Jaffe’s on there
uh well you could add that if you hadn’t gotten blocked
Okay
Um, so, who are you
She’s gotten threats
So we don’t know who you are
Like, she has suffered at the hands of some really mess, and she’s also, you have to realize she’s in the U.K, where libel laws are very lax at this point
That’s changing, ah, but uh, the the legitimate criticism, there is a big case last, me maybe 2 years ago of Simon Singh, talking about an alternative therapy, and, um, he was just saying that there’s no evidence for it but it’s promoted by um chiropractors, or something, or something like that
And he got slapped with a libel suit that cost him several years of his life and a lot of money
Um, so, there are several reasons why someone in the U.K. might uh be uh reticent to use their real name um, uh, and legitimate reasons
Um, in the U.S., I’m not sure that there is
I’ve been using my real name for a long time now
Um, you know, Gorski blogs under his real name, and is critical of uh, uh, also, let’s face it, everyone know, knows who “Orac” is
Um, how do we know that you don’t work for the clinic ?
Mhm Well see, one of the the problems is, Ju, I don’t know if you were around for the BurzynskiSaves thing
Did you ever see that account ?
Mhmm
Right
Oh no, I mean you have a right to do that but but I I’ve found that posting under a pseudonym diminishes my credibility
Um, so, . . the quote was uh um, uh, “Happily promotes bogus therapies,” was Simon Singh’s quote that got him sued
Um, but Josephine Jones does it to, quote “protect her family”
Um
So there’s that
Um, are you afraid for you’re family ?
Um, you don’t see that there would be anything to gain from, from going on-record ?
Um I I haven’t, I’ve never, honestly, I’ve never seen a Skeptic actually go after a person individually
Um, you know, uh, you, unless they were doing colossal harm to people
Um, to to focus on an, uh, let’s say, call someone’s work for um, yeah
Cite one example, of a Skeptic making shit for a Burzynski shill or anyone else in real life
That’s a quote
That’s, that’s something coming in from, from Guy
Like had anyone ever contacted Sheila Herron, or has anyone to to um, go after her job, or go after um, you know, my brother has gotten stuff from people
He didn’t tell me because he didn’t want to upset me, but my brother gets things from Burzynski supporters that are violent and threatening
I get letters telling me that I suck cancer’s dick
Um, I I’ve all sorts of things um, and I just, I’ve never seen that, that intrusion into real life on the part of uh, um, uh, Skeptics
I’ve never seen them doing that type of of of stuff
I’ve never seen them threatening bogus lawsuits
Um, and I I I wonder there, if there is some sort of, what do you think accounts for that, that difference?
Mhmm
Mhmm
I’ve I’ve I’ve shown up on, you know, as you, as you might, I imagine you moni, you monitor the Hashtag, right ?
Okay
Um, which is, which is your right
Um, uh, but every so often I jump in and say, you know, this movie has some flaws in it You know, that’s something I say rather frequently
Um, and I invite people, if they’re interested, to take a look at a couple of links
I don’t, I, you’ll notice that I no longer force people to like, “Well how do you explain this ?,” because that doesn’t seem to be very persuasive, or work at all
Ah, only people who are open minded to having their mind changed, those are the only ones I want to talk to
So I give them a choice
Kind of like Morpheus in The Matrix really
Um, b, that was a joke for me
Um, um anyway
Um, but, it it I, honestly, I would encourage you to go on-record, um, but I have, less than nothing invested in that, so, um
Uh, what’s next for you Well what happens Well what happens if he doesn’t understand what you’re saying ?
I mean one of the
I mean seriously Well, one of the problems I think that a lot of Skeptics have had, in in back channel discussions about this is that we don’t understand exactly what you’re saying
We certainly don’t understand why you’re so attached to him if you’ve never had any uh, you know, close dealing with uh, uh, with Burzynski
We don’t really understand that
Actually, especially when you consider, that all the information that we’ve put forward, that we’ve backed up with statements from uh, you know, uh, it, it, the statements that we have from from patients saying that you know, we’ve we’ve, we were told that, no that’s not exactly, they put it usually that but that that we believe that getting worse is getting better
Like how could someone continue to defend someone, when we pile up all of these different, you know, sources, saying the same thing ?
It it is, it is beyond us and we wonder if there’s absolutely anything that we could say that would convince you otherwise
But, I mean, but that means
Everything on The Other Other Burzynski Patient Group is referenced
It goes
There’s very little on
thehoustoncancerquack
There’s very little on
thehoustoncancerquack in the 1st place
Eh, right
The they both go to the same place
Uh un but, you know, we, the thing that that totally befuddles us, and is just endlessly frustrating, is like how many more examples, of patients believing that getting worse is getting better, and it’s not us saying it, it’s the patients saying it
And how many more of those patients do we need to to give you before you will like reconsider that perhaps you might be wrong ?
I don’t, the thing is though that, that that’s a inver, shifting the burden of proof off of Burzynski
Burzynski has to prove them wrong, has to prove him right
The FDA is not there to say this doesn’t work
The evidence would be
The evidence
The evidence would be phase 2 trials
And ev the evidence would be a completed and published phase 3 trial
That’s not forthcoming
The phase 3
You don’t know that he’s trying
He’d start completing these trials
And he would, he would be soliciting um, uh, lots of um, uh, you know, you know he’d be putting out papers constantly um and if the the British Medical Journal example’s anything uh representative of how Burzynski works, he’d immediately tell everyone that his he’s being . . blackballed by the, by the journal, even when it’s just a courtesy that he gets a a rejection
So, I mean, honestly, um, saying “Well, when the F, FDA tells you that it doesn’t work, the FDA’s never gonna say that because that’s not their job
So, given that what would, how many more patients do we have to show you before you consider that you may be wrong ?
That’s not an option, because they’re never gonna do it
They relinquish, a lot of authority, over to Burzynski, and his Institutional Review Board, which, I would mention, has failed 3 reviews in a row
Right ?
It is Burzynski’s job to be convincing
It is not our uh, uh, it it it he hasn’t produced in decades
In decades
In hundreds and hundreds of patients, who’ve payed to be on this
Hell, we’d we’d we’d like a prelim, well when you’re talking about something that is so difficult as brainstem glioma, that type of thing gets, really does in the publishing stream get fast-tracked there
they test it
Yeah, and they they they want uh, that was evidence of fast-tracking is what, that rejection was uh e was very quickly
Um, so, uh, uh again, the FDA is not the arbiter of this
It’s ultimately Burzynski
So, how long will it be before Burzynski doesn’t publish, that you decide that uh perhaps he’s he’s, doesn’t have the goods ?
You’ve been speculating about what the FDA’s motivation are like crazy
Why not speculate about Burzynski a little bit Well actually I’m not even asking you to speculate about Burzynski, I’m only asking you to tell me, how long would it take, uh how, for him to go unpublished like this, um, for this long, before you would doubt it ?
What ?
But these but but but that doesn’t have any bearing on
That doesn’t
Oh I’m not asking you how long, how long, would it take you for you to start doubting whether or not he has the goods ?
How long would it take ?
It’s a it’s a it’s a question that should be answered by a number uh uh months ?
Years ?
How long ?
It’s been 15 years already
I could push it back to 36 years
He hasn’t shown that it works for 36 years
I can do that
I was being nice
Perhaps based on bad phase 2
He withdrew
He withdrew the the phase 3 clinical trial
I that before recruiting,
although I’ve seen lots of people say they were on a phase 3 clinical trial
I wonder how that happened
Uh did do do you think that if they thought that he was a real doctor that they all would have refused like that ?
He’s changed things
That The Lancet is a top-tier journal like New England Journal of Medicine
It’s basically be, besieged by uh 100′s of people submitting their, their, their reports
Um, it’s just, you know, let’s say he, someone has such a thin publishing record as Burzynski does, do you think that it’s likely that he will ever get in a top-tier journal ?
What about the the Public Library of Science ?
It’s not the only journal there
What about BMC Cancer ?
There’s lots of places that he can go
Um, and he doesn’t seem to to have evailed himself of that, as far as I can tell
And I would know because he’d get rejected, or he’d be crowing, you know
Either way, he’s gonna tell us what happens
He told us what happened with The Lancet, you know
I don’t have any evidence that suggests to me that he’s even trying
So let’s go back to this
How long will it take ?
How long will it take before you, the Japanese study’s interesting too because we should be able to find that in the Japanese science databases, and we can find, we can’t find it at all
We can’t find it anywhere
And, and those are in English, so it’s not a language problem
We can’t find that anywhere
We’ve asked
We asked Rick Schiff, for, for that study
And, and it hasn’t come to us
He is now I believe on the Board of Directors, over there
He should have access to this
We can’t get it
How how long will it take before you recognize that, nothing is forthcoming ?
How long would that take ? Well, I mean, were talking about a blog here
We’re talking about life
No, we’re talking about a blogger’s feelings in that case
In in this case we’ren talking about, 1,000′s of patients, over the course of of of generations, you know
This is important stuff
This is not eh eh equating what’s happening to to patients with what’s happening to you is is completely off-kilter as far as I can tell
It’s nothing
It’s nothing like you not getting to say something on my web-site
You know
This is they they have thrown in with Burzynski, and they’ve trusted him, and he’s produced nothing
Nothing of substance
Nothing thas that has made all of that um, uh, n nothing th th th that uh his peers would take seriously
The other thing that that that strikes me now is that, you know, you you you you keep saying that, well Eric is going to to share things with you
Does it ever concern you eh uh eh occur to you that Eric might not be reliable ?
He then, and then he
And then he he, you know, the the the the dialogue that sprung up around that was, well see, he’s never going to get to get published Well you’re just setting yourself up for wish fulfillment
You want him to be, persecuted, so you are ecstatic when he doesn’t get to publish, which is unfortunate for all the cancer patients, who really thought that one day, all the studies were going to be published
Where has Eric been wrong ?
It’s it’s it’s it’s a form letter You know
They’re just saying, “No thanks”
“Thanks, but no thanks” is what they were saying, in the most generic way possible
Like I said, they’re besieged by researchers trying to publish
So, so, possibly
So possibly what you are saying is that they in fact have read it, and after having read it they’ve rejected it
Is that what you’re saying ?
Because that’s what peer-review is
Do you know it was the same editor, that it came from the same desk ?
You can’t make that assumption that that the form letter will be the same form letter every time
I mean you just can’t
I mean in in some ways we have a lot of non-information that you’re filling in, with what you expect, as as opposed to what’s actually really there, and I I I just think you’re putting too much uh stock in one uh, uh, in in in in this uh the publication kerfuffle
Um
Well, not necessarily
I’ve been in any # of professional groups where the organization is just not optimal, and publications certainly th there are all sorts of pressures from all sorts of different places
I I have no problems whatsoever with seeing that this might not be completely uh um uh streamlining uniform processes as possible
The fact that it’s not uniform, doesn’t have anything to do with Burzynski not publishing, not producing good data
Not just going to a, you know, god, even if, even if, let’s put it this way, even if he went to a pay to play type publication where you have to pay in order to get your manuscript accepted; and he has the money to do this, it wouldn’t take that much, and he were to put out a good protocol, and he were to show us his data, and he would make his, his his stuff accessible to us, then we could validate it, then we could look at it and say, “Yeah, this is good,” or “No, this is the problem, you have to go back and you have to fix this”
Right ?
So we really, every time we talk about the letter that he got, yeah that doesn’t have much to do with anything, really
We wanna see the frickin’ data
And if he had a cure for some cancers that otherwise don’t have reliable treatments, he has an obligation to get that out there anyway he can
And if if peer-review doesn’t, you know, play a, if peer-review can’t do it, you know, isn’t fast enough for him, then he should take it to the web, and he should send copies out to every pediatric, uh, you know, oncologist that there is
That’s the way to do it
Oh I, I I I certainly don’t think that he would put a lot of stock in it, but I, I, I know Dave Gorski enough, he wants this to work
He has patients who are dying, you know
And if if if let’s say that that Burzynski could get ah his gene-targeted therapy to work on breast cancer patients in in a reliable way, that would be, such a help to these people, that that Gorski’s trying to help
And, it it it doesn’t make sense, I mean, there, some of the best um, one of the the most important developments in medical history, was the development of of just washing your hands uh uh before uh uh going in and delivering a baby
Right ?
The guy who did it, was a colossal jerk, but it still worked and it’s the standard now
Right ?
Um, yea, it doesn’t matter now whether or not Burz, whether or not Gorski agrees with how Burzynski publishes
It’s the, it’s the data itself
If if Burzynski is is, is confident in his data, he will put it out there
Right ?
One way or the other
But he is a, the thing is, the thing is, you thing you have to understand is Gorski, Gorski is a genuine expert, in matters re re regarding on oncology studies
I mean, he has a
He, He’s able to convince people, he’s able to convince people, on the strength of his record, to give him money to carry out research
People who know what they’re talking about
To give him money to carry out his research
Right ?
Well what about all the other physicians, um, going back long before the Burzynski thing broke on-line
Of all these patients, with whom they have long-established relationships, and then doctors essentially after years, of treating these patients, basically saying, “I can’t work with you anymore if you go to Burzynski”
What about that ?
Di, are all of these doctors just as biased ?
Did he get burned at some point ?
We don’t know
Yeah, well, you wouldn’t expect Eric Merola to say that he got, that a doctor got burned
Would you ?
But he, he doesn’t have, he hasn’t given us his data
He’s given, he’s given, he’s given case studies
He’s done
Okay
Except for a ph, completed phase 3 clinical trial
Yeah
One of the things, one of the things that I’ve noticed going through these um, well, well there there is that
Uh, Guy Chapman, “It’s a blog, not a peer-reviewed publication”
Um, almost no treatment goes out without trials
Massive amounts of data are required
Um, so, it it is kind of, slightly disingenuous to hold uh Gorski to the same . . standard that you would, it on his blog
I think that professionally he would make, he he he would follow-up on these things, but u what I’ve noticed when you you mention these other people who are working with with Burzynski as co-investigators, the co- investigators don’t seem to have access to these, to these records
Um, you know, when they have to, when a patient has to, and often you have someone like a pediatrician, uh, signing on um uh to eh eh to work with with, uh and arrange care for patients when they’re out of state, away from Burzynski
Um, it’s it’s it’s often not an oncologist
It’s accurate to say that B Burzynski is not a board s uh certified oncologist
It’s accurate to say that no trial has been completed and fully published
Um, yeah it’s um, it it it if, all of the arguing on behalf of Burzynski doesn’t give him a single phase 3
It doesn’t give him um a uh uh of of a completed and and published phase 2
Uh, in in in that sense, you know, uh all the the the, you know, kind of back-peddling and and and trying to defend him is is going to, not going to help his case at all
You are, honestly as far as I can tell you are doing the um, you know, you’re you’re ah throwing up uh, uh, uh, you’re giving me another uh invisible dragon in the garage, um
What is the issue were not talking about
Yeah, but they
But they have track records that support the idea that you should trust them
Okay, so
What you’re telling me is that you trust the FDA to to be able to tell you when he’s not doing, good science, but also that you don’t trust the FDA
Do you see an inherent conflict there ? Well, when I, whenever I would ask about, like, why would these trials aren’t happening uh and, you know, you say well the the FDA’s arranged it
The FDA’s in control
They sign off on these things
But they’re they’re they’re they’re at the same that they’re, they’re trustworthy they’re also not trustworthy depending on what you need for the particular argument at the time
You’re suggesting that they’re untrustworthy
I I would say that the the FDA has given Burzynski every opportunity for decades
Every opportunity
When he didn’t have r r really, he got special treatment as far as I can tell
Uh, the, I’m rather stunned every morning I wake up and don’t see in the paper, that that place has has been closed down
I, I really am
Uh, so, you know, that one doesn’t really fly with me either
Um
Do you know that the FDA pulled out of the prosecution ?
Did you know that the FDA pulled out of the prosecution um of his criminal case, because they were backing a researcher ?
Yeah, the the the it wasn’t the FDA who was pressing charges, it was a Federal prosecutor
Right
And and, they declined to provide information that the prosecution needed
That’s important
That that that’s really important
That he has been given the benefit of the doubt, and he has come up wanting, for decades now
The, no, claims works
He claims works
One of the things I think
One of the things that I think is happening here
One of the things I think is happening here, is that lots of people have worked with Burzynski and then have stopped working with B Burzynski
Uh, you know, uh lots of uh uh uh these partnerships do not seem to work out in the end
I often wonder, if the uh, the way that these things are, are are playing out, because it’s s so reliable that they’re, that these partnerships are going to fail, I I wonder if th they are designed in such a way, that for instance, um a, uh, a a partner would be uncomfortable working
with him
Or um or that the specifications for what it takes to enter one of these trials is so high, that nobody will ever enter the trials
I mean, I wonder if they are, what, especially, like why hasn’t Burzynski left the country ?
That’s what I want to know
Exactly
If he was so, if he was s so persecuted and really cares about getting his treatment out to the world, why wouldn’t he ?
They’re, they’re lots of things going on here
David James has pointed this out, that a lot of questions I’m asking are not going answered
“I still don’t know how long it would take before you would have any doubts about Burzynski”
“I still have no idea, how often we can see patients reporting that signs of getting worse are getting better, before you would change your mind”
I’ve made it very clear that he just needs to have a completed study published and replicated before I support his right to go out and charge people what he’s charging for these, for these drugs, and I’m I’m just not seeing that here with you, and I I wonder what could come from, and don’t worry I will go to your site and I will comment on on on what you’ve run
Um, but, you know, I I I I it’s hard for Skeptics to imagine, what could be gained from engaging with you, if there seems to be no conceivable way, that we can, one, get a straight answer for, how many patients will have to report that getting worse is getting better before you starting doubting your opinion, or, uh, how many uh, uh, how many years does this have to go on before you decide that, “No, we probably just can’t produce the goods”
One of the interesting things about Doubting Thomas that I think you should definitely consider for yourself, is that at some point, when faced with the real opportunity to prove or disprove his assertions, he doubted himself
And that’s important
And that’s where you’re falling short in the analogy
I’ve laid out exactly what it would take for me to turn on a fucking dime
I have, I have made it abundantly clear what I need
Gorski has made it abundantly clear
Everybody else, Guy, and David, and Josephine Jones, uh, the Morgans, all of them have made it abundantly clear, what it would take to change our minds, and you’ve never done that
And even in this, this was an opportunity to do that
To come up with a basis for understanding, where it’s like, you know what, If we can show this, you know, if we can show a this guy, that, that, there, that his standards are not being met, then, you know, we could possibly have some sort of ongoing dialogue after this
Why wasn’t that study
Why wasn’t that , that that that, still . . again, it it doesn’t seem really to to approach the the the, main question here You know, um . . what are the standards that you have that it isn’t, what are your standards to show that it isn’t efficacious ?
Why was the Mayo
Why was the Mayo study delayed ?
Well you said you had so many years before you finish it and go in
Why, why did it take so long ?
I have something for you, okay ?
Send me that
Could you send me that study the way that it was published because um, just just send me the final study, um, to my e-mail address
Um, because, I can ask that question of those researchers, why was this study in this time, and what happened in-between
Why did it take so long for it, for it to come out
Right
Um, but it it would, perhaps, answer the question; because you’re using it as an example on the basis of which to dismiss criticism, whether or not, uh, it is the standard, and therefor you’re allowed to accept that Burzynski hasn’t published until 2016, or, um, it’s an anomaly, which is also a possibility, that most stuff comes out more quickly
I I, yeah, the other thing that David James points out is, you know, why 2016 when he’s had 36 years already ?
Treating people
You would expect the Burzynski Patient Group to be a lot bigger after 36 years, and in fact is
So, if you’re unsure about this stuff, if you’re unsure about the the time to publication, why are you defending it so hard, other than saying, “I don’t know, I really need to”
Uh about the
The reasons, the reasons for which that he’s, no, why are you defending him so hard, when you’re unsure ?
I’ve backed-up everything that
Every time that I’ve tried
and then other people
Way back
It is about
It is about as efficacious
Yeah, I’ve, and and I based that on a a a that type of thing
You, you, you can read that how you want, right ?
There
He does have the accent though
Right ?
No
Alright ?
No, but listen, like, it it it’s not, it, we we don’t understand why you defend himself so hard, when there is such a paucity of of of information out there
Um
Even if it’s true or false you, honestly though
Even if it’s true or false, in in that particular instance, you know, eh let’s just say that you’re right
Gorski gets that point completely wrong
It has no bearing on whether or not, ANP works
That’s a Red Herring
You’re just focusing on this, on this little niggly stuff, where the real question, is does it work ?
Are patients getting better at a better rate then not
or otherwise ?
We’re were talking about whether or not there’s evidence to suggest it works
The FDA, see that’s the thing
You, the FDA are are, you know, you invest them with, we’re just, we’re just circling around again
Uh um, alright
Well, this has gone on for rather a, longer than I thought it would
Um, I, uh, wanna thank you for coming on here
I wasn’t sure that you would actually do it
Um, I’m glad that you did
I’m glad that we talked
Um, I will look at your web-site, and we will, uh, we, uh, you, oh make sure that I I go to your blog and and I talk there
Um
Please do
And I will look at those
Maybe not in the next few days; I’ve got a lot going on but
Alright
Um
I don’t think he is
I don’t think he’s afraid
I just think he’s got a lot going on
He is act, a full-time surgical oncologist and researcher
He does have insane am, he has to pick and choose his battles
And if, if if he saw that we were going to ultimately be circling around our same arguments again and again; kind of like we’ve done here, um, he uh, you, he doesn’t have time for that, I don’t think
Alright
I I would ask that you to to go back over The The Other Burzynski Patient Group and take their stories seriously, because they deserve at least the same amount of consideration that the survivors do
That’s my
That’s my kids, okay Well, Thanks for much for talking
I greatly appreciate it
Alright
Take it easy
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