Overview Nitrilosides are a group of plant substances some people refer to as vitamin B17, although these chemicals technically are not vitamins. Amygdalin is a type of nitriloside from which Laetrile is derived. Laetrile is a claimed cancer treatment, and it may be natural or semi-synthetic, depending on its place of manufacture. The Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) advises against taking Laetrile or amygdalin supplements because no evidence supports their effectiveness, and they are associated with cyanide toxicity. Anyone who does take these products should avoid eating foods containing amygdalin, because these foods can add extra cyanide to the body. The foods are safe otherwise because the levels of amygdalin in them are low, according to Cancer Research UK. Apricot Kernels The primary source of amygdalin is apricot kernels, contained inside the seeds (pits). The health claim for preventing cancer involves eating about seven apricot kernels per day, as explained by CureZone.
The cancer treatment Laetrile, when made from natural sources, is derived from crushed apricot kernels. Cancer Research UK notes that eating 50 to 60 apricot kernels per day is toxic enough to be fatal. Other fruit seeds containing amygdalin include apple, cherry, nectarine, orange, peach, pear, plum, prune and squash. Nuts and Seeds Bitter almonds taste like apricot kernels, and these ingredients can substitute for each other in recipes. Bitter almonds also contain amygdalin, and they have over 500 mg of nitrilosides per 100 g of food, according to Alternative Health Group. For this level of vitamin B17, people should eat the bitter almonds raw. Raw cashew nuts, macadamia nuts, pecans, walnuts and flax seed also contain amygdalin. Vegetables, Beans and Grains Some vegetables, beans and grains also contain vitamin B17. Amygdalin-containing foods include various types of bean sprouts, carrots, celery, wheatgrass, yams, brown rice and pulses such as butter beans, lima beans and mung beans.
Alternative Health Group lists foods with over 100 mg of nitrilosides per 100 g of food and varying amounts of amygdalin as buckwheat, cassava, millet, fava beans, lentils, and alfalfa and eucalyptus leaves. Fruit Berries and certain other fruits also contain vitamin B17, according to Alternative Health Group. These fruits contain varying amounts of amygdalin, and they all contain over 100 mg per of nitrilosides per 100 g of food. They include wild blackberries (domestic ones contain only small amounts of nitrilosides), boysenberries, Swedish cranberries, currants, elderberries, gooseberries, huckleberries, loganberries, mulberries, raspberries, quince, choke cherries and wild crab apples. email Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center: AmygdalinCancer Research UK: LaetrileLife Enthusiast Co-op: LaetrileCureZone: LaetrileAlternative Health Group: Amygdalin DON'T MISS Vitamin B12 & Folic Acid Are Spicy Foods Bad for Pregnant Women? Can You Take Vitamins B6 & B12 Together? “When administered to cancer patients, laetrile has proven to be quite free from any harmful side effects, and I would say that no anti-cancer drug could make a cancerous patient improve faster than laetrile.
It goes without saying that laetrile controls cancer and is quite effective whenever it is located.” Dr. Shigeaki Sakai – a prominent Tokyo physician reports in Oct. 1963. Amygdalin or Vitamin B 17 is a compound that can be found in the pits of apricots, peaches, cherries, and bitter almonds (which are illegal in the US), as well as in the seeds of apples, strawberries, and red or black raspberries. Other foods that contain smaller amounts are chick peas, lentils, Lima beans, cashews, brown rice, buckwheat, millet and by juicing wheatgrass. Most modern day diets are lacking in the foods that contain a significant amount of the compound and supporters believe that the body requires some of this nutrient in order to prevent and heal from cancer. The video and book World Without Cancer; The Story of Vitamin B17 tells about the early history of the compound and the interest that has surrounded it over the years. Much of the controversy regarding it took place from the 1950’s – 70’s, and it had even been tested a few times in a laboratory setting, but each time it had reportedly failed to show any promise for the treatment of cancer.
But still, the public remained unconvinced, and in order to quell the demand once and for all, laetrile became the subject of a 5 year study at The Sloan-Kettering Cancer Institute from 1972-1977, and a second study in 1981. The following information was shared by Ralph Moss in the documentary film Second Opinion: Laetrile At Sloan-Kettering, which details the cover-up that he witnessed first-hand while serving as the Public Relations Director for Sloan during the length of the study. Ralph claims that he was told by hospital administration that laetrile was not showing success during the early experimentation and that he should relay that information if anyone ever made inquiries. A short while later, Ralph met with Kanematsu Sugiura, who was the senior scientist in charge of the testing so that he could get more details about the experiments. To Ralph’s surprise, Sugiura’s experiments clearly showed that laetrile had significantly inhibited the growth of primary tumors, and more surprisingly, there was an 80% decrease in the appearance of lung metastasis in the mice bearing spontaneous mammary tumors compared to the control mice.
Ralph said that he could see that Sugiura was clearly impressed with the compound, even stating that “laetrile had provided the best effect against tumor metastasis that he had witnessed in his 60 years of research.” Ralph was immediately suspicious of the motives of the hospital. So over the next few years he recorded the cover-up efforts that he was witnessing from the top medical professionals working at Sloan Kettering as well as from other officials working at NCI, FDA and ACS, who all seemed to be working in collusion to discredit laetrile. This knowledge bothered Ralph deeply, but he was very conflicted as he didn’t want to risk losing his job. Because of this, Ralph decided to act anonymously by asking Sugiura for copies of his laboratory notes so that he could leak them to a reporter as well as to a high-profile organization that supported the use of laetrile, all in the hopes of getting the information out to the public. Ralph also started an underground newsletter at Sloan that contained information on the laetrile coverup and other staff grievances in order to spread the information to the rest of the staff at the hospital, but none of this seemed to work quite as well as Ralph had hoped.
Finally, in June 15, 1977, Sloan held a press conference to report on the results of the 5-year study with laetrile. All of the top cancer officials at Sloan proclaimed in unison that laetrile had failed to show any promise as a cancer treatment even though these statements were in direct conflict with Sugiura’s data that lay buried within the report. Ralph was so disgusted that he held a second press conference to blow the whistle on the cover-up efforts that he had witnessed but he was fired and attacked publicly by Sloan-Kettering and the American Cancer Society. For more information on Ralph’s first hand account, please watch the film Second Opinion: Laetrile At Sloan-Kettering. Ralph Moss in the Trailer for the film Second Opinion In 1981, the National Cancer Institute announced “that they had performed the most definitive study on laetrile to date, which proved beyond any shadow of doubt that laetrile was worthless as a treatment for cancer.” But after studying the research, Ralph points out that these trials were designed to fail from the start.
Dr Charles Moertel, was put in charge of the study and he had already publicly proclaimed himself to be “a sworn enemy of all forms of alternative medicine”, so there was already bias and a conflict of interest. The 178 patients that were involved in the study were all suffering from very advanced, stage 4 cancers, and all had had prior chemotherapy treatments. When these extremely ill patients failed to respond to laetrile it was determined that it must be worthless as a cancer treatment. But Ralph points out that there was no randomization to the trial. What if some of these patients had been given chemotherapy, while others were given laetrile and then their mortality rates were judged? What if laetrile’s mortality rate turned out to be the same, or even slightly better than that of chemotherapy? Then the public would have realized that there was a very cheap product available that did not cause extreme toxicity to the body; one that did not cause a patient to feel deathly ill;
or to lose their hair … . Ralph later when on to write several definitive books on the politics related to alternative cancer research and maintains the website Cancer Decisions. Vitamin B-17 is a molecule made up of four parts: 2 parts Glucose, 1 part Benzaldahyde, 1 part Hydrogen Cyanide (which is also found in vitamin b12). It is important to note that the body has the proper compounds to either neutralize the B17 molecules or to unlock to them at the site of cancer. This is because the enzyme rhodanese is found in normal healthy cells and it automatically neutralize the Benzaldahyde and Hydrogen Cyanide, converting them into harmless compounds which the body will then excrete. Rhodanese is found everywhere in the body except for in (or around) cancer cells or tumors. In contrast, Beta-Glucosidase is found only at the site of cancer and is referred to as the “unlocking enzyme” since it will unlock the cyanide and benzaldahyde at the site of cancerous cells and tumors.
When glucose delivers the B-17 molecules to the cancerous cells, they are unable to neutralize the cyanide since they lack the rhodanese enzyme. Instead, the cyanide and benzaldahyde are released at the site of cancer allowing them to target the cancer cells directly. Please watch the video that is linked below for a complete explanation of this therapy. Ty Bollinger explains how the therapy works The documentary World Without Cancer The following supplements are recommended in order for laetrile to work properly. If you already take supplements, then take a look to see if they cover all of the components below. If not, you will need to fill in any gaps: This documentary that features laetrile, Cancer; The story of Jason Vale, who used apricot kernels and apple seeds to treat his cancer How to eat apricot kernels Carl O Helvie used B17 to treat his terminal lung cancer Sandi Rog credits B17 with curing her stage 4 Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma