8 replies to this topic

[curious_sle]

http://www.wired.com...l?tw=wn_index_3

[curious_sle]

pity is, i've ben misquoted or rather the 200 years figure was placed in my mouth and was something the author insited as a figure :-( but all in all a rather nice article.

[tom a]

all in all a rather nice article

The article struck me instead as very sneering and judgmental, as did the quotes from this guy Olshanksy.

I think it's fair to say that those of us who choose to take resveratrol supplements are taking a calculated risk.

But the article, and the quotes from Olshansky, give no real sense of all the relevant components in that calculation really are. (e.g., what is the risk of bad side effects as opposed to the upside possibility of enormously diminished health risks).

In a way, the case of fen-phen may a good example of how different people may decide to take different calculated risks.

Yes, fen-phen did induce a number of heart valve problems in women -- according to wikipedia, there were 66 such cases reported to the FDA. I'm not sure how many deaths may have been attributable to fen-phen, but one would expect that number to be a handful at most.

Yet there were over 18 million people on the drug. Now the anti-obesity effects of fen-phen on this population were considerably less than one might have hoped, though they did exist -- more so in some people than in others. But given the terrible toll extra weight exacts on people's health, it is extremely plausible that the positive effects of fen-phen far exceeded the downside, simply in terms of likelihood of dying, and of being otherwise in good health. Certainly as an individual it may make perfect sense to take fen-phen if, overall, those risks are diminished, even though one is simulataneously exposing oneself to increased risk of a particular problem.

For all that, I can certainly imagine that there are people who would choose NOT to take fen-phen even with the overall reduced health risk, on the ground that they don't want to do something that might damage themselves. That's a psychological decision based in many ways on one's emotional dispositions.

But I think the major impetus against a drug like fen-phen is legal, economic, and institutional. Such a drug subjects its prescribers to endless lawsuits, and economic damage. For them, such a drug makes absolutely no sense, and these issues will pressure such a drug off the market with great speed. But this all very little to do with the considerations that would motivate an individual to take it or not.

I see resveratrol as being a like case. I don't doubt but that there may be very special cases in which resveratrol makes a bad condition worse, or exposes "defects" in someone's physiology that might otherwise have remained dormant. Indeed, insofar as the effects of resveratrol are basic and powerful -- which is what we are hoping -- it seems very unlikely that it could be otherwise. Yet the potential upside in terms of health is tremendous, and, if the numbers in the animal studies are even a remote indication, will simply swamp the special cases in which things go awry.

That is our calculated risk. Somedays it may feel good to take it, other days it may not. But acting as though we are not already taking a big risk in simply having various "aging markers" grow worse for us with every passing day (independent of whether life ever gets extended) is mindless. This is not a baseline we should resign ourselves to, if there looks to be a way of ameliorating it.

[Karomesis]

, as did the quotes from this guy Olshanksy.

he posts here sometimes, and believe it or not he's actually on our side. He just doesn't care for shysters who take advantage of the layman public.

[curious_sle]

Yeah well, the article is short so lot's of shortcuts had to be made i guess. I am just unhappy about beeing missquoted :-) and generally underemployed. I mean I talked like more then an hour to that guy and gave him some stuff in email. Sheesh. Is it gonna be in the print edition too? I'd like a paper copy :-)

[Karomesis]

I am just unhappy about beeing missquoted :-)

Curious, to set the record straight, whereabouts were you misquoted?

[niner]

FWIW, I agree with tom_a about the sneering and judgemental character of the article. However, this caught my eye:

The 50-year-old cognitive science professor at the University of California, Irvine, added 50 milligrams of resveratrol daily to a careful diet and regular exercise. Higher doses, he says, leave him easily bruised

What's up with that? Have any of you seen this effect?

[tintinet]

No. But RESV has a been reported to have anti-thrombotic effect via inhibition of platelet aggregation:

Kirk RI, Deitch JA, Wu JM, Lerea KM. Resveratrol decreases early signaling events in washed platelets but has little effect on platalet in whole blood. Blood Cells Mol Dis. 2000;26(2):144-150. (PubMed)

Pace-Asciak CR, Hahn S, Diamandis EP, Soleas G, Goldberg DM. The red wine phenolics trans-resveratrol and quercetin block human platelet aggregation and eicosanoid synthesis: implications for protection against coronary heart disease. Clin Chim Acta. 1995;235(2):207-219. (PubMed)


This is likely, for most individuals, a positive. I am Factor V Leiden heterzygous (discovered in the early days of its study, even before it was so named, when I volunteered as a "control" for a coagulation experiment in a lab I was working in),
thus I don't mind inhibiting my coagulation a bit, and take aspirin with fair regularity.

[curious_sle]

Curious, to set the record straight, whereabouts were you misquoted?

I was quoted (see above) as saying that i think i'll live to 200 which is of course nonesense and rather something the author insited on using as figure for "really extreme life extension" whereas we all know that I ever make it to 180 i'll likely make it to 1800 :-) for the real deal is living past 120 in good health in the first place.