Recup and Lyme disease, was: Re: Latest Dubbo results and glutathione

[Guest guest]

Hi, a.

I realize that you've asked me about Recup several times, and I wish I

could give you a definitive answer for why it works for you, but I'm

not sure.

Here is something to consider, though:

Mark London noted the high citrate content of Recup, and that citrate

produces alkalinization, and this has gotten me thinking. I want to

comment on that a little, and suggest a possible mechanism for how it

could be helping you.

First, it's true that in a person whose citric acid cycles are

operating normally, if citrate is ingested, it will be utilized by the

citric acid cycle in the cells and will be burned as fuel. Probably

the cells of the gut will burn most of it, because they get first

access. So long as the citric acid cycle (Krebs cycle) is operating

well, this should happen. Since citrate is an anion (negatively

charged ion), it must come into the body with a cation (positively

charged ion) to balance the charge. In Recup, the cation is sodium.

Being an elemental mineral, sodium survives in the body as sodium, and

the excess is excreted in the urine. Since sodium is a cation, in the

urine it must be balanced with an anion, and the body takes care of

this by dissociating water molecules into hydrogen ions and hydroxide

ions, and matching up the excreted sodium with hydroxide. The result

is that the pH of the urine rises, i.e. becomes more alkaline. So

that's why taking a citrate causes alkalinization of the urine, and

that's what happens in a person who has normally operating Krebs

cycles. I suspect that your Krebs cycles are operating more or less

normally, so that this is what happens in your body when you ingest

Recup. I'll get back to your case (Lyme disease) again below, but

first I want to talk about cases in which the citric acid cycle is not

operating normally.

In many PWCs (I expect not in you, but I don't have a urine organic

acids test for you, so I can't be positive in your case) it is found

that citrate is elevated in the urine. This means that there is a

partial blockade in the citric acid cycle beyond the location of

citrate. I have argued that the partial blockade is at actonitase,

and is produced by a rise in superoxide in response to glutathione

depletion and consequenct product inhibition of the superoxide

dismutase reaction. If people who have this partial blockade ingest

citrate, I don't believe their bodies will be able to metabolize it

well, and the excess will be excreted in the urine. To the degree

this happens, the ingestion of citrate will probably not alkalinize

their urine to the degree it does in a person with normally operating

citric acid cycles. This may explain why Recup doesn't work well for

some PWCs. This could be checked by urine organic acids testing and

correlation with response to Recup. Also, by the, way, in these

people, the ingestion of citrate will not help to raise their

magnesium and calcium, as Mark suggested, because citrate is a good

chelator for the +2 ions, and will tend to take them out in the urine.

Now, back to your case, a. We know that you have tested positive

for Lyme disease, and we also know that your HLA typing shows that

your immune system is not able to recognize and destroy Lyme disease

toxin. We know from Dr. Shoemaker's work that Borrelia produce an

anion toxin, because he has been able to bind it with cholestyramine,

which is an anion exchange resin. I'm going to guess that this anion

toxin acts as a weak acid. What that means is that it binds hydrogen

ions fairly well, and doesn't give them up and become ionized as an

anion unless the pH of the environment is fairly high. This is the

case in bile (pH 7.5 in the liver, pH 6 in the gall bladder), and that

would explain why the Lyme toxin is able to be in anion form when it

is excreted into the duodenum in the bile, and hence, why it can be

bound with an anion exchange resin.

Now, move with me to the field of clinical toxicology. In this field,

one of the ways used to cause certain toxins to be excreted faster is

to alkalinize the urine, usually by the injection of bicarbonate.

However, ingesting sodium citrate will also alkalinize the urine,

provided that the Krebs cycles can burn the citrate, as I discussed

above. The reason alkalinization is used for detox of certain

substances is that if they behave as weak acids, the elevation of pH

will cause them to become ionized, and then they are more likely to

remain in solution and be excreted in the urine than to be resorbed in

the kidney tubules and be retained in the body. In clinical

toxicology, this is referred to as " ion trapping. "

So I suggest that in your case what's happening is that taking Recup

is raising the pH of your urine to a level where the Lyme toxin is

ionized and thus is excreted more readily.

This hypothesis can be tested. One of the simplest things you could

do would be to get some pH paper at a drugstore and check the pH of

your urine when you have been taking Recup. I would guess that it

will be on the high side, say pH 6 or higher. Many people, especially

if their diet is high in meat and low in vegetables, have a lower pH

than this. If your urine pH is lower than about six and Recup is

helping you, then I would say that this hypothesis is not valid for

your case. If it's pH 6 or higher, I would say that this hypothesis

still has a chance.

Another test would be to try taking a significant amount of sodium

bicarbonate orally instead of Recup, and see if that also gives a

benefit. Of course, this will tend to make you burp a lot if you have

normal stomach acid leves, but it's all for the sake of science, and

you do want to know why Recup helps you, right?(:-) If the bicarb

also helps you, then I think the alkalinization-of-urine idea may be

valid in your case.

Rich

>

> Rich,

> Have you read Mark London's article on Recuperation and why it may

> work? So far Recuperation along with antibiotics has worked the best

> of anything I have tried. My diagnosis is cfs, Lyme, and quinolone

> tendon damage.

>

> Here is a link to his article. I would be interested in your

> perspective on it.

> http://web.mit.edu/london/www/RRR.htm

>

> a Carnes