Antibiotics and cancer stem cells

Sherlock (grazie!) sent me the link to a recent BBC report (http://tinyurl.com/opnun6) on a “farm” antibiotic called salinomycin and its killing effect on breast cancer stem cells. One of the uses of salinomycin, I read, is that it is added to chicken feed to prevent certain types of infections. A quick online search, though, turned up a bunch of serious toxicity issues in animals (sheep, horses, turkeys…and camels, yes, camels, see: http://tinyurl.com/nx22v9). By the way, if I am not mistaken, the use of such antibiotics has been banned in the European Union…

Anyway, the article states that, When given to mice with tumours, the growth of the cancer slowed. However, the researchers stressed that it was too early to know if similar successes could be achieved in human cancer patients.

Well, this was an interesting read, even though I would definitely NOT test salinomycin on myself!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *