Toxins and Venoms: The Bad and Good

Bacterial toxins 0.00003 to 1

Animal venoms 10 to 100

Algal toxins 10 to 1.000

Mushroom toxins 1,000s

Mycotoxins 1,000 to 10,000

Sodium cyanide 10,000

Pesticides 10,000s

* C.K. Winter et al., “Chemicals in the Human Food Chain, (New York, Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1990)

Another way to present some toxic data is shown in Table 2.

Table 2- Hold a nickel in your hand. Here’s how many lethal doses equal that nickel’s weight.*

Thallium 5

1080 Rat Poison 7

Cyanide 25

Strychnine 50

Nicotine 111

Botulinum 100,000,000

Anthrax 500,000,000

* Cathy Newman, “12 toxic tales,” National Geographic, 207, 2, May 2005

Venomous Species

Spider Venom

Part of the search for new medicines has focused on the world’s 45,000 species of spiders, many of which kill their prey with venoms that contain hundreds—or even thousands- of protein molecules. Some of these molecules block nerve activity.

New research shows that seven compounds of the countless found in spider venom block a key step in the body’s ability to pass pain signals to the brain. The hunt for a medicine based on just one of these compounds, which would open up a new class of potent pain killers is now a step closer. (4)

Botox

The bacterium Clostridium botulinum produces a poison so deadly that a few hundredths of an ounce can kill a million people. Small wonder it’s one of the most dreaded agents of biological warfare as evident from Table 2. Yet it is also one of the most widely used therapeutic drugs, at least in domesticated form known as Botox.

Originally developed for the treatment of uncontrollable blinking, Botox is now used to help treat some 40 ailments ranging from crippling diseases such as cerebral palsy and Parkinson’s to less than life threatening troubles like facial wrinkles and excessive sweating. It may even ease migraines for some people. (5)

Hydrogen Sulfide

Besides being an annoyance, hydrogen sulfide (H2S) is highly toxic, being the second most common cause of fatal gas inhalation exposures in the workplace (at 7.7 percent, second to carbon monoxide at 36 percent).The health effects are dependent (the dose makes the poison), and at high enough concentrations, the gas can be fatal within seconds. High exposures cause respiratory failure. Lower exposures can cause a variety of symptoms, ranging from irritation to labored breathing and unconsciousness. (6)

However, hydrogen sulfide is not the devil. Beneath the danger and stench is a molecule as basic and indispensable as sodium chloride. The gas is produced in all of the body’s tissues, all the time, regardless of what was for dinner.

Studies have shown that this compound is involved in many physiological functions, and may have significant therapeutic applications. Notably, along with nitric oxide and carbon monoxide, H2S is a so-called gasotransmitter.

Mounting evidence indicates that the gas plays a beneficial role in the health of the cardiovascular system and other parts of the body.

Based on these findings, researchers are developing H2S based therapies for conditions ranging from cardiovascular disease to irritable bowel syndrome.

Recent research suggests that slower transit time—that is, longer exposure to this nasty stuff, may in fact be of benefit. Hydrogen sulfide appears to prevent inflammation and it sometime consequences, ulcerative colitis and cancer. In rodent studies, the gas has a significant anti-inflammatory effect on the walls of the digestive tract: the opposite of what aspirin does in there.

Aspirin and ibuprofen combat inflammation everywhere but the stomach and bowels; there they create inflammation. Used in tandem with hydrogen sulfide, aspirin or ibuprofen may be thousands of times as potent at preventing tumor growth—at least, in mice and in laboratory grown tumor cells. Human trials have not yet begun, reports Mary Roach. (7)

Also, physiologic role for H2S in regulating blood pressure raises the possibility that pharmacologic blood pressure enhancement of H2S formation could be an alternative approach for treatment of hypertension. (8)

Warfarin- Rat Poison

The drug label for a common rat poison called warfarin illustrates the importance of the disclosure statement. Doctors prescribe warfarin for tens of thousands of human patients every year. DuPont sells the drug under the trade name of Coumadin. Warfarin kills rats by blocking the capacity to form blood clots. As a result, the animals hemorrhage and die. Coumadin provides a textbook example that the difference between a poison and a drug is the dose.

At the right dose, Coumadin can prevent unwanted blood clots from forming in the blood. After a heart attack, and certain other cardiac events, some individuals are at great risk that the blood may coagulate and form a small clot. If this clot lodges in the brain, the result is a stroke. Clots can also form in the in the lungs, in veins of the legs and other extremities. The drug label of Coumadin describes its ability to prevent clots. (9)

Nitric Oxide

An unlikely wonder drug is the unstable free radical nitric oxide (NO) gas, which is found in cigarette smoke and smog. Not long ago, no one would have dreamed how important nitric oxide is within our bodies. Now, it is being implicated in everything from memory to blood pressure. Tiny puffs of NO mediate an extraordinary range of biological properties in our bodies, ranging from destruction of tumor cells to the control of blood pressure. (10)

NO was the first gas to be approved as a drug product. Although oxygen and N2O (laughing gas) have been used medically for many years, they never were subjected to the current rigorous approval process. Most of the anesthetic gases are actually volatile liquids; therefore, NO is unique in the pharmaceutical industry. (11)

Carbon Monoxide

Researchers have shown that carbon monoxide (CO) can be used to reverse pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), which is caused by uncontrolled proliferation of the smooth muscle cells of the pulmonary arteries—blood vessels that carry blood from the heart to the lungs. (12)

Summary

Edward Calabrese of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, is a strong proponent of hormesis, a scientific term that means low doses help and high doses hurt. He’s concerned that if researchers don’t begin regularly probing the effects of agents at very low doses, scientists will continue to miss important health impacts—both good and bad, of pollutants, drugs and other agents.

Two obvious benefits can accrue from testing effects at low doses: 1- medical help might be found from material otherwise known to be toxic and 2- if traces of certain pollutants are not as dangerous as previous estimates had suggested, perhaps some overly stringent regulations could be changed.

References

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