High-Tech Homeopathy May Boost Immune Function

April 1998 --Lark Lands
POZ MAGAZINE

Dilute. Shake. Repeat. Cryptic shampoo instructions? No, it's the process for making a homeopathic medicine and it may be of the moment because small new trials show that PWAs (patients with AIDS) given a set of four such highly diluted potions - called Cell Signal Enhancers^® (CSEs^®) -- had CD4 cell stabilization, small viral load decreases and improved scores on a standard measure of bedewed inflammation and infection. They also experienced increases in weight and body cell mass as well as better nervous system function.

Is this for real? Well, skeptics abound when the topic is homeopathy. After all, it's based on a little something called the Law of Similars: Let like be cured by like. Huh? OK, it means that the same substance that causes a symptom at a high dose may, when given at a much lower dose, reduce the symptom by evoking a healing response.

In the case of the proposed HIV treatment, former National Institutes of Health researcher Barbara Brewitt, Ph.D. and her University of Washington colleagues -- the developers of CSEs^® -- believe that these substances may be able to restore the communication between immune and nervous system cells that is fundamentally disrupted in PWAs, enabling the body to better control the virus.

A stumbling block in most scientists' paths toward belief in homeopathy is the fact that the starting substances are often so diluted that there is little, if any, left in the final remedy. However, cutting edge physicists have recently hypothesized the existence of what they call icy crystals -- crystalline mirror images that form around a substance being diluted and retain their shape even after the original molecules have vanished. Brewitt proposes that such mirror images in the CSEs^® might change the electromagnetic forces in the body, thereby normalizing immune and nervous system function.

This would all seem like a lot of techno-babble if it weren't for those results in PWAs. Long-term follow-up of people in the first trial is intriguing, at the very least. Comparing the seven people who continued on the CSEs^® for three years to the 11 people who switched to combination anti-retroviral therapies, no differences are seen in CD4 or CD8 changes (which increased or stabilized in people on either approach) or viral loads (which decreased comparably in both sets of people). The people who chose to do neither experienced the predictable declines in CD4s and increases in viral loads. Additionally, people on the CSEs^® just plain felt better. Phoenix PWA Brent Butler gained a needed 10 pounds after beginning the remedies and says, "I feel a change in my body when I take the drops and they've definitely improved my energy."

Brewitt's explanation for all these good effects falls back on that Law of Similars. She created the formula for the CSEs^® by starting with the cell-produced chemicals -- cytokines -- that worsen HIV disease when over produced by the body. Too-high-insulin-like growth factor (IGF1) suppresses immune function and raises sedimentation rates. An overabundance of platelet-derived growth factor (PDGFBB) causes enlarged lymph nodes. Too much transforming growth factor-beta (TGFb) suppresses immune function. Also, over-the-top levels of granulocyte-macrophage colony stimulating factor (GM-CSF) increase HIV replication. Giving a highly diluted mix of these does the opposite, educating the immune system to help destroy the virus. Or so the theory goes... It can only remain a theory until much larger trials confirm the benefits so far seen. Luckily, a larger (100-person) double-blind placebo-controlled trial is now underway in six cities. Early trends are encouraging, so stay tuned for the final results on this one.