PLT Test Blog

  Our reader Natasa brought to my attention various things recently; this included the fact that intranasal delivery of Suramin for autism is being developed and the repurposing of an old drug called Metyrosine for autism. I also noted a recent study that used a popular probiotic formerly called VSL#3, now called Visbiome/Viviomixx. This is interesting because it found that autistic people without GI dysfunction benefited.   The study had a high drop out rate and the improvement was not huge. Visbiome/Viviomixx is pricey for a probiotic, but not the price of two Ferraris like Metyrosine.   Suramin Nasal Spray -   PAX 102 Suramin is Dr Naviaux’s idea to treat autism and indeed several other conditions. Suramin is an existing drug approved outside the USA and made by Bayer.   Clearly Dr Naviaux’s new partner Paxmedica was not able to make a deal with Bayer, so they have to figure out themselves how to manufacture Suramin, which loses more time.   The good...

    In the next 30 to 50 years I think many common diseases will be, in part, treated by bacteria.  There is already a great deal of research to show that gut bacteria play a key role in both some diseases and the effectiveness of some therapies. I was surprised to read that the effectiveness of some common existing cancer drugs appears to depend on the presence, or not, of specific gut bacteria. Many gut bacteria have very specific, but different, effects on the immune system.  There may be no one-size-fits-all options and it is not a case of good bacteria and bad bacteria.  Too much of some “good” bacteria and they becomes “bad” bacteria. Taking a pragmatic approach you can look at the effects of widely available probiotic bacteria and see if any might have a beneficial effect on a specific person’s autism. We already saw in the trials that people made following Alli from Switzerland’s revelation about the two L.reuteri bacteria found in Biogaia Gastrus, that ...