Editors' Column
From Buchler...keeping pace with the age of discovery: An ALL NEW digital power supply. Buchler introduces the first laboratory power supply with large, bright L.E.D. digital readout and instant pushbutton selection of constant-power, constant-vo/fage, or constant-currenf modes. The bright L.E.D. display means easy reading, even from across the room, without the distraction of dual or multifunction scales. Overvoltage and overcurrent protection are built in; control circuits operate at low voltage for long life and reliability. This is the only truly contemporary power supply. It's new from Buchler. Available through your leading laboratory supply house.
SEARLE
Buchler Instruments Division of Searle Diagnostics Inc. 1327 Sixteenth Street Fort Lee, New Jersey 07024 U.S.A. 201-224-3333
Buchler Instruments: made in the United States, sales and service worldwide.
284 A ·
CIRCLE 56 ON READER SERVICE CARD ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY, VOL. 50, NO. 2, FEBRUARY 1978
cancerous tissues to liberate cyanide, which would kill the cancer. When scientific evidence was used to refute this claim, the theory was advanced t h a t the material is a vitamin which prevents cancer and t h a t cancer is a manifestation of a vitamin deficiency. However, no properties of a vitamin have been associated with this compound as presented to FDA, nor has a deficiency disease been associated with its lack. Identity and analysis form cornerstones of any Federal action on drugs. In the past, accurate and careful analysis has helped squelch some so-called cancer "cures". Examples are Dr. Koch's t r e a t m e n t in the 1940's and 1950's. Analysis showed the material to be distilled water of unusual purity. Dr. Koch claimed it contained 1 p a r t of the chemical glyoxylide in 1 trillion parts of water! We wonder how Dr. Koch determined this amount in those days! Two decades later, another cancer "cure", Krebiozen, was found to contain only creatine monohydrate, an amino acid present in all animal tissues and without value as a cancer treatment. Ampuls for injection contained only mineral oil. Commissioner Kennedy has run into severe roadblocks in his efforts to protect the public from Laetrile promoters. T h e most recent court decision by District Court Judge Luther Bohanon in Oklahoma City directs the Federal government, in an unusual Nationwide ruling, to cease interfering with the importation, introduction, delivery, or use of the controversial cancer drug Laetrile. T h e Food and Drug Administration has no choice other than appeal to support the necessity for scientific validation of drugs rather than "witchcraft". Surprisingly, the court also ruled t h a t Laetrile is not a " n e w " drug, although the FDA maintains t h a t the material cannot be "grandfathered". " T h e r e is no evidence t h a t experts in 1962 recognized Laetrile to be safe and effective in the t r e a t m e n t and management of cancer; none of the experts who submitted testimony to FDA knows of scientific reports on which such recognition could have been predicated." Further, and most important, FDA's Kennedy reports t h a t "numerous variations of the identity of Laetrile make it certain t h a t before 1938, and probably even in 1962, the material now understood to be Laetrile was a different compound or compounds entirely". See " T h e Analytical Chemistry of Amygdalin", page 317, this issue. Josephine M. Petruzzi
