A question somewhat medical about super hots.

[Nigel]

Sorry to hear about your loss.

For future reference for others:
If somebody runs out of peppers try Fresh horseradish.
I know people I sent root cuttings to that didn't like peppers that horseradish helped with sinus and other breathing problems.
Like Peppers it has a lot of various vitamins in it and the fumes are said to be good for the lungs and sinus.

Most of the Pepper/cancer stuff only works in labs on cells in a petre dish not in animals or humans so far.

MAYBE it might eventually work as a drug but so far eating peppers seems to have no effect on cancer rates from what I've read.
Cancer cells treated directly showed SOME promise with Prostate Cancer in a lab.
From what I've read so far.
Eating peppers is different than cancer cells being in direct contact with the stuff a pepper has in it.

My Mother has been fighting a couple kinds of cancer over the last several years.
She doesn't like super hots or habs for that matter.
Eats Jalapeno salsa.
She is in remission but on Kemo for life.
Kemo messes her up and she can't eat a lot of stuff when on Kemo.
Peppers would make it worse I think,as far as eating them goes.

To me it's like medical Pot,It works for some stuff but not everything it is supposed to work for.
There is no miracle herb or pod for any given disease.
Some stuff just works better than other stuff,depending on the disease and patient I think.
Anything is sometimes worth a try when you are hurting.
If it works Great!
You won't know until you try it...

I was a cancer researcher for almost 18 years and you are 100% correct about capsaicin and cancer. It`s actually quite difficult to get grants to work on natural products and you can forget about Big Pharma involvement, as they can`t make money from natural products. The first thing that needs to happen is for someone to develop a test on human cells in culture, that gives an easy to see readout on efficacy. Then you give capsaicin to a medicinal chemist and allow him/her to make thousands of slight changes in the chemical structure. Then you test them all and hope something you`ve made works better than capsaicin. Then you do it all over again. And again. And again until you find something that works really well. Then you try it on every different type of cell you have in your lab (hundreds, normally). If you get good results, you then have to figure out how it works. Then you think about animal trials. If you are lucky and get a Big Pharma company to foot the bill for clinical trials, 15 years later you have a new anti-cancer drug. Or maybe the first time you give it to mice they all die and the project ends right there.       
 
My Dad died of stomach cancer a few years ago and I had him eating every kind of fruit and veg that was black or purple, as anthrocyanins are claimed to have anti-cancer properties. Even a cancer researcher will try anything when it`s close to home. He couldn`t eat anything hot, as the Chemo made it impossible for him to tolerate the slightest heat. Before Chemo, he liked hot food. 
 
I hope your Mom is getting all the treatment and support she could ever need and I wish her a lot of luck and a long life.

 

[Sanchez]

Peppers are a huge help to chronic sinus sufferers. I know first hand as this is one of the main reasons why I started growing the super hot types in, C.chinenses. These are the only types of peppers that make my nose run when I eat them raw. There is no medicine OTC or Rx that has the same effect.

 

[Brad in Cheek]

i can agree with all this, just 2 days ago i was having horrible allergy problems and would just fill right up in my sinuses. made some stir fry with a pinch of dried flakes and it alllllllllll came out while eating it and i feel 10000 times better today!