We want an effective drug for all cancer patients

It means, the effect of AHCC was half - and half.

I want an effective drug for as many cancer patients as possible. So I changed my point of view and tried to develop a new drug for cancer.

It was the dark ages of immunity treatment for cancer. Usual independent medication of immune activation drugs was limited, and recent cytokine treatment, LAK treatment, and other treatments have no bright future.

At an academy of cancer, I present a subject in a speech every year, but I didn't get up my will power to present this at the time. Besides, AHCC has an actual effect, but its method was not clear, and the data ran short of a presentation.

When I was looking for new treatments, the academy of cancer was held in Sendai. I didn't expect to short the truth, but I got to know of a vascularization obstructant extracted from mold.

A pharmaceutical company developed it. Vascularization obstructant is wonderful because it obstructs the increase of vascularization of cancer. But it became clear that it attacks normal vascular tissue too, by biological test.

But even though it's faulty, developing vascularization obstructant was good news. So I've been wondering if there is an orally administered form, because vascularization obstructant was developed as an injection.

Then SEISHIN Company asked me " We've heard that you've been experimenting. Could you use our product?"

It was shark cartilage.

Doubtfully at first I used it in a basic experiment of vascularization obstructing action. But although it was orally administered, it was as effective as the injection.

" How great!" I thought heartily.

But shark cartilage has some weak points. It's weak against acid in the stomach, not absorbed well by the bowel, smells fishy, affected by heat and should be taken in large amounts, - 50g~60g per day.

I began to improve the shark cartilage immediately. I made it into a powder that can only be recognized by an electron microscope, packaged so it is not melted by acid in the stomach, but is able to dissolve in the bowel. Mr. KOTANI from NIHON Oils and Fats company cooperated in this development. Also Mr. FUJII and Mr. SAITO from KUREHA Chemistry company cooperated in the biological test. It has taken 1 year for a satisfactory product to be made.

Then the clinic that uses AHCC got started.

AHCC promotes the product " Interleukin 12, a specific medicine for cancer".

While I've suspected it produces some powerful cytokine (physiologically active substance) except for a natural killer cell, it has a great anti-tumor effect.

I've been thinking it is likely to be Interleukin 12 but the method of measurement of Interleukin 12 has not been proven yet in Japan. So I got a measurement kit from USA and about the method of Interleukin 12 measurement. Then at last, it turned out that AHCC promotes the production of Interleukin 12. It was July 1996.

Now in the USA attention is paid to Interleukin 12. I heard it is mass-produced by gene engineering. I think it will be done in Japan.

But it has many side effects and should be used a lot to obtain an effect now, as apparently, it takes a lot of time to become practicable.

But Interleukin 12 greatly promotes immunity because it has following actions.

• It activates the natural killer cell.
• It activates the killer T cell.
• It reinforces production of Interferon-gamma.
• It reinforces HLA class 1 and HLA class 2.
• It obstructs vascularization.

It produces a lot of natural killer activity and TNF-alpha for patients who react well to immunity treatment.

So I examined how much Interleukin is produced by the macrophages of such patients. A lot of Interleukin had been produced as expected. Besides it was about 60 times the amount of a normal person.

Interleukin made in the body has no side effects and has much effect even it's not genetically engineered.

AHCC can produce a lot of Interleukin 12 is noted as a cytokine of the new age. At least it's the first discovery in the world that Interleukin 12 can be conducted by oral administration. Now, I'm busy accumulating and analyzing data to contribute to the science magazine " NATURE".