FDA: Just say No to cooking with NyQuil

In an attempt to head off future Darwin Awards, the FDA is issuing what you would think would be an unnecessary warning: If some chucklehead on TikTok suggests a challenge involving over-the-counter drugs, don’t do it. Just don’t.

That includes the recent idea: cooking chicken in NyQuil.

The fact that the FDA felt it necessary to explain why that’s a stupid idea — rather than just saying, “Cooking chicken in cold medicine is a stupid idea” — tells you something.

Fighting chemo GI problems

Chemotherapy and radiotherapy have a lot of nasty side effects, including all sorts of stomach issues. That’s in large part because they kill intestinal stem cells, so the gut lining isn’t replaced.

But now Chinese researchers have found a simple way to protect those cells: flumazenil, the already-FDA-approved anti-sedative. In short, a protein called GABRA1 is what dooms those stem cells, and flumazenil keeps it from binding to a particular receptor.

Once GABRA1 is out of the picture, the stem cells are more likely to survive — and it also means patients can tolerate higher doses of the medication. (Oh, and flumazenil doesn’t stop the chemo drugs from attacking the cancer, either.)

Meds save the queen

Here at GPhA Buzz, we wish a speedy recovery for Queen Margrethe of Denmark, diagnosed with a second bout of Covid-19 even after being vaccinated. A reminder that when it comes to efficacy, 99% isn’t 100%. The Danes are shifty, but we have a soft spot for Margrethe.

(She apparently contracted it at the funeral for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, which makes us wonder if that might have been a superspreader event for international leadership.)

This sounds familiar

The FDA is poised to approve a drug called AMX0035 that’s supposed to treat ALS (aka, Lou Gehrig’s Disease).

Problem: An FDA advisory committee voted against its approval because there wasn’t much evidence it actually works.

Committee comments included, “The applicant hasn’t provided robust evidence,” “The data isn’t [sic] as strong as we would hope,” ‘The study was problematic,’ and it “did not meet the threshold.”

Then the public letter-writing campaign began, essentially saying that AMX0035 should be approved because there was no other drug available and the disease is fatal — i.e., it should be held to a lower standard that typical approvals.

And the committee changed its mind.

Echoes of the Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm, also approved without much evidence? You bet.

“The message to companies is that you don’t have to show that your drug works. You have to do the bare minimum to show that it might work.” — Penn bioethicist Fernandez Lynch

Your possible new income stream?

According to a new study out of Britain’s University of Brighton (reported by the North American Menopause Society), “Foot Massage Effective in Improving Sleep Quality and Anxiety in Postmenopausal Women” (PDF).

This small study in Turkish women shows how a simple, inexpensive intervention such as foot massage can improve these bothersome symptoms in postmenopausal women.

Of course, they say, “Further investigation is indicated.”

Diabetes and UTIs (and a possible treatment)

People with diabetes are more susceptible to urinary tract infections. Apparently, higher glucose levels reduce the amount of psoriasin — a peptide that helps protect the bladder from infection. Combine that with diabetes’ overall weakening of the immune system, and you’ve got a one-two punch to the gut. Or, rather, the bladder.

Good news: A possible treatment (being investigated by the same Swedish research team) is estrogen, which “boosted levels of psoriasin and reduced bacterial populations, indicating that the treatment may have an effect also among patients with diabetes.”

If you’re only going to read one story this week about fly vomit pathogens, why not this one?

Insect bites cause all sorts of trouble, but what about insect vomit? Eew, you say? Yeah, and for good reason. As, a UMass entomologist points out, because of flies’ weird digestive system, they, er, ‘expel’ water from what they eat before it’s digested — thus, what comes out of the fly contains all the pathogens from whatever it’s eaten.

And thus:

While epidemiologists have focused their attention on the biting flies that can spread diseases by transferring infected blood from host to host, it turns out that what the non-biting flies regurgitate is a far greater risk to human health.

Sweet dreams, hopefully

If you’re middle-aged and you’re having nightmares — like, all the time — British researchers have some bad news: “People who experience frequent bad dreams in middle age are more likely to be diagnosed with dementia later in life.”

While more work needs to be done to confirm these links, we believe bad dreams could be a useful way to identify individuals at high risk of developing dementia, and put in place strategies to slow down the onset of disease.”

(Sound familiar? You might be thinking of our story from June about how frequent bad dreams seemed to be associated with a higher risk of Parkinson’s.)