[ RadSafe ] High Dose Antedotes

[Otto G. Raabe]

JAMES FORD PIX11.com

7:45 p.m. EST, November 26, 2011

NEW YORK (PIX11)­
In a city that's been the victim of one of the 
world's largest terrorist attacks, and which is 
within a fifty mile radius of both the Indian 
Point and Oyster Creek nuclear power plants, one 
of the greatest fears in New York is of a 
radioactive emergency caused by terrorism or by 
accident. Now, however, a breakthrough has 
emerged to treat the devastating, fatal effects of such an incident.

"[It's] a groundbreaking study," Dr. Ofer Levy, 
45, of the Children's Hospital, Boston and 
<http://www.wpix.com/topic/health/medical-research/harvard-medical-school-OREDU0000185.topic>Harvard 
Medical School, told PIX11 News in an exclusive 
New York interview about a two-drug treatment 
that in clinical trials appears to create 
conditions that could help people survive some of 
the worst known health conditions. "[Such as] a 
nuclear leak, or war, terrorism or other sources of radiation," Levy said.

The newly released results of the five-year study 
Dr. Levy conducted with Dr. Eva Guinan of the 
Dana-Farber/Harvard 
<http://www.wpix.com/topic/health/diseases-illnesses/cancer-HEDAI0000010.topic>Cancer 
Center are remarkable. In the study, they 
combined two substances -- fluoroquinolone, an 
antibiotic related to Cipro, which is taken 
orally, and a protein called 
bactericidal/permeability-increasing protein, or BPI.

When that combination of substances was 
administered in trial after trial on mice that 
had been exposed to radiation multiple times the 
lethal level, not only did the mice survive, 
according to Dr. Levy, "We found dramatically 
improved survival in the animals who got the combination."

In other words, the health of the mice improved. 
Also, the two substances used in the study have 
not only been used on mice, they have been used 
separately, and safely, on humans for years. The 
study provided the first comprehensive results of 
fluoroquinolone and BPI being used together, and 
what's more, they were administered a full 24 
hours after the radiation exposure, and still provided unprecedented results.

"That you can give them so late and that they 
both have a safety track record in humans," Dr. 
Levy told PIX11 News, "We believe makes this a ground breaking study."

Copyright © 2011, WPIX-TV
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