Green tea could block benefits of cancer drug

Washington, Feb 4 (ANI): The health benefits of green tea have come under scanner following a new research which has found that the "healthy" drink could reduce the effectiveness of one kind of chemotherapy treatment.

Researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) have found that the widely used supplement renders a cancer drug used to treat multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma completely ineffective in treating cancer.

The study found that a component of green tea extract (GTE) called EGCG destroys any anticancer activity of the drug Velcade in tumor-bearing mice.

The study will be published in the journal Blood.

"Our finding that GTE or EGCG blocked the therapeutic action of Velcade was completely unexpected," says lead author Axel H. Schonthal, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the Keck School of Medicine of USC.

"Our hypothesis was that GTE or EGCG would enhance the anti-tumor effects of Velcade, and that a combination of GTE with Velcade (or EGCG with Velcade) would turn out to be a superior cancer treatment as compared to treatment with Velcade alone," the expert added.

Using preclinical models and tumor-bearing mice, the researchers found that the unusually effective blockage of Velcade's therapeutic activity was based on the chemical interaction between molecules. The EGCG molecule and the Velcade molecule were able to form chemical bonds, meaning that the Velcade molecule could no longer bind to its intended target inside the tumor cells.

"The most immediate conclusion from our study is the strong advice that patients undergoing cancer therapy with Velcade must avoid green tea, and in particular all of its concentrated products that are freely available from health food stores," says Schonthal.

"It is important to spread this message to health care providers who administer Velcade to patients," the researcher added. (ANI)