Resveratrol, The Wonder Drug for Rats
But will it help me?
The news was too good to be true. In November 2006, a study by Harvard Medical School and the National Institute on Aging showed that obese mice lived longer, healthier lives - without dieting - when they consumed large doses of red wine extract.
The extract the mice were given is called resveratrol, a compound that plants produce to help protect them from bacteria and fungi. The mice ate a high fat diet, didn't have to exercise and yet their fat-related death rates dropped 31 percent. What was even more amazing is the organs of the obese mice looked normal, not ravaged by the fat as researchers expected.
In 2008, there was more good news.
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LifeGen Technologies in Wisconsin announced that, "A low dose of dietary resveratrol partially mimics caloric restriction and retards aging parameters in mice." Shortly after that, the University of Granada in Spain found that obese Zucker rats given resveratrol had reduced metabolic disturbances and lower blood pressure.
It seemed like resveratrol was the wonder drug that an increasingly obese America was looking for. Supplement companies started cranking out pills and the marketing hype kicked in. A few that caught my eye include; "Resveratrol EXTENDS LIFE", "Resveratrol slows the onset of VIRTUALLY ALL of the aging diseases" and my personal favorite, "Resveratrol repairs alcohol -damaged livers, slows bone loss (osteoporosis), boosts endurance, promotes hair growth, and re-energizes cells."
Never mind that there are only a few studies. Forget about the fact that the companies responsible for two of the most significant studies were created to sell or manufacture the drug they were testing. Don't worry that nobody had any idea how much a human should take or if there were any long term side-effects. We all saw those fat mice lived longer!
The perfect drug is here. Shouldn't everyone take resveratrol?
Not so fast. While the studies showing resveratrol is the new miracle drug are in all the newspapers, other research is bringing up troubling questions. In August of 2008 the National Institute on Aging released the results of a study that said resveratrol does delay age-related deterioration, but it did not extend life span. That's right. Mice fed a regular diet did not live a longer life by taking resveratrol. It gets worse.
In September of 2008 the Cardiovascular Research Center at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine published a study that said, "Resveratrol...delivers either survival signal or death signal to the ischemic myocardium depending on dose."
What that means in plain English is this. If you take a low enough dose of resveratrol, your heart should be fine. Take too much and you risk damaging or destroying your heart.
If you're currently taking resveratrol, I'm guessing you were never told it hasn't been shown to increase human lifespan. I'm also guessing you weren't told it might damage your heart. You probably weren't told there is no published human research on what dose might be appropriate, how much longer you might live or any other specific things those pills are supposed to do to help you.
You were sold the promise that if you took that pill, just like that fat rat your life would somehow be better. Shut up, pay up and don't ask questions.
Since supplement companies won't tell you, I will. Resveratrol is a compound that has promise, but there is extremely limited research available that has been conducted on humans. If you're an obese rat, this is the drug for you. If you're a human, you're wasting your money and risking your health on an unproven compound.
Don't pay those companies to be a test guinea pig and certainly don't gamble on a pill. If you really want to live longer, there are some very simple things you can do.
