Subject: Sci.life-extension FAQ #2: Resources

From: [email-masked] (Brian Manning Delaney)
Date: Wed, 9 Mar 1994 14:50:14 GMT

(Sci.life-extension FAQ #2.)           March 8, 1994 Edition.

                               Resources

*[One minor change since 1/27: access to the archived articles is
*clarified a bit. Search for '*'.]

(Some resources related to CR are in the CR FAQ.)

[] Contents.
  <> Information Sources.
     -Calorie Restriction.
     -Cryonics.
     -Cognitive Enhancers.
     -General Books on Life Extension.
     -Other Resources.
     -Research Gerontology.
  <> Supplements, Drugs and Other Supplies.
     -Supplements
     --Fowkes' Charges against the Life Extension Foundation.
     -Overseas Drug Sources.
     -Other issues re getting drugs from overseas (Dealing with the
            FDA, etc.)

<> Information Sources.

People interested in participating actively in this group may want to
get some background information on life extension. Here are a few
resources for various topics.

-Calorie Restriction (CR).

    The 120-year Diet
     Roy L. Walford (1986)
     ISBN: 0-671-46677-1
     (cheap paperback: 0-671-74474-7, 1988)
    
This is an account of CR (shown to increase radically the life spans
of laboratory animals) written for the layperson. Walford also
discusses supplements and other anti-aging regimens. Best book of its
kind.

The Sci.life-extension CR FAQ contains lots of other references and
much more information, including resources for people thinking about
trying CR.

-Cryonics.

The Usenet newsgroup, sci.cryonics, has evolved into a paragon of
sophisticated electronic discourse. Anyone interested in cryonics
should peruse this group. The FAQs (postings of frequently answered
questions) appear fairly often and contain a huge amount of useful
information, including pointers to various cryonics organizations and
publications.

-Cognitive Enhancers.

There were very useful FAQs ftp'able from ftp.u.washington.edu, but as
of today they are no longer available (or they are in a new,
non-obvious directory). (Note that the alt.drugs folks, who maintain
this ftp site, say that cognitive enhancers shouldn't be discussed in
alt.drugs.) If someone knows where these files are now located, let me
know. Meanwhile, there are some useful files at fenris.claremont.edu
in the pub/drugs/nootropics directory.

Included in the U/Washington files are pointers to books and other
information that I won't reprint here. Look (when these files are
located!) for the file names that begin with "nootropic."

[Technically, "nootropic" should refer only to a subclass of "smart
drugs" or cognitive enhancers -- those that have virtually no
side-effects or toxicity.]

Note: one of the files at U/Washington contains a list of foreign
sources of cognitive enhancers and anti-aging drugs that are not yet
approved by the FDA. Although the FDA (through a "pilot program"
started in 1988) allows Americans to purchase a small quantity of
these drugs for personal use, they have recently become much less
liberal in allowing these drugs into the country. There is a risk that
if you send one of these overseas companies your money you will never
see the drugs you ordered (but you will see a note from the FDA saying
that the drugs are being held, and that if you provide a note from a
doctor proving the necessity of treatment with the drugs, they will be
released to you), and will not get your money back. Last time I looked
at the nootropic files at U/Wash., this risk was not made clear. (See
"-Getting Drugs from Overseas, Dealing with the FDA, etc." under
"<> Supplements, Drugs and Other Supplies" below, for more information
on this.)

The rest of the information in the files is up-to-date, as far as I
know. Look at the files before asking questions on the net about
cognitive enhancers, FDA policy, etc.

(If you don't know what "ftp" means talk to your local computer guru,
or post a question in news.newusers.answers.)

-General Books On Life Extension.

Unfortunately, there is no credible, up-to-date, general book on life
extension, to the best of my knowledge. The popular book by Pearson
and Shaw, _Life Extension: A Practical Scientific Approach_, covers
many of the topics that are generally considered to be part of life
extension. However, it is now outdated, and regarded with skepticism
by everyone I've heard of who has a research interest in life
extension [1].  Walford is highly critical of Pearson and Shaw. Let me
note, however, that many readers of this group feel that Pearson and
Shaw should be praised for popularizing the idea of life extension,
and for raising awareness of the possibility that supplements may have
an effect on life span. As was discussed in this newsgroup, however,
interpreting research on vitamin-supplementation is very tricky.

One book that was cited by several Sci.life-extension readers is:

    Prolongevity II.
     Albert Rosenfeld
     Knopf, 1985
     ISBN 0-394-534755-I

I have not been able to find this book (I believe it is no longer
in print), so I cannot recommend it. But most of the people who
mentioned it to me recommended it highly.

There are two excellent books published by the Center for
Bio-Gerontology that are must-reads for longevists, although neither
covers all aspects of life extension:

    The Neuroendocrine Theory of Aging and Degenerative Disease,
    Dilman, Vladimir M. and Dean, W. 1992.
     ISBN 0-937777-02-1 (Case)
          0-937777-03-X (Perfect)

[This is also available from Cognitive Enhancement Research Institute,
P.O. Box 4029, Menlo Park, CA 94026 415-321-2374, and from Life
Services Supplements (800-542-3230)].

This is a somewhat technical book that covers many (but not all)
theories of aging, with an eye towards how the aging process might be
altered.

    Biological Aging Measurement: Clinical Applications
     Ward Dean, M.D., 1988

This book suggests hundreds of measurements that could be used to help
assess the effectiveness of an anti-aging regimen.

The address of the Center for Bio-Gerontology is:

P.O. Box 11097
Pensecola, FL 32524

-Other resources.

The absence of a reliable, general, up-to-date book on life extension
means that other sources of information on life extension need to be
exploited. Here are a few.

  Forefront Health Investigations

    MegaHealth Society
    P.O. Box 60637
    Palo Alto, CA 94306
    (415) 949-0919

This comes out six times a year, and costs $23.00/year ($25 for
Canadians, and $29 for overseas airmail). Each issue has a
few scientifically detailed (but clear and non-"jargony") articles
on life extension techniques. There are often articles about political
issues as well, such as the FDA and supplement availability.

  The newsletter of the Life Extension Foundation (800-841-LIFE).

This usually has pointers to academic journal articles dealing with
various aspects of life extension. I would be happier with the
newsletter if the Foundation didn't also sell supplements, but the
newsletters are usually quite informative, if occasionally overly
optimistic (in my view).

  The Immortalist.

    The Immortalist Society
    24443 Roanoke
    Oak Park, MI 48237
    (313) 547-2316 & (313) 548-9549

This publication deals mainly with cryonics, but a number of other
life extension topics are usually addressed as well.

  Longevity Letter.

    American Longevity Association
    1000 West Carson Street
    Box 22, Torrance, CA 90509

Walford lists this in the "Readings and Resources" section of
_120-Year Diet_. (Note that the address has changed.)  Unfortunately,
they stopped publishing a few years ago. I don't know whether they
plan to resume publishing in the near future. However, if you contact
them they will send you a list of back issues which can be ordered.

  Longevity Magazine.

I've found the usefulness of this magazine to be highly variable. The
July, 1993 issue is fairly worthless, whereas the previous month's
issue (the one with Linda Hamilton on the cover) had much useful
information about sunscreens, UV-blocking sunglasses, and more. In
general, but not always, the magazine is geared towards the cosmetic
side of life extension.

     [These next two were contributed by Bob Cruder.]

   Cognitive Enhancement Research Institute
   P.O. Box 4029
   Menlo Park, CA 94026
   415-321-2374
   Subscription $40/year

   Lifenet News
   The Newsletter of the Designer-Foods Network
   Published by Life Services Supplements, Inc. (Only D&S products)
   3535 Hwy #66, Bldg 2
   Neptune, NJ 07753
   800-542-3230 (Canada 800-345-9105)
   Subscription $19.95 - Free if you order once in a while.

  Moore, Thomas. Lifespan: Who Lives Longer and Why. 1993.

It's arguable whether this book deals with life extension per se, as
opposed to disease-prevention. Mainly Moore talks about ways of
reducing one's chances of getting cancer and heart-disease. He does
take a critical, and I think intelligent, look at Walford and Calorie
restriction, but his discussion is quite brief. On the whole the book
is very conservative when it comes to supplementation and the like
(erring in the opposite way that Pearson and Shaw do, I'd say). But
it's useful if only as an overview of the medical establishment's
perspective on longevity and life extension.

*  Archives of Sci.life-extension articles.

All of the articles, as well as the FAQs, of Sci.life-extension are
accessible via Gopher, WAIS, ftp, and ftpmail at sunSITE.

To get there telnet or ftp to:

sunsite.unc.edu

Login: gopher (or swais)
Enter terminal emulation (vt100 works fine)

FTP: the FAQs are in
/pub/academic/medicine/alternative-healthcare/faqs/life-extension.

The archived articles (all of them, as far as I can tell) are in
/pub/academic/medicine/alternative-healthcare/discussion-groups/
sci.life-extension. In this directory there are subdirectories for
each year of Sci.life-extension's existence, at the moment, 1993
and 1994.

Archived articles of sci.med.nutrition are in the discussion-groups
subdirectory also.

GOPHER: browse sunSITE archives
WAIS: enter /sunsite at first page of sources

  Medline, and other indexing services.

The best strategy for anyone interested in pursuing life extension
seriously is probably to learn some biology and do some library
research.  Medline is an electronic indexing service for medical and
(many) biology journals. Most medical school libraries have it, and
Medline is on-line at several universities. (Old-fashioned indexes
work well, too.) There are other electronic indexes as well. One is
called "Grateful Med."

-Research Gerontology.

In the next version of this FAQ I'd like to list some books on
research gerontology (and theories of aging). I've been looking at a
few, but most of the ones I've seen so far aren't very good.
My free time has become quite limited, so I'm not sure I'll get to
this.

One that I liked was:

   Biomedical Advances in Aging, ed., Allan L. Goldstein, 1990.

This is a collection of articles, some very technical, some not.
Several of the articles deal with Calorie restriction and how this
impinges on theories of aging.

(Dilman and Dean's book, cited above, also qualifies as a good book on
research gerontology, although it does not give a broad overview of
the field.)

An article came out recently in the _Journal of Gerontology_ which
reviewed several theories of aging and proposed a new theory that
combined elements of the others. It might be a good place to get
started for people unfamiliar with theories of aging (but you'll need
to know some chemistry and biology to understand the article):

   "An Emerging Hypothesis: Synergistic Induction of Aging by Free
     Radicals and Maillard Reactions," Bruce S. Kristal and Byung P.
     Yu, Journal of Gerontology, 1992, Vol. 47, No. 4, B107-B114.

One place to get started for people without a good background in
biology might be:

   Life Magazine, October 1992 issue.

This was a surprisingly lucid overview of most of the important,
current lines of research into aging. It is, of course, very much
simplified for a popular audience. But it gives the names of
researchers and their institutional affiliations, so it is easy to
pursue the topics mentioned in the article more deeply.

<> Supplements, Drugs and Other Supplies.

Several people asked me to include a list of mail-order supplement
companies in this FAQ. I hesitate to do this because there is no easy
way to assess the reliability of manufacturers or distributors of
supplements, thanks to current law in the U.S., so I have no way of
knowing whether what I'm listing is nothing but a bunch of scam
artists or not.

Manufacturers of supplements are not required to print a processing
date or expiration date on packages of supplements, nor is there any
federal agency which monitors the quality of supplements. There is a
small book called _Natural Supplement Review_, put out by the Natural
Supplement Association and written by W. Nathaniel Phillips, which
addresses some of these issues and analyzes some supplements. Beyond
that, I'm unaware of any means of deciding which among the plethora of
vitamin manufacturers and distributors are reliable, aside from
finding a lab to do some analyses. Here's the address of the publisher
of _NSR_:

     Mile High Publishing
     P.O. Box 277
     Golden
     CO 80402
     phone: 1-800-637-1572

The book (106 pages) costs $25.95

-Supplements

Here are some others that were posted in sci.med.nutrition recently. I
know nothing about any of them:

(All are 800 numbers.)
Vit. Research Products
VRP-24HR
Bronson Pharmaceuticals
235-3200 [new number]
Health Products
742-4478
Ephedrine
237-3759
Life Extension Foundation 
841-LIFE
Met-Rx
637-1572
SportPharm
654-4246
Marathon
321-5064
Anabol
426-2265
Amino Discounters
365-6006 Ext. 500
V.Shop
223-1216

If anyone has suggestions about assessing the quality of supplements,
e-mail me.

--Fowkes' Charges against the Life Extension Foundation.

David Cosenza recently posted a copy of a Q&A with Steven Fowkes that
originally appeared in "Smart Drug News: The Newsletter of the
Cognitive Enhancement Research Institute," Vol. 1, No. 10 of December
1992. Fowkes criticizes the ethics of the Life Extension Foundation,
questioning, among other things, the quality of the supplements that
the Foundation sells. A copy of the Q&A is available via FTP at
netcom7.netcom.com in /pub/dcosenza/FYI.ASC. Saul Kent and Bill Faloon
of the Life Extension Foundation wrote a response, which I posted.
This should be archived along with all the other articles of
Sci.life-extension at SunSITE (see above). If it isn't, ask and I'll
repost it.

The exchange is ongoing. So look for updates....

-Overseas Drug Sources.

Here is a list of overseas companies that sell life extension drugs
not available in the U.S. and Canada (also included are some other
suppliers of supplements; they belong in the above list but I don't
have time to move them -- also I wanted to keep the info from Samu
together). It was posted in alt.psychoactives a while back.

From: [email-masked] (Samu Mielonen)

Alzheimer's Buyers Club, Box 7006, San Jose 1000, Costa Rica.
Orgsanized by Dr.  William Summers. Supplies THA and lecithin.

B. Mougios & Co. O.E., Pittakou 23 T. K., 54645, Thessaloniki, Greece.
Supplies most nootropics.

Baxamed Switzerland Medical Center, Realpstrasse 83, CH-4054 Basel,
Switzerland, FAX 061-301-38-72. Supplies smart pharmaceuticals by
mail order.

Big Ben Export Co., Tudor Trading Co., P.O. Box 146, Mill Hill, London
NW7 3DL, England. Supplies many smart pharmeceuticals that can be
ordered with Visa and Mastercard.

Cell Tech, 1300 Main St., Klamath Falls, OR. 97601, 503-882-5406.
Suppliers of Super Blue-GreenTM microalgae products.

J. Channet, MD, Postfach, CH-891, Rifferswil, Switzerland. Supplies
KH-3.

Discovery Experimental & Development, Mexico, N.A., B & B Freight
Forwarding service, Inc., P.O. Box 7178, Wesley Chapel, FL 33543,
619-661-0010, 619-661-1070, Mexico: 011-5266-304464. Supplies liquid
deprenyl which can be ordered COD by phone for 5-7 day UPS delivery.

Earth Girl's Get Smart Think Drink, 17370 Skyline Blvd., Woodside, CA
94062; 415- 851-9861, 800-783-MIND. Supplies smart drinks products.

Fountain Research, P.O. Box 250, Lower Lake, CA 95457, 800-659-1915.
Supplies liquid deprenyl.

GH-7 Product Literature, 1920 Monument Blvd. #544, Concord, CA 95420

Global Medical Information Services, Pharmaceuticals International,
416 West San Yvidro Blvd., #715, San Ysidro, CA 92173. 619-492-8928,
800-365-3698, International,011-52-66-30-0680 for doctor consultation.
Offers an extensive catalog of smart products by written request.

J-M Pharmacal Co. 251-B East Hacienda Ave., Campbell, CA 95008,
408-374-5920, 800-538-4545. Wholesalers of amino acids. Customers can
phone for a product and price ist.

Life Services Supplements, Inc., 81 First Avenue, Atlantic Highlands,
NJ 07716; 800- 542-:32:30; 908-872-8700; Fax 908-872-8705. Sells
Pearson and Shaw products an offers distributorships.

Longevity Plus Buyer's Club, U Dubu 27,147 00 Prague 4-Branik,
Czechoslovakia.  Supplies rnany smart pharmaceuticals and accepts
personal checks. Will send an order form upon request.

The Mail Order Pharmacy, 3170 North Federal Highway, Suite 104B,
Lighthouse Point, Fl 33064, 800-822-5388; Fax 800-487-1821. Fills
doctor prescriptions by mail order.

Masters Marketing Co. Ltd., Masters House No. 1 Marlborough Hill,
Harrow Middx., HA1 1TW, England, Fax 081-427-1994. Supplies a wide
range of smart pharmaceuticals and other products. Interested persons
must write or Fax specifying information on specific products for a
price quotation.

Mexican pharmacies supply nootropics over the counter without a
prescription and are usually less expensive than ordering by mail
order.

Nutritional Engineering, Ltd, Box 1320, Georgetown, Grand Cayman,
British West Indies; 800-949-8279; Fax 809-949-7602. Supplies Vitacel
products created by Dr.  Robert Koeh. Customers can order by phone or
fax with a credit card.

Qwilleran, Box 1210, Birmingham, B10 9QA, England. Supplies most
nootropics and some AIDS drugs. Inquiries must specify the products
you are interested in.

Smart Products, 870 Market Street, Suite 1262, San Francisco, CA
94102; Phone: 800- 858-6520; Fax 415-981-3334. Supplies smart nutrient
products. Orders can be placed by phone with credit card or by mail
with personal check. Discounts on orders over $100 and two day
delivery is available.

Sun-Chlorella Ca. Inc., 2641 Manhattan Beach Blvd., Redondo Beach, CA
90278, 213- 536-0088. Suppliers of chlorella microalgae products.

Wholesale Nutrition, Box 3345, Saratoga, CA 95070, 800-325-2664, FAX
408-867-6236.  Supplies smart nutrients. Orders can be placed by phone
with credit card. Two day delivery is available.

World Health Services, P.O. Box 20, CH-2822 Courroux, Switzerland.
Supplies many European pharmaceutcalst that have not been approved by
the FDA.

-Other issues re getting drugs from overseas (Dealing with the
            FDA, etc.)

    [Contributed by Bob Cruder; minor additions by me.]

[....]
The latest FDA trick is to not send the seizure notice until after the
appeal date has passed and the product has already been destroyed.

It is much safer to buy through an AIDS buyers club. Neither the FDA nor
any other US government agency can force you to say that you have AIDS,
force release of your medical records or even demand the name of the
physician who is treating you for the disease. 

The FDA knows that if they start seizing products from AIDS buyer's
clubs, they will see a firestorm aimed directly at Mr. Bill.

E-mail me with suggestions for future editions of this
FAQ.

Thanks,
Brian Delaney <[email-masked]>

[1] Tim Freeman contributed this [Fri, 6 Aug 1993]:

Here's a pointer to a book written by a physician who seemed to me to
have his head on straight and to be highly critical of Pearson & Shaw:

   Type of Material: Book
     LC Call Number: RM217 .Y47 1986
             Author: Yetiv, Jack Z.
              Title: Popular nutritional practices : a scientific appraisal /
                      Jack Zeev Yetiv.
   Publication Info: Toledo, Ohio : Popular Medicine Press, c1986.
  Phys. Description: 318 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.
              Notes: Includes bibliographies and index.
-- 
Brian M. Delaney <[email-masked]>
              or <[email-masked]>