Proteins show promise in AIDS research
March 30, 1998
Web posted at: 7:45 p.m. EST (0045 GMT)

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A protein found in the urine of pregnant women
apparently can stop the reproduction of HIV, the virus that causes
AIDS, researchers have learned.

The protein found in women's urine during early pregnancy is known
is , or human chorionic gonadotropin associated factor. It was

discovered by accident by a researcher who was studying Kaposi's
sarcoma, a rare but deadly cancer that affects some people with
HIV.



When male and female mice were inadvertently put together in a cage,
researchers noticed that some of the mice failed to develop the
cancer. It was discovered that the cancer-free mice had two things in
common: they were female and pregnant.



"It's significant in its potential in that it has broad activity
against a number of the pathological aspects of HIV: it directly
blocks the virus, it directly suppresses Kaposi's sarcoma, and
improves the capability of blood cells to reproduce themselves," said
Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health.

HAF also boosts the immune system by raising the number of T cells,
which fight infection, and it prompts the bone marrow to manufacture
more blood cells.

The discovery has one additional advantage. Because the protein is
produced by the human body, it's non-toxic and has very few side
effects.



"These are natural products that haven't been toxic in the
concentrations that we used," said Dr. Robert Gallo of the Institute
of Human Virology at the University of Maryland. Gallo is one of the
researchers who discovered HIV.

Doctors now have to identify the protein molecule of HAF, which they
hope to do very soon. If things go as planned, it could be available
to patients in as little as three years.



Typical hCG Levels in a Normal Pregnancy






This chart explains why we are looking for women who are between week
8 and week 12 of their pregnancies to provide urine.





(BETA) DRUG WATCH: Human Chorionic Gonadotropin - Associated Factor
Bulletin of Experimental Treatments for AIDS, July, 1998
Liz Highleyman



Recent research has shown that a factor associated with human
chorionic gonadotropin (hCG) may be a potential therapy for Kaposi's
sarcoma (KS), HIV disease, cancer and anemia. The newly discovered
factor -- which has been named human chorionic gonadotropin-
associated factor, or HAF -- was isolated by Robert Gallo and
colleagues at the Institute of Human Virology at the University of
Maryland in Baltimore. A report of their findings appears in the
April 1998 issue of Nature Medicine.

Earlier studies of hCG had produced mixed results, with some showing
that hCG caused KS tumors to shrink and HIV blood levels to decline,
and others showing no effect. The new research indicates that a
factor associated with hCG -- rather than hCG itself -- is
responsible for the beneficial effects.

Human chorionic gonadotropin is a hormone produced by the placenta
supporting the fetus, and is found in the urine of women during early
pregnancy. It helps maintain the correct environment to allow the
fetus to develop. HCG is made up of 2 pieces, or subunits, called
alpha and beta chains.

KS is an opportunistic cancer that affects many people with AIDS, in
particular gay men. KS is characterized by purplish lesions on the
skin and may also affect internal organs. Scientists have recently
determined that the condition is caused by a sexually transmitted
virus called Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus, or KSHV (also
known as HHV-8).

Early HCG Discoveries
HCG was found to have anti-KS effects due to a mishap in the Gallo
tmor biology laboratory in 1995. Male and female mice that had been
injected with KS cells were accidentally put together in the same
cage. Nature took its course, and researchers noticed that the female
mice that became pregnant did not develop KS, while the male mice
did. In addition, it had been reported some years previously that a
small number of HIV positive women experienced a remission of KS when
they became pregnant, then relapsed after they gave birth.

Gallo and his colleagues concluded that some factor associated with
pregnancy was responsible for the results, and they began studying
chorionic gonadotropin. When the researchers tried using crude
preparations of hCG in HIV-infected people with KS, they found that
hCG preparations decreased the size of KS tumors and reduced the
amount of HIV in the blood of some patients. HCG preparations also
reduced viral load, increased CD4 T-cell counts and led to weight
gain in monkeys infected with simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV).

Uncovering the Mystery Factor
In the studies reported in April, the University of Maryland group
found that purified or recombinant hCG and preparations containing
only alpha or beta chains of hCG did not have the expected anti-KS
and antiviral effects. This led the researchers to believe that some
other factor in crude hCG preparations -- rather than hCG itself --
was responsible for the beneficial effects. The existence of such a
factor had previously been suspected by other scientists.

Gallo and his colleagues used a technique called gel permeation
chromotography to separate clinical grade hCG preparations and
concentrates of urine derived from pregnant women into various
components on the basis of molecular weight. When the researchers
filtered out the hCG and isolated the remaining components, they
found 2 substances -- which they call HAF -- that had an anti-tumor
effect when injected into mice and stimulated the growth of blood
cells in laboratory culture tests.

Although the identity of HAF is not known, researchers believe that
it is a protein that attaches to hCG. According to Gallo, "I think we
are getting close to identifying what the material actually is. It's
a small protein, and it's completely separable from hCG."

The researchers showed that HAF interferes with HIV replication in
CD4 T-cells and macrophages in laboratory culture tests by inhibiting
the activity of HIV genes. In addition, HAF also stimulates the
production of red and white blood cells in the bone marrow. At the
same time, the factor suppresses the growth of new blood vessels
(angiogenesis); it is this effect which reduces the size of KS
lesions, and it may be helpful in controlling other types of cancer
as well. So far, the factor does not appear to have toxic side
effects, although this cannot be known for sure until further studies
are conducted.

The discovery of HAF explains why hCG appeared effective against KS
in some but not all earlier studies: some of the hCG preparations
used in studies contained HAF, while other more purified preparations
lacked the factor. HAF is present, although probably at low
concentrations, in some commercial clinical grade hCG preparations.
These preparations are used to treat undescended testicles and
underproduction of testosterone in boys.

The Future of HAF
Now that the existence of HAF is known, researchers will attempt to
determine the factor's chemical identity and structure, and to
produce a purified version for medical use. A purified HAF produced
by recombinant technology could allow the factor to be produced in
large amounts and used in higher concentrations. Currently the factor
is only available from the urine of women in the first trimester of
pregnancy. Gallo estimates that HAF will probably not be available as
a drug for human use for at least 2 years.

Liz Highleyman is Assistant Editor of BETA.

References
Anonymous anti-HIV Agent (editorial). Nature Medicine 4(4): 371.
April 1998.

Lunardi-Iskandar, Y and others. Effects of a urinary factor from
women in early pregnancy on HIV-1, SIV and associated disease. Nature
Medicine 4(4): 428-434. April 1998.
980701
BE980709





April 1998 Volume 4 Number 4 p428


Effects of a urinary factor from women in early pregnancy on HIV-1,
SIV and associated disease
Yanto Lunardi-Iskandar1, Joseph L. Bryant1, William A. Blattner1,
Chia Ling Hung2, Louis Flamand1,3, Parkash Gill4, Philippe Hermans5,
Steven Birken6, & Robert C. Gallo1


The effects of clinical grade crude preparations of human chorionic
gonadotropin (hCG) on Kaposi's sarcoma, HIV, SIV and hematopoiesis
were examined in vitro and in vivo. In contrast to previous studies,
we report that the antiviral activity of hCG associated factors is
not due to the native hCG heterodimer, including its purified
subunits or its major degradation product, the beta-core. Using gel
permeation chromatography of the clinical grade hCG and urine
concentrates from pregnant women, we demonstrate that an as yet
unidentified hCG associated factor (HAF) with anti-HIV, anti-SIV,
anti-KS and pro-hematopoietic activities elutes as two peaks
corresponding to 15­30 kDa and 2­4 kDa.





1Institute of Human Virology, University of Maryland, 725 West
Lombard Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21201-1192 USA2Advanced
BioScience Laboratories Inc., 5510 Nicholson Lane, Kensington,
Maryland 20895 USA3Presently at Laboratory of Virology, Rheumatology
and Immunology Research Center, Pavillen CHUL and Laval University,
Quebec, Canada4University of Southern California, School of Medicine,
1441 Eastlake Avenue, Los Angeles, California 90033 USA 5University
Libre de Bruxelles, CHU St-Pierre Hospital, Dept. des Maladies
Infectious, 322 rue Haute, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgium6College of
Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, 630 W. 168th Street,
New York, New York 10032 USACorrespondence should be addressed to
R.C.G.





Anonymous anti-HIV agent






Ever since Robert Gallo and his colleagues reported (Nature 375, 64;
1995) that crude, urine derived preparations of the human pregnancy
hormone chorionic gonadotrophin (hCG) inhibit the growth of Kaposi's
sarcoma (KS) cell lines and cause regression of KS lesions in mice,
the race has been on to discover the mechanism of this action and
whether hCG might be effective in the clinic.

The first task was to clean up the crude hCG preparations and confirm
that the anti-KS activity remained. Taking it one step further,
Albibi et al. showed that the important anti-KS activity resided in
the beta-core fragment of the hormone (AIDS 11, 713; 1997). Before
long there was a flurry of small phase I clinical trials that
variously introduced clinical grade hCG directly into the KS lesions,
subcutaneously or systemically, showing that in about half of
patients the treatment was successful. The exciting bonus was a
gradual realization that some treated patients saw their HIV-1 plasma
levels decline and their CD4 counts rise. Further work confirmed that
hCG did indeed inhibit HIV-1 replication in vivo. More elaborate
clinical trials were planned.

The first twist in the tail of this promising development came in
December 1997 with the publication of a short report by Griffiths et
al. (Nature 390, 568) claiming that in fact an RNase contaminant of
the hCG preparation was probably responsible for most of the anti-KS
activity. Whereas at first glance this report seemed at odds with so
much earlier work, on closer examination it appeared to make more
sense: Griffiths and colleagues showed that the RNase was associated
closely with the beta-core of hCG. They even speculated that "overall
potent anti-KS activity of commercial hCG preparations might result
from the combined effects of hCG and RNase activities."

With hindsight, this may have been an all too eager attempt to fit a
square peg into a round hole--hindsight, because in this issue Gallo
and colleagues show that the anti-KS and anti-HIV-1 activities belong
to neither hCG nor RNase. Instead they ascribe these properties (and,
in contrast to most chemotherapies, a pro-hematopoietic effect) to an
unidentified urinary factor that they have dubbed HAF or hCG-
associated factor.

This latest finding brings the story full circle. The original 1995
paper was prompted by a fortunate accident; while studying neoplastic
KS cells in mice, Joseph Bryant, one of Gallo's collaborators,
inadvertently assembled a mixed cage of male and female animals.
Bryant was surprised to find that some of the mice failed to develop
KS lesions. Closer examination revealed not only the mixed sexes but
also that all the neoplastic-negative mice were female and pregnant.
Assuming a pregnancy-related inhibitory effect at work, the
researchers hastily reviewed the literature on early pregnancy
hormones and found that hCG is very high in early human pregnancy.
What they missed was that mice do not produce chorionic
gonadotrophin!

Whatever it turns out to be, HAF holds much promise for treating KS,
HIV-1 infection and Gallo and colleagues are work-ing overtime to
purify enough to identify the mysterious substance. This is not
without problems--the only known source is first trimester human
urine and it took 40 liters just to get this far.


WHAT MODERN SCIENCE KNOWS ABOUT A MIRACLE MEDICINE (AND ISN'T TELLING)

So what is this mystery miracle medicine and why don't any of us know
anything about it? If the body really does produce such an amazing
substance, and doctors and scientists have used it to heal people,
where are the news reports, the accolades, the commercials, the media
hype? You want to know the answer? Then prepare yourself by first
opening your mind. Let go of your initial disbelief and
preconceptions and get ready for the best-kept secret in medical
history.
This extraordinary miracle medicine that numerous doctors,
researchers and hundreds of people have used for healing is human
urine.

Surprised? Now before you scream "I don't believe it!" consider this.
Whether you know it or not, you've already re-used and reingested
your urine-large amounts of it for a long period of time-and it's one
of the reasons you're alive today.

As medical researchers have discovered:
"Urine is the main component of the amniotic fluid that bathes the
human fetus.
"Normally the baby 'breathes' this urine-filled amniotic fluid into
its lungs. If the urinary tract is blocked, the fetus does not
produce the fluid, and, without it, the lungs do not develop."
(G. Kolata, "Surgery on Fetuses Reveals They Heal Without Scars", The
New York Times, Medical Section, 16 August 1988)

This is a fact that probably none of you without a medical background
know, but the reality is that urine is absolutely vital to your
body's functioning, and the internal and external applications of
urine have proven medical ramifications far beyond anything that we,
the general public, can imagine.
What amazes people most when they first hear about the medical use of
urine is that they've never heard of it before. To the vast majority
of mankind, urine is nothing more than a somewhat repugnant 'waste'
that the body has to excrete in order to function.
But as you'll discover, urine is not a waste product of the body but,
rather, an extraordinarily valuable physiological substance that has
been shown throughout the history of medical science right up until
today to have profound medical uses that most of us know absolutely
nothing about.

One of the first things we need to clear up is the common perception
of urine. Urine is not what you think it is. As a matter of fact, you
probably have no idea what urine is or how your body makes it.
In reality, urine is not, as most of us believe, the excess water
from food and liquids that goes through the intestines and is ejected
from the body. I know that we generally think of urine in just this
way: you eat and drink, the intestines 'wring' out the good stuff in
the food, and the urine is the leftover, dirty, waste water that your
body doesn't want, so it should never, ever be reintroduced into the
body in any form-right? Wrong.

No matter how popular a conception, this commonly shared scenario may
be, it just isn't true. Urine is not made in your intestines. Urine
is made in and by your kidneys. So what does this mean, and why
should it change the way you feel about urine?
In layman's language, this is how and why urine is made in the body.
When you eat, the food you ingest is eventually broken down in the
stomach and intestines into extremely small molecules. These
molecules are absorbed into tiny tubules in the intestinal wall and
then pass through these tubes into the bloodstream.
The blood circulates throughout your body, carrying these food
molecules and other nutrients along with critical immune-defence and
regulating elements such as red and white blood cells, antibodies,
plasma, microscopic proteins, hormones, enzymes, etc., which are all
manufactured at different locations in the body. The blood
continually distributes its load of life-sustaining elements
throughout the body, nourishing every cell and protecting the body
from disease.
As it flows through the body, this nutrient-filled blood passes
through the liver where toxins are removed and later excreted from
the body in the form of solid waste. Eventually, this
purified, 'cleaned' blood makes its way to the kidneys.
When the blood enters the kidneys it is filtered through an immensely
complex and intricate system of minute tubules, called nephron,
through which the blood is literally 'squeezed' at high pressure.
This filtering process removes excess amounts of water, salts and
other elements in the blood that your body does not need at the time.
These excess elements are collected within the kidney in the form of
a purified, sterile, watery solution called urine. Many of the
constituents of this filtered watery solution, or urine, are then re-
absorbed by the nephron and delivered back into the bloodstream. The
remainder of the urine passes out of the kidneys into the bladder and
is then excreted from the body.
So, you say, the body's gotten rid of this stuff for a reason-so why
would we want to use it again? And here's the catch. The function of
the kidneys is to keep the various elements in your blood balanced.
The kidneys do not filter out important elements in the blood because
those elements in themselves are toxic or poisonous or bad for the
body, but simply because the body did not need that particular
concentration of that element at the time it was excreted.

And medical researchers have discovered that many of the elements of
the blood that are found in urine have enormous medicinal value, and
when they are reintroduced into the body they boost the body's immune
defences and stimulate healing in a way that nothing else does.
As medical research has revealed:
"One of the most important functions of the kidney is to excrete
material and substances for which the body has no immediate need..."
(A. H. Free, and H. M. Free, Urinalysis in Clinical and Laboratory
Practice, CRC Press, Inc., USA, 1975, pp. 13-17)

For instance, the kidneys filter out water and sodium from the blood
into the urine. These are both vital life-sustaining elements without
which your body cannot function. But both elements could be lethal if
there were too much water or sodium in your blood.
Now what about potassium, calcium and magnesium? These are familiar
nutrients that we ingest in our food and vitamin pills every day, but
they're also in your urine. These nutritional elements are extremely
valuable substances to the body, certainly not toxic, and yet the
kidney excretes these elements into the urine. Why? Because it's
taking out the excess amounts of potassium, calcium, etc. that are
not needed by your body at the time they are filtered out. Actually,
it is this regulating process of the kidneys and the excretion of
urine that allows us to eat and drink more than our bodies need at
any one time.
"The principal function of the kidney is not excretion, but
regulation... The kidney obviously conserves what we need, but, even
more, permits us the freedom of excess. That is, it allows us to take
in more than we need of many necessities-water and salt, for example-
and excrete exactly what is not required."
(Dr Stewart Cameron [Professor of Renal Medicine, Guy's Hospital,
London], Kidney Disease: The Facts, Oxford University Press, Oxford,
UK, 1986)

But this isn't the end of the story. Scientists have discovered that
urine, because it is actually extracted from our blood, contains
small amounts of almost all of the life-sustaining nutrients,
proteins, hormones, antibodies and immunising agents that our blood
contains.
"Urine can be regarded as one of the most complex of all body fluids.
It contains practically all of the constituents found in the blood."
(A. H. Free and H. M. Free, Urinalysis in Clinical and Laboratory
Practice, CRC Press, Inc., USA, 1975, pp. 13-17)

Many medical researchers, unlike most of us, know that far from being
a dirty body-waste, fresh, normal urine is actually sterile and is an
extraordinary combination of some of the most vital and medically
important substances known to man. Now this fact may be unknown to
the vast majority of the public today, it is nothing new to modern
medicine.

To us, the public, urine seems like an undesirable waste product of
the body, but to the medical research community and the drug industry
it's been considered to be liquid gold. Don't believe it? Read this:
"Utica, Michigan - Realising it is flushing potential profits down
the drain, an enterprising young company has come up with a way to
trap medically powerful proteins from urine. Enzymes of America has
designed a special filter that collects important urine proteins, and
these filters have been installed in all of the men's urinals in the
10,000 portable outhouses owned by the Porta-John company, a
subsidiary of Enzymes of America.
"Urine is known to contain minute amounts of proteins made by the
body, including medically important ones such as growth hormone and
insulin. There is a $500-million-a-year market for these kinds of
urine ingredients.
"This summer, Enzymes of America plans to market its first major
urine product called urokinase, an enzyme that dissolves blood clots
and is used to treat victims of heart attacks. The company has
contracts to supply the urine enzyme to Sandoz, Merrell Dow and other
major pharmaceutical companies. Ironically, this enterprise evolved
from Porta-John's attempt to get rid of urine proteins-a major source
of odour in portable toilets.
"When the president of Porta-John began consulting with scientists
about a urine filtration system, one told him he was sitting on a
gold mine.
"The idea of recycling urine is not new, however. 'We thought about
this,' says 26 Whitcome of Amgen, a Los Angeles biotechnology
firm, 'but realised we'd need thousands and thousands of litres of
urine.'
"Porta-John and Enzymes of America solved that problem. The 14
million gallons flowing annually into Porta-John's privies contain
about four-and-a-half pounds of urokinase alone. That's enough to
unclog 260,000 coronary arteries."
("Now Urine Business", Hippocrates magazine, May/June 1988)

But urokinase isn't the only drug derived from urine that, unknown to
us, has been a financial boon to the pharmaceutical industry.
In August of 1993, Forbes magazine printed an article about Fabio
Bertarelli who owns the world's largest fertility drug-producing
company, the Ares-Serono Group, based in Geneva, whose most important
product is the drug Pergonal which increases the chances of
conception. Guess what Pergonal is made from?
"To make Pergonal, Ares-Serono collects urine samples from 110,000
postmenopausal women volunteers in Italy, Spain, Brazil and
Argentina. From 26 collection centres, the urine is sent to Rome
where Ares-Serono technicians then isolate the ovulation-enhancing
hormone."
(N. Munk, "The Child is the Father of the Man", Forbes Magazine, 16
August 1993)

Ares-Serono earned a reported $855 million in sales in 1992, and
people pay up to $1,400 per month for this urine extract.

Obviously, most of us are operating under a gross misconception when
we wrinkle our nose at the thought of using urine in medicine.
Urea, the principal organic solid in urine, has long been considered
to be a 'waste product' of the body. It's even been considered to be
dangerous or poisonous, but this, too, is completely untrue.
Like any other substance in the body, too much urea can be harmful,
but urea in and of itself is enormously valuable and indispensable to
body functioning. Not only does urea provide invaluable nitrogen to
the body, but research has shown that urea actually aids in the
synthesis of protein, or, in other words, it helps our bodies use
protein more efficiently. Urea has also been proven to be an
extraordinary antibacterial and antiviral agent and is one of the
best natural diuretics ever discovered.
Urea was discovered and isolated as long ago as 1773 and is currently
marketed in a variety of different drug forms.
These are a few more examples of commercial medical applications of
urine and urea in use today:

Ureaphil: diuretic made from urea
Urofollitropin: urine-extract fertility drug
Ureacin: urea cream for skin problems
Amino-Cerv: urea cream used for cervical treatments
Premarin: urine-extract oestrogen supplement
Panafil: urea/papain ointment for skin ulcers, burns and infected
wounds
Another urine-related product ingredient is carbamide. Carbamide is
the chemical name for synthesised urea. Where do you find carbamide?
In places you'd never thought of, such as in products like Murine Ear
Drops and Murine Ear Wax Removal System which contain carbamide
peroxide, a combination of synthetic urea and hydrogen peroxide.

Medical researchers have also proven that urea is one of the best and
only medically proven, effective skin moisturisers in the world. In
many years of laboratory studies, researchers discovered that, unlike
just about all other types of oil-based moisturisers that simply sit
on the top layers of the skin and do nothing to improve water
retention within skin cells (which gives skin its elasticity and
wrinkle-free appearance), urea actually increases the water-binding
capacity of the skin by opening skin layers for hydrogen bonding,
which then attracts moisture to dry skin cells.
This is a remarkable fact considering that women spend billions of
dollars a year on outrageously expensive skin moisturisers whose
ingredients, even in tightly controlled double-blind comparison
tests, don't even come close to hydrating dry skin as well as simple,
inexpensive urea.
So, as surprising as it seems, urine and urea do have an amazing,
voluminous history in both traditional and modern medicine.

An article, titled "Autouro- therapy", published in the New York
State Journal of Medicine (vol. 80, no. 7, June 1980), written by Dr
John R. Herman, Clinical Professor of Urology at Albert Einstein
College of Medicine in New York City, points out the general
misconceptions regarding urine and its medical use:
"Autouropathy (urine therapy) did flourish in many parts of the world
and it continues to flourish today... There is, unknown to most of
us, a wide usage of uropathy and a great volume of knowledge
available showing the multitudinous advantages of this modality...
"Urine is only a derivative of the blood... If the blood should not
be considered 'unclean', then the urine also should not be so
considered. Normally excreted, urine is a fluid of tremendous
variations of composition...
"...Actually, the listed constituents of human urine can be carefully
checked and no items not found in human diet are found in it.
Percentages differ, of course, but urinary constituents are valuable
to human metabolism..."
Look up urea in a medical dictionary. In Mosby's Medical and Nursing
Dictionary, urea is defined not as a useless body waste but as a
systemic diuretic and topical skin treatment. It's also prescribed to
reduce excess fluid pressure on the brain and eyes.

Uric acid, another ingredient of urine, is normally thought of as an
undesirable waste product of the body that causes gout. But even uric
acid has recently been found to have tremendous health-promotion and
medical implications.
Medical researchers at the University of California at Berkeley
reported in 1982 that they have discovered that:
"Uric acid could be a defence against cancer and ageing.
"It also destroys body-damaging chemicals, called free radicals, that
are present in food, water and air and are considered to be a cause
of cancer and breakdowns in immune function.
"Uric acid could be one of the things that enables human beings to
live so much longer than other mammals."
(O. Davies, "Youthful Uric Acid", Omni magazine, October 1982)

Urine is a critically important body fluid that has fascinated
medical science throughout the centuries. Medical scientists study
urine with tremendous intent because, unlike the public, they know
that it contains innumerable vital body nutrients and thousands of
natural elements that control and regulate every function of the body.
So, whether we know it or not, urine does have an extremely important
and undisputed place in medicine-and not just as a diagnostic tool or
as an ingredient of various synthetic drugs.

Your first reaction once you've read the convincing research
demonstrating urine's often startling medical uses may be a
willingness to use it as long as it's altered enough to make it
unrecognisable. Many people might consider a synthetic or chemically
altered form of urine-such as urokinase, the blood clot dissolver-as
preferable to using it as a natural medicine.
But, there are many reasons for using urine in its natural form
rather than as a synthetic drug or extract, not the least of which is
the fact that there is no synthetic equivalent for individual urine,
and never will be, owing to the tremendous complexity and uniqueness
of each person's urine constituents.

Just as nature produces no two people who are exactly the same, there
are also no two urine samples in the world that contain exactly the
same components. Your own urine contains elements that are specific
to your body alone and are medicinally valuable ingredients tailor-
made to your own health disorders.
How can that be? It is because your urine contains hundreds of
elements that are manufactured by your body to deal with your
personal, specific health conditions. Your body is constantly
producing a huge variety of antibodies, hormones, enzymes and other
natural chemicals to regulate and control your body's functions and
combat diseases that you may or may not know you have.
Modern research and clinical studies have proven that the thousands
of critical body chemicals and nutrients that end up in your
individual urine reflect your individual body functions, and, when re-
utilised, act as natural vaccines, antibacterial, antiviral, anti-
cancer agents, hormone balancers, allergy relievers, etc. (Talk about
the perfect preventive care treatment!)

Many doctors have discovered and shown that it's extremely important
to use our own natural urine in healing because extracts or synthetic
drug forms of urine don't contain all of these individualised
elements that address our personal, individual health needs.
Another reason that many doctors have emphasised the use of the
natural form of urine is that it does not produce side-effects
whereas synthetic drugs and therapies all produce side-effects, many
of which are extremely dangerous.
As an example, the urine-extract drug called urokinase, which is used
to dissolve dangerous blood clots, can cause serious abnormal
bleeding as a side-effect; but natural urine itself, which contains
measurable amounts of urokinase, has been used medicinally even in
extremely large quantities without causing side-effects.

If you're not familiar with just how pervasive and extreme the risk
of chemical drug-taking is, go to the library and look up a copy of
The Physician's Desk Reference for Non-prescription Drugs (Medical
Economics Data Productions Co., Inc., 1993, 14th ed.). This is the
doctor's guide to every prescription and over-the-counter drug on the
market, and every one of them is accompanied by a long list of
ominous and frightening potential side-effects.

On the other hand, in almost 100 years of laboratory and clinical
studies on the use of natural urine and simple urea in medicine,
extraordinary results have been obtained, but no toxic or dangerous
side-effects to the user have ever been observed or reported by
either researchers or patients using the therapy.
As we've learned, urea, which is the principal solid ingredient of
urine, has been synthesised and medically used with excellent results
and with no side-effects. But again, research has shown that whole
urine can cure many disorders that urea cannot, because urine
contains thousands of therapeutic agents such as important natural
antibodies, enzymes and regulating hormones that urea alone does not
contain.

Urine therapy not only has dozens of successful research trials
supporting it, but also thousands of success stories from people all
over the world. As many people today have discovered, conventional
medicine held no answers for either their chronic or acute illnesses
and health disorders-but urine therapy did.

About the Author:
Martha Christy is a nutritional and natural health-care consultant,
medical research writer and editor, and author of the international
bestseller, Learn to Control Stress with the Stress Test. Her other
books include Reconstructing The Real You, Even Good Foods Can Be Bad
For You (Personalizing Your Nutrition), Balancing Your Body's pH,
Simple Diagnostic Tests You Can Do At Home, and Homeopathy and Your
Own Perfect Medicine.