Paul Wakfer and I recently had a private email discussion about the
benefits and drawbacks of using blood donation as a method of
reducing high body iron stores. I thought it would be of interest to
others in the group, so I have placed it in this message (below).

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Steve Floyd

[In order to maintain correct dialog level information, I decided to
only retain Steve's original question in this message and to place my
response in an immediately following reply to it. --Paul]

---------------- original message -------------
Hi Paul,

I am working on my literature review for my organic chemistry
course, which is due this week. This literature review is concerned
with the possible negative health-consequences of high iron status.
It's coming along fairly well, but there's one point I would like to
make in this review that I don't yet have sources for. I remember
reading an article recently (I think on Morelife Yahoo) where you
caution Olafur about blood donations. You mention that blood
donations, while effective at lowering iron stores, may have
unforeseen negative effects, such as depleting limited immune cells,
stem cells, and others. I was wondering if you had any references for
those assertions, as I would like to discuss these negative
consequences in the section of the paper where I discuss phlebotomy
as a method of reducing iron stores. If not, I will search for them
on my own, as I think it is prudent to give an accurate benefit vs.
risk evaluation in a paper such as this. Even pointing me to a
certain journal or article on sci.life-extension or other such group
would be very helpful. I spent a little time searching for several
items in Morelife Yahoo and sci.life-extension and did not find what
I am looking for.

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Steve Floyd