An Analysis of the Use of Apitherapy in the Detection and Treatment of Cancer

Apitherapy: detection and treatment of cancer in humans

Apitherapy is the application of bee products in a medicinal setting. The word comes from the Latin word “apis,” which means bee. These bee products include bee venom, honey, pollen, royal jelly, propolis, and beeswax. Bee products have been used for thousands of years as medicine. Apitherapy was practiced in ancient Egypt, Greece, and China, which all had very advanced medical systems. Even Hippocrates, who is known as the father of medicine, used bee venom to treat arthritis and joint pain. More recently, in 1888 the Austrian physician Philip Terc published a paper called “Report about a Peculiar Connection between the Bee Stings and Rheumatism.” This paper spurred more research and apitherapy eventually made it to the United States. Today, apitherapy is used to treat or manage symptoms of autoimmune diseases, cancer, Alzheimer’s, HPV, Lyme Disease, multiple sclerosis, and arthritis. Some people believe that bacteria in bee stomachs could act as an alternative to antibiotics. Apitherapy has been used for thousands of years, and is causing quite the buzz in medical communities, especially those focused on alternative or homeopathic medicine.

Recent studies suggest that bees can be trained to detect cancer using their extremely perceptive olfactory senses. They can locate very faint odors in a room, consisting of only a few molecules, and can be trained using classical conditioning, or the stimulus-response method, to react to certain smells. Bees have been shown to effectively diagnose diseases like tuberculosis and diabetes. They can detect a specific chemical odor associated with a disease, and can be trained to act in a certain way using food rewards, like sugar, when the chemical is detected. Certain diseases such as lung cancer alter the composition of bodily fluids and produce odorous compounds that show up in urine and sometimes blood. These are known as biomarkers. Using animals to detect these biomarkers is nothing new, in fact, scientists have trained mice and dogs to detect different types of cancer in the past. Electronic nose devices have also been used to detect these biomarkers that would be impossible for humans to smell.

While mammals and electronics have been used to detect these diseases, insects offer some advantages because they use antennae for their olfactory sense. Electronics have trouble detecting specific molecules in a more complex environment, so their use isn’t as applicable for conditions such as the mixture of gasses found in human breath. As for dogs, they require about three months of training, and only correctly identify odors about 71% of the time. Bees take about 10 minutes to train and have an accuracy rate of 98%. Unfortunately, without constant reinforcement of behavior, bees stop reacting to biomarkers. As of now, bees are not used to detect cancer in medical settings, but there is research being done that points to it being a possibility in the future.

If bees can detect cancer, is it possible for them to treat it as well? Bee products are currently used to treat a variety of diseases, but apitherapy is seen more as a homeopathic remedy and less as an accepted medical treatment. However, recent studies suggest that both propolis and bee venom can be used to treat cancer. Two specific compounds in propolis, caffeic acid phenethyl ester and artepillin C have both been shown to fight cancer and inflammation. Propolis in general is great for humans, as it contains many compounds such as antioxidants, magnesium, calcium, iron, zinc, amino acids, and B vitamins, all of which are necessary to live a healthy life.

As for bee venom, it’s been the focus of scientists around the globe for years to treat cancer, with limited results. While the venom does destroy cancer cells, in the high doses needed to do so, it also causes damage to red blood cells and other healthy cells, which can be fatal. However, studies conducted by Washington University have found that making minor changes to a bee venom peptide can reduce the harmful effects and make it a potential cancer treatment. This modified peptide is called melittin, and it’s been proven to shrink or slow the growth of tumors in mice. Researchers used nanotechnology, aptly named “nanobees,” to deliver the melittin directly to the tumors in lab mice. These nanobees directly target the tumors, and only the tumors, unlike other cancer treatments that can destroy both cancerous and healthy cells. Because of the use of nanotechnology, the melittin is able to go directly to the cancer cells to induce apoptosis and avoid entering the blood stream. Without this very exacting technology, the melittin would destroy the red blood cells and kill the mice. To go into more detail, the enzyme found in melittin catalytically hydrolyzes and digests cell membrane components of cancer cells, which disrupts the integrity of the lipid bilayers and makes the cancer cells susceptible to degradation, leading to growth inhibition, cell cycle arrest, and apoptosis.

Though this treatment for cancer hasn’t progressed much in the past few years, there is lots of promising research and evidence that points to bee venom as a possible treatment for cancer. Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of research currently being conducted, and it seems that one of the reasons is that there isn’t much profit for pharmaceutical companies involved in apitherapy. Bee products have been used for centuries in various medical pursuits, and recently it’s been proven that they can be used to detect, manage the symptoms of, and treat cancer.