Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

technologyreview.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 47 posts

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#31

Post by Pete_D »

imaginenore wrote: post #27
tossedaway334 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe there is a startup opportunity to sell spare kidneys, and even lungs and liver-halfs too! Maybe even a cash-for-corpses business, we need to get rid of these ridiculous self-serving medical regulations. DISRUPT!

You know you make new blood, and people donate blood regularly? Apart from small slices of liver, your organs don't really regrow. You could donate/sell one of your kidneys, but we now know there are negative long-term effects of that.

Somewhat OT, but kidney donation is surprisingly low risk in the long term.

"Compared to the general public, most kidney donors have equivalent (or better) survival, excellent quality of life, and no increase in end-stage kidney disease"

https://nhsbtdbe.blob.core.windows.net/umbraco-assets/1433/1... [PDF, page 7]

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#32

Post by dragonwriter »

Pete_D wrote: post #31
imaginenore wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know you make new blood, and people donate blood regularly? Apart from small slices of liver, your organs don't really regrow. You could donate/sell one of your kidneys, but we now know there are negative long-term effects of that.

Somewhat OT, but kidney donation is surprisingly low risk in the long term. "Compared to the general public, most kidney donors have equivalent (or better) survival, excellent quality of life, and no increase in end-stage kidney disease" https://nhsbtdbe.blob.core.windows.net/umbraco-assets/1433/1... [PDF, page 7]

I would suspect that there is a selection bias here, as a whole lot of the low end of the general health distribution would prevent you from donating a kidney, or at least make it less likely. So you'd expect them to do better than average if donation had no effect.

To know if there is an effect, you need to not compare to the general public, but to a subset similar in factors which are associated with the outcome measures to kidney donors.

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#33

Post by ZainRiz »

Cyph0n wrote: post #21
bitwize wrote: post #11

Young blood as an anti-aging remedy for the rich? Why do I imagine it being sipped from golden goblets in darkened castle halls?

Sounds like a plot point from Berserk ...

Or like the residents of Mount Weather (from the show 100)

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#34

Post by withdavidli »

bitwize wrote: post #11

Young blood as an anti-aging remedy for the rich? Why do I imagine it being sipped from golden goblets in darkened castle halls?

Daybreakers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daybreakers

People are vampires farming the remaining humans for their blood.

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#35

Post by Cyph0n »

withdavidli wrote: post #34
bitwize wrote: post #11

Young blood as an anti-aging remedy for the rich? Why do I imagine it being sipped from golden goblets in darkened castle halls?

Daybreakers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daybreakers People are vampires farming the remaining humans for their blood.

What. How have I not heard of this? Watching it tonight, thanks.

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#36

Post by gspetr »

bitwize wrote: post #11

Young blood as an anti-aging remedy for the rich? Why do I imagine it being sipped from golden goblets in darkened castle halls?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_B%C3%A1thory

The stories of her serial murders and brutality are verified by the testimony of more than 300 witnesses and survivors as well as physical evidence and the presence of horribly mutilated dead, dying and imprisoned girls found at the time of her arrest.

Stories which ascribe to her vampire-like tendencies (most famously the tale that she bathed in the blood of virgins to retain her youth) were generally recorded years after her death and are considered unreliable. Her story quickly became part of national folklore, and her infamy persists to this day.

She is often compared with Vlad III the Impaler of Wallachia, on whom the fictional Count Dracula is partly based, and has been nicknamed The Blood Countess and Countess Dracula.

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#37

Post by [deleted] »

hughes wrote: post #18
tossedaway334 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe there is a startup opportunity to sell spare kidneys, and even lungs and liver-halfs too! Maybe even a cash-for-corpses business, we need to get rid of these ridiculous self-serving medical regulations. DISRUPT!

When you can grow back your kidneys, lungs, and livers, this will be a sensible extension of the idea. I initially wanted to make this comment sarcastically, but really, if we become capable of regrowing organs within your body you could legitimately make a business case for it.

[deleted]

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#38

Post by JshWright »

imaginenore wrote: post #30
pharrlax wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Science's default position -- the null hypothesis -- is that there is no relationship between two phenomena. In this case, the phenomena are "administering treatment" and "seeing positive results". If the null hypothesis is accurate, and there is no relationship between treatment and outcomes, then it doesn't work. So yes, that is indeed science's default position.

No, in this case, the phenomena are "administering treatment" and "seeing results" (not just positive). You start off with "we don't know if it makes humans better or worse or does absolutely nothing, let's do a bunch of tests". Also, when it comes to clinical tests, you almost never do simply control/placebo vs treatment. There are usually a few groups with various degrees of treatment.

No, you start off with "we assume it does nothing".

"Clinical tests" is a wide range of studies, and initially may indeed be 'simple' placebo controlled studies. If an effect is seen, then testing will be done with 'various degrees' to determine a dose response, etc.

Re: Questionable “Young Blood” Transfusions Offered in U.S. As Anti-Aging Remedy

#39

Post by ktRolster »

chadgeidel wrote: post #22
imaginenore wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your claim ("it doesn't work") requires evidence, which you haven't presented. The evidence that it does work already exists: "When Wyss-Coray’s team tried a simpler experiment than parabiosis—giving old mice injections of plasma from young mice—they saw similar effects on the hippocampal neurons. The old mice also performed significantly better than untreated animals on tests of learning and memory." http://www.scie…

That's not how science works. The onus isn't on someone to "prove it doesn't work" - the onus is on the person making the claim that it does work.

The onus is on whoever cares enough to figure it out. If no one cares enough, then no one will figure it out.

Sometimes people do the work to prove things wrong.

Post reply on HN