Sepsis is a dangerous illness in which the bloodstream is flooded with bacteria. Common symptoms of sepsis include shock, confusion, blood pressure drop, hyperventilation, or organ failure. Sepsis often attack babies, the elderly and those with weakened immune systems. But even healthy people can become deathly ill from the disease.
Up to now, there has been no effective treatment for sepsis. So the mortality rate of people with sepsis is very high, nearly 40%. Now scientists have discovered a possible safe and inexpensive treatment for this condition, vitamin C. Vitamin C can not only prevent the onset of sepsis, but can reverse the disease.
Dr. Karel Tyml and his colleagues from University of Western Ontario and Lawson Health Research Institute were the first to discover the plugging of capillaries that prevent oxygenation and the supply of life-supporting materials to the organ tissue and stop the removal of metabolic waste product. Plugged capillaries are seen in organs of septic patients. These organs may eventually fail, leading to multiple organ failure and death.
The capillary plugging in sepsis is caused by oxidative stress and the activated blood clotting pathway. Once clotting has begun, the body can no longer remove toxins from the blood or cells. Dr. Karel Tyml’s team discovered oxidative stress can be prevented by a single bolus of vitamin C early at the time of induction of sepsis. Additionally, vitamin C reverses plugging by restoring blood flow in previously plugged capillaries.
This discovery may bring a safe and cost-effective to those with sepsis. More significantly, it is a good news for the patients in developing countries where expensive care is not available because vitamin C treatment is cheap and especially, it reduce the mortality of sepsis.
So take vitamin C daily in order to help prevent not only sepsis but also other diseases such as glaucoma, gingivitis and other infectious diseases.