High-dose ascorbate (10 g/day intravenous, then oral maintenance) prolongs survival in terminal cancer patients roughly four-fold compared to patients not receiving it, and a meaningful minority survive more than a year versus almost none of the untreated comparison group.
The claim’s evidentiary base was two retrospective, non-randomized, unblinded, non-placebo-controlled studies (Cameron & Pauling, PNAS 1976 and 1978) comparing ascorbate-treated patients to historical hospital controls matched only on broad clinical variables. Two Mayo Clinic randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials directly tested the claim: Creagan et al. (NEJM 1979) found no difference in symptoms, performance status, or survival between vitamin C and placebo in 150 advanced-cancer patients; Moertel et al. (NEJM 1985), designed specifically to remove the one methodological objection Pauling had raised about the first trial (that its patients had already received chemotherapy), again found no tumor response, no symptom benefit, and no survival advantage in chemotherapy-naive patients. The archive marks the survival-benefit claim refuted by the two controlled trials that followed it.
Appears in
Sources
- Supplemental ascorbate in the supportive treatment of cancer: Prolongation of survival times in terminal human cancer — Cameron E, Pauling L. Supplemental ascorbate in the supportive treatment of cancer: Prolongation of survival times in terminal human cancer. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1976;73(10):3685-3689. PMID: 1068480.
- Supplemental ascorbate in the supportive treatment of cancer: reevaluation of prolongation of survival times in terminal human cancer — Cameron E, Pauling L. Supplemental ascorbate in the supportive treatment of cancer: reevaluation of prolongation of survival times in terminal human cancer. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1978;75(9):4538-4542. PMID: 279931.
- Failure of high-dose vitamin C (ascorbic acid) therapy to benefit patients with advanced cancer. A controlled trial — Creagan ET, Moertel CG, O'Fallon JR, Schutt AJ, O'Connell MJ, Rubin J, Frytak S. Failure of high-dose vitamin C (ascorbic acid) therapy to benefit patients with advanced cancer. A controlled trial. N Engl J Med. 1979;301(13):687-690. PMID: 384241.
- High-dose vitamin C versus placebo in the treatment of patients with advanced cancer who have had no prior chemotherapy. A randomized double-blind comparison — Moertel CG, Fleming TR, Creagan ET, Rubin J, O'Connell MJ, Ames MM. High-dose vitamin C versus placebo in the treatment of patients with advanced cancer who have had no prior chemotherapy. A randomized double-blind comparison. N Engl J Med. 1985;312(3):137-141. PMID: 3880867.
- Intravenous High-Dose Vitamin C in Cancer Therapy — Cantley L, Yun J. Intravenous High-Dose Vitamin C in Cancer Therapy. Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research, 24 January 2020.