Therapeutic Uses of Vitamin E Treatment of Acute Malaria with Pyrimethamine Sir,-the Paper

SIR,-The leading article on "The Therapeutic Uses of Vitamin E" (December 20, 1952, p. 1345) certainly calls for comment by us, the proponents of the use of a-tocopherol in cardiovascular disease. Such an article might conceivably have been written in 1948 or 1949. However, the picture has changed so rapidly since that time that your leading article now simply does not reflect the findings of investigators in this field. This is best illustrated, perhaps, by the current issue of our medical journal, the Summary, which contains the abstracts of 122 reports which have appeared in the medical literature supporting our original contentions. It seems that atocopherol shares with Christianity both its beneficence and the observation that those who say it has failed have rarely tried it. Since the American Aristotles first condemned it, too many doctors have dropped a pebble from their own towers to make that condemnation stick. Briefly, our current Suimmary records that 17 reports have supported us in the use of a-tocopherol for the menopause; 5 in its use for nephritis; 6 for kraurosis vulvae; 4 for capillary permeability; 4 for purpura; 5 for vascular dilatation; 1 1 for Buerger's disease; 10 for vascular sclerosis; 15 for thrombosis; 3 for muscular power; 20 for indolent ulcers; 14 for diabetes; 4 for Roentgen tissue damage; 4 for incipient gangrene; 2 for wound healing. Finally, 46 reports have supported us in the use of atocopherol for heart disease. It is difficult to believe that all these investigators have duplicated an error. Certainly it is cavalier to dismiss such work in one paragraph. Fortunately, our forthcoming book should help to keep the record straight and we will recommend it to your perusal. Also, as Auden, one of your own poets, has said: "One notices, if one will trust one's eyes, The shadow cast by language upon truth." -We are, etc., WILFRID E. SHUTE.