The therapy of high dose vitaminC [ascorbic acid]
has been rousing controversy since Linus Pauling
first wrote about it over 30 years ago,
and a number of messages on this newsgroup
have been highly critical whenever the subject
has been raised.Here is some more information
about it which you may not be aware of.

                     [QUOTE]

"Dr Ewan Cameron ...   ...   ...   has during the past
two years treated over two hundred terminal cancer
patients with ascorbic acid alone.He has usually
given the patient ten grams of ascorbic acid by
intravenous infusion over a period of about ten days.
The patients are usually by that time well enough to
go home,and they continue to receive about ten grams
by mouth. Dr Cameron is now preparing a paper
describing his experience with the first fifty patients.
He has reported to me that a small fraction,
perhaps ten per cent of the patients appear to have
complete remission of the disease.Also in a small
fraction of the patients,perhaps less than ten per cent,
the cancerous growth  seems to react in a striking way
to the administration of the ascorbic acid,with walling-off
and necrosis of the tumor. With most of the patients the
principal effect that Dr Cameron has observed  is a great
decrease in the amount of pain suffered and a greatly
increased sense of well-being,with disappearance of
cachexia,restoration of appetite,and return of the ability
to carry on a normal life. Some of the patients have,
after a period of some months,suddenly become very
seriously ill dying in a day or two. Dr Cameron has
reported on the decrease in pain,which permits patients
to stop taking morphine,   ...   ...   ...   ...   ...  ".

                    [END QUOTE]

Dr Ewan Cameron worked at the Vale of Leven District
General Hospital, Scotland, where he was senior
consultant surgeon.

The above quotation comes from a copy of a letter from Linus Paulin
to Lewis Thomas, President of  Memorial Sloane-Kettering
Research Center, asking for a research study to be carried out
into the use of ascorbic acid as a means of decreasing the incidence
of cancer and also treating cancer.The letter runs to about three
and a half pages  and can be seen through this link

http://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/MM/B/B/G/L/_/mmbbgl.pdf

Pauling's request to Thomas was rejected.
No studies were conducted.

A much fuller statement about vitamin C was written by
Cameron and Pauling together, but it is long and in
parts technical.It includes a table of all the cancers treated
compared witha control group of 1000 patients
The conclusion is good and not too technical.This link will
take you there:

            http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=2QduA19d_X8C&pg=PA1361&lpg=PA1361&dq=ewan+cam
eron&source=web&ots=ISDmx8gXGq&sig=QLJRnTwZGks1_6GwCc-yl76hp1M&hl=en&sa=X&oi=boo
k_result&resnum=5&ct=result#PPA1415,M1

The letter and paper which I have quoted are from the 1970's and it
could be argued that many important advances have been made
over the last 30 years which now supersede Vitamin C therapy
which in any case was never a part of mainstream medicine.
Well,the last bit about mainstream medicine may be true,
but I am not so sure about  the first bit.
Here's one reason:

Dr Cameron breaches the final taboo, Death and the mode of dying:-
"Dr Cameron has reported on the decrease in pain,which permits
patients to stop taking morphine   ...".

Has that been superseded? Sadly no.Terminal cancer
patients still have morphine.

Let's take another look:

"...He has usually given the patient ten grams of ascorbic acid
by intravenous infusion over a period of about ten days.
The patients are usually by that time well enough to
go home ..."
" ...a great decrease in the amount of pain suffered ..."
" ...a greatly increased sense of well-being, ..."
"....disappearance of cachexia   ..."
"...restoration of appetite ..."
"...return of the ability to carry on a normal life ..."

{cachexia means 'wasting']

These were not newly diagnosed patients,they were
terminal patients.
"... patients who in the opinion of at least two independent
    clinicians the continuance of any conventional form of
    treatment would offer no benefit.  ...  "
They had nothing to lose, they had everything to gain,
and some of them did.

I do not think that it matters that this was thirty years ago.
Here you have a doctor who sees his terminally ill
patients rising from their death beds and going home.
Patients, for whom the continuance of any
conventional form  of treatment would offer no benefit,
miraculously recovering and in a few days going home.

Sooner or later most came back but even then their pain had
greatly decreased and they did not need morphine.

Despite the  criticisms which vitaminC therapy has met over the
years,it is not universal criticism.The therapy is used in various
clinics around the world,and its usage is increasing.

Many doctors use it - orthodox practitioners not back-street
snake oil pedlars, not just Naturopaths and Medical Herbalists,
but orthodox medical practioners, some of them distinguished,
and they practice in many countries.

This link will show a list of some of the practioners and organisations
all over the world who use this therapy:
[I do not know how up-to-date it is]

     http://www.canceraction.org.gg/index2.htm
[hint: on the banner on the left click on "in extremis"]

Some of the names are well-known e.g. Dr Charles Simone.
He is an M.D. and also the rare Master of Medical Science
[MMS].He is an international consultant and was called in
as consultant for President Ronald Reagan's colon cancer.
He later received this message:

"Nancy joins me in sending you our best wishes for the success of your
vital work.
  Ronald Reagan, President.".

When the most powerful man in the world falls ill,he gets
the best physician  to treat him.
He got Dr Simone; Dr Simone also practices vitamin C therapy,
prescribing  Vitamin C = 350 to 6,000 mg per day  as part
of his ten-point plan.

http://www.drsimone.com/report.htm

[scroll down to Table 2.]

Such people realize the importance nourishment
has for good health,and they recognise that there are other
successful therapies available which are not so damaging as
those that mainstream medicine has to offer even today.

"The American Dr Hugh Riordan M.D. is probably the world expert on this
approach.
His institute, The Center for the Improvement of Human Functioning,
has just completed a 10 year research project on high dose intravenous C
and cancer, and his patented method recently underwent Phase I clinical
trials at the University of Nebraska medical school hospital.
These trials have established the non-toxicity of this treatment for cancer,
and Dr Riordan is now proceeding with a Phase II clinical trial,
under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health, using therapeutic
doses of vitamin C on Renal Adenoma." [see canceraction above].

I hope that this message and links are of interest to you,
and will give a better understanding of this subject.
I am not a doctor nor do I have any medical qualifications.
I am here as a patient,but everything  I have quoted
comes from reliable sources not from charlatans.

Always consult your doctor,but consult  sensibly from an informed
position.The internet is an instrument of research only available
widely in recent years,and is a means by which Joe Public can
reach the wisdom of the world like never before.He can also be
beguiled by charlatans. Judge carefully and be better informed.

Best Wishes,
Old Bill.