Well, yes, I took it 3 times so far, once weekly, 3mg, 4mg, 5mg - and observed zero effects either way. Like taking sugar pills.
I have several things I want to test - the effects of pitavastatin, empagliflozin and rapamycin. So, for empagliflozin, I want to be on it a minimum of three months, so I can test for A1c. I started it 12/01/24 - so it’s been less than two months. I’ve calculated that I’ll take a whole bunch of tests late March early April, including the test for sirolimus.
Here’s the key thing to understand. If you just send out the pills to be tested, you are not going to learn much that is useful. In fact, even my blood tests will not tell us much. Here’s why: the issue is not so much that these pills contain zero rapamycin - I think that’s highly, highly unlikely. And I believe people here who have purchased Biocon pills have shown rapa in their blood. The issue is completely different: is there an enteric coating on the pills! You send the pills to the lab, and it’ll show it has rapamycin in them, but so what - you want to know if they have enteric coating. According to data from the PEARL trial, if you take rapamycin without enteric coating you get about 1/3 of the rapamycin dose. So, if you take 6mg, in reality, you are only getting a 2mg dose. This is why even my blood test is not going to tell us much - all it will tell us is that (as I expect), that yes, there is rapamycin detected. But that says nothing about the dosage - the reason being is that everyone responds to the same dose differently. Some - like apparently Matt Kaeberlein, clear the rapa from their blood extremely rapidly, while others show substantial elevation for quite some time - so you really don’t know what the dose is.
That is the crux of the matter. Yes, odds are - overwhelming - that these Biocon pills are pills containing the correct dose of rapamycin (1mg) - but the problem is how bioavailable are they? Without the enteric coating, they’re really 1/3 the strength, so you are not getting the dose, systemically, that you think you are. You think you are getting 6mg, meanwhile you are getting 2mg. And what makes me suspicious, is the fact that they have scoring. What reason on earth is there for the scoring, unless there is no enteric coating. The only explanation is a manufacturing mistake - which I simply think is super unlikely. All these people who show that the Biocon pills have rapamycin detected in their blood, yes, they have it, BUT AT WHAT DOSE? That’s kind of critical! And I’ve seen photos of the Zydus pills, they have no scoring and look shiny like they have a coating. Biocon pills are not shiny.
Again, if I were to do it over again, I would not buy Biocon. I’d buy Zydus. Not even because I’m 100% sure the Biocon pills are subpar - I honestly have no proof either way. But I’d get the Zydus pills just for the peace of mind. This is the kind of thing you don’t always learn on sites like this from other users - only through personal experience. But hey, I’m very, very particular about dosage and protocols, making sure I’m getting what I think I’m getting… meanwhile I’m always astonished when I read how people pop various supplements with zero investigation as to whether the brand is reputable or what they are getting. But I might be especially cautious, so I criticize no one, just to each their own. YMMV.
