Another mechanism of fasting is the cleansing of the body of toxins. The concept of “toxins” involves the final products of metabolism, including metabolites of drugs, endotoxins, antigenic and other “deposits” in various organs of the human body, having direct contact with the external environment or directly related to the purifying function of circulating blood (lungs, gastrointestinal tract, liver, kidneys). When starving, the body cleansing occurs owing to the switch to internal nutrition: in the absence of external nutrition, the body will start using, in addition to fat tissue, the unneeded substances accumulated over time. Such a deep cleansing of the body at the cellular level is another mechanism of the therapeutic action of fasting (O. Buchinger, Yu. Nikolaev).

The founder of the scientific approach to the study of therapeutic fasting in Russia was the prominent Soviet psychiatrist Yuri Nikolaev. In the 1950s, he successfully used this method in a clinical setting to treat patients with lingering neuroses and schizophrenia, and then, together with his followers, began trying to adopt it in patients with somatic diseases. The positive results he obtained prompted the Ministry of Health of the USSR in the 1970s to begin extensive scientific research on the therapeutic properties of fasting. Among all treatable diseases, Soviet doctors paid special attention to bronchial asthma. The problem of finding a cure for asthma, not related to drugs, has always been relevant, because from the very beginning of the use of drug therapy pulmonologists were aware of its serious deficiencies. These deficiencies were particularly evident in asthma patients with comorbidities: diabetes, hypertension, skin and gastrointestinal lesions with allergic reactions. In such cases, the situation requires the prescription of many drugs at the same time, which is difficult or impossible, as asthma often develops hypersensitivity to many medications.

In 1984, two prominent Soviet pulmonologists, Alexey Kokosov and Sergey Osinin, who had been using therapeutic fasting in their work for 10 years, published the book Razgruzochno-dieticheskaya terapiya bol’nyh bronhial’noj astmoj (Diet-fasting therapy in bronchial asthma patients). This book was based on the authors’ own experience and the experience of their colleagues working in the pulmonology departments of clinics in different cities of the country. The second edition of this book was published in 2004. The publication describes in detail the indications and contraindications to fasting method and its variants, specifying treatment tactics depending on the severity of asthma and the presence of comorbidities. Possible complications and ways to prevent them, as well as prevention of recurrence of the disease are described.

The fasting method used by the authors of the book is mainly responding to the “classic” protocol< developed by Yuri Nikolaev and consists of 10-24-day water-only fasting. The book contains one of the most comprehensive descriptions of this protocol among the ones found in literature. Therefore, it can be useful for anyone interested in using of fasting method not only for asthma patients, but also for patients with other somatic and mental illnesses. The book was translated into English in 2020.