Here we go again.
Naturopaths crave legitimacy for their brand of pseudoscientific medicine. Basically, they delude themselves into thinking that they are real doctors and can function as primary care providers, despite abundant evidence that they cannot. they One (of several) ways they seek to acquire that legitimacy for naturopathy and themselves is through promoting the passage of laws in states licensing them as health care providers, as they have been repeatedly doing (and, fortunately, thus far failing to achieve) in my home state of Michigan and continuing to attempt in Massachusetts. Once they achieve that licensure in a state, inevitably they keep trying to increase their scope of practice, even to the point of being allowed to prescribe drugs and do minor surgery. Of course, I always wondered why they even want these latter two privileges if naturopathy is as great a system of medicine as they claim, but perhaps, deep down, they realize that conventional medicine works better than their woo. Of cours, another reason is financial, as under the Affordable Care Act, which mandates insurance coverage for any licensed health professional, licensure would open the way for requiring insurance companies to reimburse naturopaths for their services. No wonder supplement companies have been enthusiastically (and financially) supporting naturopathic licensing efforts.
They’re at it again. As is so often the case, whenever a bill licensing naturopaths fails to pass, the push begins immediately to pass another one. For instance, Senate Bill 2290 died in committee in February after another, House Bill 725, failed last year. Never to be deterred, on Wednesday, supporters of naturopathic licensing testified before the Senate Committee on Public Health and Welfare:
In July 2015, doctors diagnosed Nicole Matis with stage IV breast cancer, telling her the disease was so far advanced, she had no shot of eradicating the disease. She said the best they offered was to “treat the symptoms until (they) couldn’t treat them anymore.”
But in January, Matis’s oncologist found no evidence of active cancer cells. Nine months later she remains cancer-free.
Matis had defied the odds. And on Wednesday, she told members of the Mississippi Senate committee on health and public welfare that she credits her recovery to naturopathic medicine, which she received along with traditional chemotherapy. She said the naturopathic medicine improved her overall health during the rigorous chemotherapy treatments.
“Nurses were constantly amazed at how well I looked and felt (during chemotherapy). I never felt sick or lost my hair. I had little to no side effects, and I attribute that to naturopathic medicine,” Matis said.
Chemotherapy can be rough, certainly, but for breast cancer it’s often not as rough as the common public perception would lead one to believe. The reason is that supportive care has advanced considerably in 25 years. I once saw a talk by an oncologist who’s almost as “insolent” as I am, and he started out by describing how he ad been asked a question: What is the greatest advance in oncology over the last 20 years? His first choice: Zofran, an drug that combats nausea and vomiting, because Zofran and other drugs like it allow people to make it through chemotherapy more readily. Chances are that whatever woo that naturopaths administered to Nicole Matis had little to do with how well she did compared to good, old-fashioned science-based oncology and supportive care. Yet, like alternative medicine cancer cure testimonials in which a patient survives because of conventional treatment, chooses alternative medicine, and then attributes his survival to the alternative medicine instead of conventional treatment, Matis probably would have done just as well without the naturopathy. I could be wrong, but I’m playing the odds, based on what I’ve observed before time and time again.
Oddly enough, unlike the case in Michigan, where so many medical societies didn’t bother to oppose naturopathic licensing, allowing the bill to persist and be referred to the House, in Mississippi, at least Dr. Lee Voulters, president of the Mississippi Medical Association, was willing to testify against licensing. However, that might not be enough, as the “stars” might have aligned to give a new bill a better chance this session. Dr. Voulker might point out that naturopathy is not well regulated (a massive understatement, which makes me wonder if Dr. Voulker, like so many physicians, doesn’t really know what naturopathic medicine is), but this is what he’s up against:
But naturopathic medicine has something many issues in Mississippi don’t — bipartisan support. Both Sen. John Hohrn (D-Jackson) and Sen. Josh Harkins (R-Flowood) have come out as proponents of a bill to license naturopathic doctors.
“I think it’s about having every medical option available to our citizens that’s safe and effective,” Harkins said. “Who can be against that?”
Horhn agreed.
“I’ve always leaned toward an integrated approach in healthcare,” Horhn said. “And I think the stars seemed to be lining up on the Senate side for some serious consideration.”
The story also notes:
Ron Matis, more than most civilians, knows how to get a bill through the legislature. During the last session he was one of the main advocates of a House Bill 1523. The “religious freedom” law garnered national headlines and a fight in federal court after opponents said it discriminated against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Mississippians.
The bill sailed through the House and Senate with almost unanimous Republican support. Matis, who is political director for the United Pentecostal Church of Mississippi, spent months lobbying several key legislators to make sure this happened.
Somehow, that’s not reassuring. Mississippi’s “religious freedom” law was basically a Trojan Horse that, in the name of religious freedom, allowed discrimination against LGBT people. Some of its objectionable consequences would have been that religious groups could fire a single mother who gets pregnant or, in the case of religious adoption agencies, refuse to place a child with a same sex couple. State employees could refuse to sign same sex marriage certificates. You get the idea. No wonder the law was struck down in July. One can look at naturopathic licensing bills as the same sort of Trojan Horse but in a different area.
While one can’t help but sympathize with Nicole Matis and her husband Ron because of her battle with stage IV breast cancer and understand their motivation for promoting naturopathic licensure, when it comes to public policy personal anecdote cannot be allowed to triumph over science. Yes, I know that frequently personal anecdote trumps science and other policy considerations, but in medicine I like to hope that such tendencies can be minimized. (One can say this while continuing to hope that Ms. Matis continues to do well.) For instance, Mississippi is one of only three states that do not permit nonmedical exemptions to school vaccine mandates; so the state can get it right at times. Be that as it may, in the name of “health freedom,” the licensing of naturopaths promoted by Matis and woo-friendly legislators would legitimize all sorts of outrageous quackery and eliminate a lot of consumer protections that prevent bogus health care providers from plying their quackery. don’t believe me? Take a look at the text of Senate Bill 2290:
(1) A naturopathic physician may order and perform physical and laboratory examinations consistent with naturopathic education and training, for diagnostic purposes, including, but not limited to, phlebotomy, clinical laboratory tests, orificial examinations and physiological function tests.
(2) A naturopathic physician may order diagnostic imaging studies consistent with naturopathic training.
(3) A naturopathic physician may dispense, administer, order, and prescribe or perform the following:
(a) Food, extracts of food, nutraceuticals, vitamins, amino acids, minerals, enzymes, botanicals and their extracts, botanical medicines, homeopathic medicines, all dietary supplements and nonprescription drugs as defined by the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act;
(b) Prescription substances as determined by the Naturopathic Formulary Council;
(c) Hot or cold hydrotherapy, naturopathic physical medicine, electromagnetic energy, colon hydrotherapy, therapeutic exercise;
(d) Devices, including, but not limited to, therapeutic devices, barrier contraception, and durable medical equipment;
(e) Health education and health counseling;
(f) Repair and care incidental to superficial lacerations and abrasions;
(g) Removal of foreign bodies located in the superficial tissues; and
(h) Musculoskeletal manipulation consistent with naturopathic education and training.
(4) A naturopathic physician may utilize routes of administration that include oral, nasal, auricular, ocular, rectal, vaginal, transdermal, intradermal, subcutaneous, intravenous, and intramuscular consistent with the education and training of a naturopathic physician.
(5) A naturopathic physician may perform those therapies as trained and educated, and approved by the board.
As most of these bills would do if passed into law, Senate Bill 2290 would form a naturopathic licensing board, in this case consisting of three naturopaths and two members of the public. Even more frightening:
(1) The board shall establish a Naturopathic Childbirth Attendance Advisory Committee to issue recommendations concerning the practice of naturopathic childbirth attendance based upon a review of naturopathic medical education and training.
(2) The committee shall be composed of representation from each of the following: one (1) medical doctor with clinical specialty or board certification in obstetrics, one (1) certified nurse midwife or certified midwife, and two (2) naturopathic physicians with clinical experience in natural childbirth.
(3) The committee shall review naturopathic education and training and make specific recommendations to the board regarding the qualifications to practice naturopathic childbirth attendance.
(4) Graduation from a naturopathic midwifery or naturopathic obstetrics program that is offered by an approved naturopathic medical program as defined in paragraph (e) of Section 3 of this act will be required to practice naturopathic childbirth attendance.
That’s right. Naturopaths would be allowed to deliver babies.
As is usually the case, when I see a licensing bill for naturopaths in a state, I like to see what naturopaths are doing there. There are naturopaths in Mississippi, but they are not licensed, just as there are in Michigan and Massachusetts. (I also like to refer to my Sh*t Naturopaths Say series.)
For example, Elizabeth Cox, who is also an acupuncturist, would be eligible to be licensed. Interestingly, she got rid of part of her website quoted by Jann Bellamy:
Offering far infrared heat waves and negative ionization, the amethyst biomat can be used for balancing and maintaining health as well as detoxification. It is paired with select meditative and brain wave altering headset audio to help change habit patterns, achieve relaxation and optimize health. As this quantum energetic is cumulative, three and six session packages are available. Amethyst can be added on to any treatment. Both the mini mat and full length professional mat are available for rental.
The link Jann quoted regarding the amethyst “biomat” therapy is now dead, but the almighty Wayback Machine remembers all:
A BioMat healing session is deeply detoxifying and relaxing as negative ions are introduced, infrared rays penetrate and the brainwaves shift to theta. The biomat
Assists in purging pesticides, PCBs and heavy metal toxins thru the skin.
Reduces stress and fatigue:
- Anti-aging
- Relieves anxiety and promotes relaxation
- Improves sleep patterns
- Reduces inflammation
- Eases joint pain and stiffness
- Provides warm, soothing pain relief
- Eliminates toxins in the body
- Increases blood circulation
- Alleviates migraines and tension headaches
- Reduces allergy symptoms
- Improves immune system function
- Improves cardiovascular health
- Burns calories and controls weight
- Improves muscle tone and skin quality
Of course, right now, there aren’t a lot of naturopaths in Mississippi, although there are a lot of “holistic” clinics. Likely that is due to a lack of naturopathic licensing. Clearly naturopaths aim to change that, and, as in other states, they will not give up. I liken naturopaths to the Terminator paraphrasing Kyle Reese: They can’t be bargained with. They can’t be reasoned with. They don’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear (for medicine). And they absolutely will not stop… ever, until they are licensed (and medical standards are dead)!
44 replies on “Licensing naturopathic quackery in Mississippi: If at first you don’t succeed…”
Thank you for raising awareness of the slow but steady invasion of naturopaths. Interestingly enough, the George Washington University Center for
QuackeryIntegrative Medicine is staffed with a naturopath and offers treatment with the Biomat Amethyst.. The center’s web page suggests it is effective for 11 conditions, including cancer, dementia, and “Skin Purification”.Zofran is pretty amazing. It has kept my son attending school the last week and a half after severe ear infections took out both eardrums and left him deaf and with severe vertigo. (The hearing is beginning to return in one ear and should return in the other soon.) Because of school rules vomiting, even due to noninfectious causes, is a ticket home, but with Zofran he has been able to keep the nausea under control and attend class.
Do I really want to know what that is?
@eric #3:
Flensing. Got to get those last few stubborn PCBs out somehow.
I was more interested in how it might burn calories. Maybe ihat would be something to do with the way it generates ions, especially if plugged straight into the mains. After all, if the naturopath’s knowledge of electricity is anything like their knowledge of biology…
Yes. Zofran is great. Kept me from losing that much weight when I was sick. I don’t know numbers but I bet it saved a huge number of lives alone.
Politicians shouldn’t be trusted with deciding these kinds of issues. Proposed health legislation should first be vetted by Health Departments and professional associations and only the broadly supported bills then be considered further. Still no guarantee that weirdness won’t sneak through but may help slow the influx.
It drives me nuts that naturopaths can be given the status of licenced professionals. It gives them the state stamp of approval and everyone in my family thinks of them as doctors, especially capable to deal with difficult and chronic issues.
Again, minority opinion from those of us who aren’t in the medical trade. Having not taken the Hippocratic Oath, I’m allowed to think about unethical outcomes. One way to limit naturopaths in the far field is to let them slit their own throats: let them screw up in grand scale trying to ply care that they are not trained to handle. That’s a sure fire way to bring out the legislative pitchforks down the line.
I think that a big part of why all this garbage alternative medical care has become big now is because people have such soft lives in this country: they never see contagious childhood diseases and the standards of care for illnesses like cancer are so comparatively good that we really don’t see the level of mortality needed to respect where we came from. For most people, I think it’s necessary to eat bitter at some level in order to appreciate sweet. It’s easy for quacks to flourish in an environment where they can mask exactly how ineffective they are. However painful it is, a dose of perspective can be a good thing. The measles surging back in the Disneyland scare had a positive outcome.
@ Eric Lund:
Depends on *which* skin they’re talking about. ( I say as I duck from the shoe he just tossed)
At any rate, isn’t the dry brushing woo much easier and cheaper ?
More seriously, a few weeks ago, Sarah Silverman confessed that she is doing dry brushing ( I believe that it is to encourage toxins to leave the body through the skin or suchlike and lymph drainage) as instructed by Bill Maher.
So I thought- if it’s good enough for Sarah..
I gave it a try because I found a rather old clothes brush with bristles made from natural material ( but definitely not boar bristles- which stink to high heaven plus I wouldn’t rub piggy stuff on my skin) – which I used to use on the cat.
It really is not bad. You’re supposed to brush from the hands and feet towards the body ( as well as other actions I didn’t follow). I suppose it encourages circulation. I couldn’t imagine doing it every day – I already waste enough time preening.
I am not familiar with dry brushing, but at least with that one I can see a causal mechanism which could appear plausible to an educated layman: the brush removes layers of dead skin, allowing sweat glands to work more efficiently. There may or may not be anything to that mechanism, but it is at least not obviously false in the way homeopathy or reiki are. And it is indeed cheaper, because it doesn’t involve paying some huckster big bucks for supplements or office visits (or, all too frequently, both). But yes, it sounds like something that would make the morning get-ready-for-the-day ritual take longer, and lots of women (and men, for that matter) really don’t have time for it.
Nonetheless, given his track record, it’s not a good sign that Bill Maher advocates this.
So, would this bill allow naturopaths to write “medical” vaccine exemptions? Because there goes Mississippi’s heard immunity if they can!
One broken medical system destroying the competition, again, no matter how defective all may be. We as a country are literally going broke with MSM and hangers on. Not to worry about Obamacare is on the way out as designed, it is already monsterously unaffordable in some places.
This site seems to advocate a MAD policy
“”Monopolistically assured destruction”
Ultimately a larger group of individuals than one group of providers is going to have to take actions to change things. One has to be functional in multiple ways to participate effectively today.
From what I can read, experience and measure, some part of naturopathy can today enable better quality of life and longer lives than without it. At much lower cost.
A pox on both houses, for better systems of medicine to arise.
I am clearly certain all parties here have been through both rigorous training, medical and naturopathic schooling. And, but not limited to clinical studies from each. Both fields have their pros and cons. Personally food has healed my body more than a medication has (minus antibiotics). But honestly, to “cure” any disease or illness with western medicine requires you to take a drug every day and if you stop, it returns. End of story. There are good medications in the medical field as well. But return to last statement. Both fields can work together in harmony. Pick what you prefer and leave the other field alone. Everyone is hate hate bash bash if you don’t like it, don’t do it. Don’t go there. That’s it. You have a choice, along with everyone else. Stop putting the other party down just because you don’t agree. Thanks for the read.
prn, do naturopaths do surgery? Trauma? Radiology? Organ transplants? Vaccinate? Physical and occupational therapy? Speech therapy? Orthopedics?
You want to eliminate “mainstream medicine” and replace it with naturopathy (because it’s cheaper), but you have totally failed to address all the things that mainstream medicine do for us right now that naturopathy can’t do.
Something tells me that if offered a very cheap medical system that can’t do a single thing about trauma, the vast majority of people will tell you NO.
You might want to think that through again.
I wonder what approach an N(ot a) D(octor) would have taken for my endocarditis. Would he or she have had the knowledge/sense to have done an echocardiogram? Would that have led to the cardiac angiography and transesophageal echo that followed? Would I have had valve replacement done in a timely manner, if at all?
Or would I have been (mis)treated with water, hand waving, thinking good thoughts, flower sniffing, or other nonsense? Maybe they would have punched a hole in my chest to let the evil spirits out.
A naturopath is nothing more than a witch doctor in a lab coat. Worse, actually, because the witch doctor probably has never been exposed to scientific medicine or the science that it’s founded on.
@ ORD #13: I just had a vision of Dr. McCoy complaining about “stone knives and bear skins.”
When will real doctors associations perform a ferocious lobbying targeted at the Department of Education to remove naturopathy from the disciplines eligible for financial aid?
Wanna to kill the Hydra? Go for the carotid(s), press hard and witness the beast drop to ground for the count!
JT@13
You seem to miscategorize my answers. I’m unhappy with almost everybody as “behind” in some major ways. We have to shop for specific capabilities, to do better than std stats. Almost all services that I’ve bought are some stripe of MD, sometimes more akin to biochemically based ND stuff. We try to extend our informed medical choices on a more global basis than just los Estados Unidos, and corrupt EBM.
Some MSM organizations are clearly interfering with our informed choices and deliveries. We’ve had (potentially) life altering/threatening service and supply problems with availability a number of times, often due to fiat actions.
Std medicine alone just isn’t cutting it on hard, clearly satisfactory results.
@ Eric Lund, #9: Bill Mayer told Sarah Silverman that dry brushing is for exfoliation.
@ Myranda #12: You raise a common myth. On the contrary, there are numerous patients who have taken prescription medications for a time and were able to stop the drug without the disease returning. Going off the drug was conducted under physician care.
As for your statements, “I am clearly certain all parties here have been through both rigorous training, medical and naturopathic schooling. And, but not limited to clinical studies from each. Both fields have their pros and cons”, that’s not the case. However, I agree that both naturopaths and those in the field of science-based medicine “have their pros and cons”.
Informed by who?
Some people lie. There are several reasons they lie. Sometimes it’s because they have the wrong info, sometimes it’s because they are embarrassed to say they don’t know, sometimes it’s because they are evil sumbitches, and there are other reasons, but it happens.
How can I, just a regular old consumer of health services, know who to trust? Sure, you can say caveat emptor, and do your own research, but doesn’t it come down to trust?
And why should I trust you?
Really would you name any other, than an emergency procedure that can save a live? Conventional medicine kill a190,000 thousand peopla year, and those are just here, you invented HIV who kills nobody, but the medicine you made for it is at the culprit of all the deaths and complications in relation to that “HIV. MENTION ANYTHING THAT HAVE CAUSED SUCH MASSIVE DEATHS AS VIOXX MENTION ANY BENEFITS OF CHOLESTEROL DRUGS, MENTION ANY ASTHMA DRUG THAT IS BETTER THAN EPHEDRA. I AM POSITIVE SURE YOU CAN JUSTIFIED ALL THIS.
…Informed by who?
Conventional medical literature, often a little older or a little less thoroughly sponsored by megamarketing, that I can cross check with other independent papers, or even get consistent, in-range measured results myself.
And why should trust you ?
If you know me, because I have a good track record. But it doesn’t matter, you should be cautious for yourself.
The cutting question is why we should quietly allow anyone to interfere with me or my family in life altering or life or death situations with choices. Especially those that we do specifically accept responsibility for our outcomes and fate with some degree of capability and individual competence to make the final decision (think DNR, heart, cancer etc – non infectious for simplicity) ?
Right now, MSM has a terrible batting average around our house.
Scurvy on line 2.
Well, that’s pretty vague. Isn’t there a chakra target or something? If I’m going to be running a brush over my skin (and steam heat can make one itchy), I’d at least like to maximize the surface area.
myranda mentions a point I often hear with “…if you don’t like it, don’t do it. Don’t go there.”
The thing is, I don’t have a choice but to go there. My various governmental layers are having me provide at least some of the economic support for these things through the taxes I pay. I don’t want to support these things for I have every reason to conclude that they are bunk, but my support must go there nevertheless.
So, what are my options? I can’t really get away with paying my taxes by stipulating that the funds be earmarked only for things I approve of. Nor can I really get away with withholding them altogether. The only thing left, short of illegal plans and shenanigans, which I’m not even entertaining, is to push back through speech and legislation. Our inimitable host here is merely doing the same, but with an even better knowledge base than I can muster; not to mention a far more civil insolence than I would probably have in such a capacity.
As long as alternative medicine seeks legitimacy through governmental agencies and programs, there will be citizens expressing their justifiable concerns.
@ JustaTech #10:
One of the supporters of Naturoquacky who testified is an Arizona naturoquack named Sharon Stills has come out against flu shots and probably is anti-vaccine…as are most naturoquacks.
Currently in Mississippi, to obtain a vaccine exemption:
To request a medical exemption from one or more required vaccinations, the MSDH Medical Exemption Request (Form 139) must be completed and signed by the child’s pediatrician, family physician, or internist who is duly licensed in Mississippi. Children receiving specialized or tertiary care outside of the state may have medical exemption requests completed and signed by their tertiary care physician. Exemption from required immunizations for religious, philosophical, or conscientious reasons is not allowed under Mississippi law.. ( http://www.msdh.state.ms.us/msdhsite/_static/14,0,71,688.html )
I did look at the text of the HB725 bill that failed last year–it did not say anything about allowing naturoquackics being allowed to write vaccine exemptions. But once they are licensed in your state (as they are in mine (AZ), they love crawling out of their holes in the ground to express their anti-vaccine beliefs.
Geez, this Stills quack is a “Breast Cancer Expert”: http://thenatpath.com/natural-news/sharon-stills-talks-steps-for-breast-cancer-prevention-at-the-natural-cancer-prevention-summit/
No, Stills is a quack.
@ narad:
There’s ALWAYS a chakra involved..
but I didn’t do that part. It seems that they brush STARTING with the limbs and then proceed to the torso in order to effect some lymphatic voodoo.
It does exfoliate though.
see GOOP**- How to Dry Brush – and Why It’s So Potent
** Where else you expect it to be- in the Times?
As well as facilitating the spread of warts, I imagine.
And WHO would want that?
Panacea, you do know that DeForest Kelly’s epitaph is “I’m Dead, Jim.”
myranda wrote
It’s odd you say that just after saying you have used antibiotics – just one example of “western medicine” that presumably cured a disease or illness which did not return after you stopped taking it.
But let’s talk about those chronic conditions where that is, in fact true. Let’s say you are being treated for chronic hypertension. I presume* that a medical doctor would try to treat chronic hypertension with some mix of lifestyle changes , diet changes, and drugs, while a naturopath** would try to treat you with a combination of lifestyle changes, diet changes, supplements, herbal medicines, and possibly acupuncture or homeopathy. Let’s assume for the moment that both are able to treat your condition successfully (I don’t know that this is the case, but let’s assume that).
So – what happens if you stop following your doctor or naturopath’s advice?
* Not being a doctor myself, naturally, but based on what I see at mayoclinic.org.
** Based on what I see at naturopathic.org.
Add another vote for Zofran.
It came out while my son was on chemo for acute lymphocytic leukemia in 1990. We went from vomiting on the way home from his treatments to stopping at his favorite fast food restaurant for lunch. Because it was so expensive, the clinic and hospital did not want to stock it. We got it at our local hospital and brought it with us until they did.
Any state legislator who is considering licensing naturopaths should be reminded about what happened to the toddler in Canada, Ezekiel Stephan, and should read Britt Marie Hermes’ blog.
I wonder if Zofran could help me. I feel like throwing up from reading all these unfounded opinions of naturopathic DOCTORS and homeopathic medicine. My mother was a nurse but became of victim of the medical industry – operation after operation and prescription after prescription to offset the side effects of the previous one and none of them working. Her health improved when she finally found a German M.D. who used homeopathic medicine. Homeopathic medicine works. You can’t tell a baby it’s all in her head that chamomile drops stopped the teething pain or the colic, EVERY TIME. Then at age 13, when she is crying after breaking her elbow, and 15 minutes after a dose of arnica, is joking about it, we are supposed to explain it away as a placebo effect. Even though it required surgery to pin it together, Arnica kept her pain free whereas the Tylenol they gave her made her sick which they planned to offset with Gravol. When the nurse wasn’t looking we continued with the Arnica. I know you think she just believed really hard. When my husband and I had our wisdom teeth out, we took Arnica the whole day before and after. Neither of us had even the least bit of pain or swelling. Queen Elizabeth’s mother always carried her kit of homeopathic remedies with her and she lived to be over 100. My father is 90 and his only medicine is his cupboard full of vitamins. My children are 32 and 29 and have never taken an antibiotic for any illness in their lives. Vitamin C, and various homeopathic remedies worked every time. My son caught Whooping Cough at age 3 and woke up every hour with the choking cough, for about a week until we got homeopathic drops specially blended for whooping cough, The first bottle had Ipecac in it which pulls stuff up and the second contained expectorants. How do you tell a 3 year old that he should believe a few doses of his drops will stop his cough and let him sleep 7 hours from the first night on? Six of his friends who also had it were given antibiotics after which they got pneumonia. They each had a residual cough that lasted 6 months. My son was better in less than 2 weeks. You know nothing about the facts concerning Ezekiel Stephan. He was feeling a little sick but got better and then worse. A friend mentioned that it was possible it was meningitis and that’s all the media needed to know and they never changed their story even when it was proven he didn’t. The media is responsible for villifying these parents. There was no sign of meningitis in the autopsy report but the medical examiner was forbidden to present it in the court. His parents had phoned 911 and were told to phone back if his symptoms got worse which they did. The dispatcher sent an ambulance from the hospital which was 30 minutes away. (It was later discovered there was an ambulance only 5 minutes away.) To save time, Ezekiel’s parents met the ambulance part way. Because of cutbacks, the ambulance was not equipped with the proper size respirator. The paramedics were devastated and testified in the courtroom that they had been begging for this equipment. The Alberta government killed Ezekiel
Antoine Beauchamp is the scientist you need to research. He said “the germ is nothing; the terrain is everything.” Pasteur rejected his own germ theory before he died. Germs float around everywhere. They are circulating in and out of our bodies all the time. It is up to our army of T-cells and macrophages to eat up the bad guys. Antibiotics kill off our army and leave us vulnerable to the next virus floating around. Junk food, toxic air and water, heavy metals, petrochemicals, and stress, etc. make our immune system work harder. That’s where the antioxidants and vitamins play a huge part. Vitamins A, C, D, and E are 4 huge fighters, as are so many minerals, like zinc. Tumeric, garlic, limes, pomegranates, cinnamon, oregano, thyme and peppermint are all immune boosters. Hyppocrates is credited with being the father of medicine as a rational science and he said “Let food be thy medicine” and “First do no harm.” That sounds like a naturopath speaking. Almost every comment I read on this post exudes arrogance, intolerance, and narrow-minded rigidity and condescending insolence that is not all respectful.
@ Linda Marek:
When someone trained as a naturopath tells us that naturopathic training is a farce, it’s a farce.
Homeopathy is a hoax. Teething pain gets better all by itself. Colic gets better all by itself. A placebo given for pain works about half as well as morphine if the recipient believes he’s getting morphine. The cough from pertussis may last as little as one week. None of your anecdotes prove homeopathy does anything beyond the placebo effect from your believing it helps.
Ezekiel Stephan was moribund when his parents finally decided to get him real medical treatment. Despite the absence of the ideal equipment on the ambulance, the EMS crew kept him alive on the way to the hospital. The medical examiner did indeed produce a report and that was presented in court. He testified that Ezekiel was brain dead when EMS got to him. The autopsy also included evidence that Ezekiel had Hemophilus influenzae, which is vaccine preventable.
The naturopath that was involved in the case did not even examine the child, but if she had done so she had no training that would have qualified her to diagnose and treat meningitis.
http://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2016/03/naturopaths-restricted-treating-children-heres.html
By the way, Pasteur did not “reject his own germ theory” and Béchamp was just wrong about germs. The “terrain” matters, but it is not “everything”.
You missed out on a prime majuscule opportunity there.
I learned a new word, Narad. Thanks!
He didn’t say that in any of his surviving writings, though, and the quote remains an attribution. He did, however, admit that over two thirds of his patients died.
You think he still sounds like a naturopath?
Was the Bullshit Shop where Linda Marek buys her lies and fabrications having a Two-for-the-price-of-one special?
I never met Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon, Queen Dowager, but if the stories are to be believed, then
1. She never carried anything bigger than her reticule. She had staff for that.
2. The nearest she came to homeopathy was when she decided on the amount of tonic to dilute her gin.
No-one told me that Linda was organising a game of Bullshit Bingo.
If I were Linda Marek, I would take back a few of these fraudulent inventions and see if the shop could give me paragraph breaks in exchange.
A series of new posts in a dormant thread is an infallible indication that it has been revived by someone engaged in loonbaggery.
Those who are fond of selective quotes from Hippocrates tend to ignore some real beauts from the Master, such as “A physician without a knowledge of Astrology has no right to call himself a physician.” Or one of my personal favorites, wherein Hippocrates claims hysteria is caused by a “wandering womb” and that maidens with hysteria are cured by marriage.
The Hippo sometimes fell down when it came to rational thought.
@ SuzyQ2016
Linda Marek’s reference to “no sign of meningitis in the autopsy report but the medical examiner was forbidden to present it in the court.” in the Stephan case is not the Crown’s ME, but defense ‘expert witness’ Annie Sauvageau, disgraced former ME of Alberta. She did get to testify with her opinion on the autopsy, but some supporting material or something was excluded by the Court, and this is the subject of an appeal by the Stephans.
The Stephan case has minimal relevance to the licensing of naturopaths. The parents are part of a family of despicable ‘health supplement’ scam artists, and relied on their own Truehope products to treat their son. They rejected, as a matter of course, any and all health care professionals, including naturopaths. Most of the reporting and commentary on the role of ND Tracey Tannis is simply false, stemming from ambiguous or mistaken language in the physicians and RCMP reports of what Collet Stephan said at the hospital.
Once Collet became aware of the possibility of meningitis, and while David was off at work at Truehope, she went “off the reservation” a bit in search of a non-Truehope product to ‘boost Ezekiel’s immune’. Her Googling led her to ‘Blast’, and she phoned Lethbridge Naturopathc to confirm they carried it. The day Ezekiel became brain dead, the Stephans drove into Lethbridge to see their lawyer, bringing Ezekiel along, no doubt since they didn’t want to leave the struggling toddler alone. They were in no hurry to get further treatment for him, and had no intention of having him examined by anyone. On their way home, they stopped briefly at Lethbridge Naturopathic, and Collet popped in and picked up the Blast, without telling anyone that Ezekiel was outside in the car.
Tracey Tannis testified that she has no competence to deal with meningitis, and instructed her receptionist to tell the unidentified woman on the phone who mentioned the possibility of meningitis to take her child to the ER immediately. Regardless of whether she’s shading the truth or not, there is now question whatsoever that she had no influence whatsoever in how the Stephans did or did not treat Ezekiel.
Please do not quote old articles or posts back here in some attempt at contradiction. What I have written is all substantiated by court documents that have been made public since then,
Also, please understand I am as opposed to naturopathy and its licensing as anyone. What we need to oppose it well is systematic evidence, of which there should be more than enough. Even if Tannis had told innocent parents that she thought their sick child merely had croup and needed nothing more than an ‘immune booster’ like Blast (which is clearly NOT what happened) that would only be one act of mis-diagnosis by one practitioner. Using ginned-up vilification of her role in the preventable death of a cute toddler as an anecdotal, emotional scare appeal against naturopathy is totally unworthy of science. As bad as naturopathy is, Truehope is orders of magnitudes worse. Ezekiel’s death is a Truehope story all the way, and absolutely representative of how Truehope operates, and the dangers it represents to its many customers. That this has been largely buried in all the misplaced attention on one naturopath is truly disturbing.
@ sadmar:
I know about Sauvageau, but she was not the medical examiner who actually did the autopsy, and Linda did not specify Sauvageau, That makes her statement in her post misleading.
The fact remains that Tannis provided a product (I refuse to call it a medication) without seeing a young child. If a medical doctor in the US did that and the patient died he would be looking at a multimillion dollar lawsuit.
Tannis’s employee stated that Tannis told her to prepare the “Blast” for Ezekiel. I find it kind of hard to believe that if you talked on the telephone to a mother with a sick child about Blast and told her to take that child to the ER, then a mother pops in shortly afterward to pick up Blast for a sick child, that anyone with a brain would not think to ask if this is the mother who was told to take her child to the ER.
The blame for Ezekiel’s death clearly lies with his parents. I do not think that there is “misplaced attention” on the naturopath. The case serves to also focus on the fact that naturopaths should not treat children and should not treat anyone without seeing the person first. This is not just a problem with Tannis. It’s a systematic problem with naturopathy.