一个医学叛逆者的自白: 西医是一场百年骗局
发布: 2011-12-02 10:22
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http://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Medical-Heretic-Robert-Mendelsohn/dp/0809241315
Confessions of a Medical Heretic
Robert S. Mendelsohn, M.D., 1979
Numbers in brackets correspond with page numbers in theWarner Books Edition, 1980.
Non Credo
[11] I do not believe in Modern Medicine. I am a medicalheretic. My aim in this book is to persuade you to become a heretic, too. Ihaven't always been a medical heretic. I once believed in Modern Medicine. Inmedical school, I failed to look deeply into a study that was going on aroundme, of the effects of the hormone DES -- because I believed. Who could havesuspected that twenty years later we would discover that DES causes vaginalcancer and genital abnormalities in children born to women receiving the drugduring pregnancy?
I confess that I failed to be suspicious of oxygentherapy for premature infants, even though the best equipped and most advanced[12] premature nurseries had an incidence of partial or total blindness ofaround ninety percent of all low birth weight infants. A few miles away in alarge, less "advanced" hospital, the incidence of this condition --retrolental fibroplasia -- was less than ten percent. I asked my professors inmedical school to explain the difference. And I believed them when they saidthe doctors in the poorer hospital just didn't know how to make the correctdiagnosis.
A year or two later it was proved that the cause ofretrolental fibroplasia was the high concentrations of oxygen administered tothe premies. The affluent medical centers had higher rates of blinding simplybecause they could afford the very best nursery equipment: the most expensiveand modern plastic incubators which guaranteed that all the oxygen pumped inreached the infant. At the poorer nurseries, however, old-fashioned incubalorswere used. They looked like bathtubs with very loose metal lids. They were soleaky that it made very little difference how much oxygen was pumped in: notenough reached the infant to blind it.
I still believed when I took part in a scientific paperon the use of the antibiotic Terramycin in treating respiratory conditions inpremature babies. We claimed there were no side effects. Of course thereweren't. We didn't wait long enough to find out that not only didn't Terramycin-- or any other antibiotic -- do much good for these infections, but that it --and other tetracycline antibiotics -- left [13] thousands of children withyellow-green teeth and tetracyeline deposits in their bones.
And I confess that I believed in the irradiation oftonsils, lymph nodes, and the thymus gland. I believed my professors when theysaid that of course radiation was dangerous, but that the doses we were usingwere absolutely harmless.
Years later around the time we found out that the"absolutely harmless" radiation sown a decade or two before was nowreaping a harvest of thyroid tumors -- I couldn't heip wondering when some ofmy former patients came back with nodules on their thyroids: Why are you comingback to me? To me, who did this toyou in the first place?
But I no longer believe in Modern Medicine.
I believe that despite all the super technology and elitebedside manner that's supposed to make you feel about as well cared for as anastronaut on the way to the moon, the greatest danger to your health is thedoctor who practices Modern Medicine.
I believe that Modern Medicine's treatments for diseaseare seldom effective, and that they're often more dangerous than the diseasesthey're designed to treat.
I believe the dangers are compounded by the widespreaduse of dangerous procedures for non-diseases.
I believe that more than ninety percent of ModernMedicine could disappear from the face of the earth -- doctors, hospitals,drugs, [14] and equipment -- and the effect on our health would be immediateand beneficial.
I believe that Modern Medicine has gone too far, by usingin everyday situations extreme treatments designed for critical conditions.
Every minute of every day Modern Medicine goes too far,because Modern Medicine prides itselfon going too far. A recent article, "Cleveland's Marvelous MedicalFactory," boasted of the Cleveland Clinic's "accomplishments lastyear: 2,980 open-heart operations, 1.3 million laboratory tests, 73,320electrocardiograms, 7,770 full-body x-ray scans, 24,368 surgicalprocedures."
Not one of these procedures has been proved to have theleast little bit to do with maintaining or restoring health. And the article,which was published in the ClevelandClinic's magazine, fails to boast or even mention that any people were helpedby any of this expensive extravagance. That's because the product of thisfactory is not health at all.
So when you go to the doctor, you're seen not as a personwho needs help with his or her health, but as a potential market for themedical factory's products.
If you are pregnant, you go to the doctor and he treatsyou as if you're sick. Childbirth is a nine-month disease which must betreated, so you're sold on intravenous fluid bags, fetal monitors, a host ofdrugs, the totally unnecessary episiotomy, and -- the top of the line product-- the Caesarean delivery!
[15] If you make the mistake of going to the doctor witha cold or the flu he's liable to give you antibiotics, which are not onlypowerless against colds and flu but which leave you more likely to come downwith worse problems.
If your child is a little too peppy for his teacher tohandle, your doctor may go too far and turn him into a drug dependent.
If your new baby goes off his or her feed for a day anddoesn't gain weight as fast as the doctor's manual says, he might barrage yourbreast-feeding with drugs to halt the natural process and make room in thebaby's tummy for man-made formula, which is dangerous.
If your are foolish enough to make that yearly visit forthe routine examination, the receptionist's petulance, the other patients'cigarette smoke, or the doctor's very presence could raise your blood pressureenough so that you won't go home empty-handed. Another life "saved"by anti-hypertensive drugs. Another sex life down the drain, since more impotenceis caused by drug therapy than by psychological problems.
If you're unfortunate enough to be near a hospital whenyour last days on earth approach, your doctor will make sure your $500-a-daydeathbed has all the latest electronic gear with a staff of strangers to hearyour last words. But since those strangers are paid to keep your family awayfrom you, you won't have anything to say. Your last sounds will be theelectronic whistle on the cardiogram. Your relatives will participate: they'llpay the bill.
[16] No wonder children are afraid of doctors. They know!Their instincts for real danger are uncorrupted. Fear seldom actuallydisappears. Adults are afraid, too. But they don't admit it, even tothemselves. What happens is we become afraid of something else. We learn tofear not the doctor but what brings us to the doctor in the first place: ourbody and its natural processes.
When you fear something, you avoid it. You ignore it. Youshy away from it. You pretend it doesn't exist. You let someone else worryabout it This is how the doctor takes over. We let him. We say: I don't want tohave anything to do with this, my body and its problems, doc. You take care ofit, doc. Do what you have to do.
So the doctor does.
When doctors are criticized for not telllng their patientsabout the side effects of the drugs they prescribe, they defend themselves onthe grounds that the doctor-patient relatlonship would suffer from suchhonesty. That defense implies that the doctor-patient relationship is based onsomething other than knowledge. It's based on faith.
We don't say we know our doctors are good we say we havefaith in them. We trust them.
Don't think doctors aren't aware of the difference. Anddon't believe for a minute that they don't play it for all it's worth. Becausewhat's at stake is the whole ball game, the whole ninety percent or more ofModern [17] Medicine that we don't need, that, as a matter of fact is out tokill us.
Modern Medicine can't survive without our faith, becauseModern Medicine is neither an art nor a science. It's a religion.
One definition of religion identifies it as any organizedeffort to deal with puzzling or mysterious things we see going on in and aroundus. The Church of Modern Medicine dealswith the most puzzling phenomena: birth, death, and all the tricks our bodiesplay on us -- and we on them -- in between. In "The Golden Bough,"religion is defined as the attempt to gain the favor of "powers superiorto man which are believed io direct and control the course of nature and ofhuman life."
If people don't spend billions of dollars on the Church of Modern Medicine in order to gain favorwith the powers that direct and control human life, what do they spend it on?
Common to all religions is the claim that reality is notlimited to or dependent upon what can be seen, heard, felt, tasted or smelled.You can easily test modern medical religion on this characteristic by simplyasking your doctor Why? enough times. Why are you prescribing this drug? Why isthis operation going to do me any good? Why do I have to do that? Why do youhave to do that to me?
Just ask why? enough times and sooner or later you'llreach the Chasm of Faith. Your doctor will retreat into the fact that you haveno way of knowing or understanding all the [18] wonders he has at his command.Just trust me.
You've just had your first lesson in medical heresy.Lesson Number Two is that if a doctor ever wants to do something to you thatyou're afraid of and you ask why? enough times until he says Just Trust Me,what you're to do is turn around and put as much distance between you and himas you can, as fast as your condition will allow.
Unfortuately, very few people do that. They submit. Theyallow their fear of the witch doctor's mask, the unknown spirit behind it, andthe mystery of what is happening and of what will happen to change intorespectful awe of the whole show.
But you don't have to let the witch doctor have his way.You can liberate yourself from Modern Medicine -- and it doesn't mean you'llhave to take chances with your health. In fact, you'll be taking less of achance with your health, because there's no more dangerous activity thanwalking into a doctor's office, clinic or hospital unprepared. And by preparedI don't mean having your insurance forms filled out. I mean you have to get inand out alive and accomplish your mission. For that, you need appropriatetools, skills, and cunning.
The first tool you must have is knowledge of the enemy.Once you understand Modern Medicine as a religion, you can fight it and defendyourself much more effectively than when you think you're fighting an art or ascience. Of course, the Church of Modern [19] Medicinenever calls itself a church. You'll never see a medical building dedicated tothe religion of medicine, always the medical arts, or medical science.
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