On Aug 8, 2006, at 10:37 AM, ravi wrote:
> What you are talking about above is a result that may demonstrate that
> professional-racket medicine is more successful than hippie-
> medicine and
> placebos. Well, if so, why not? Billions are spent on
> professional-racket medicine, not to forget (as I mentioned), that
> professional-racket medicine borrows at will (and to enormous profit)
> from hippie-medicine (tribal remedies, ayurveda, etc). One would
> expect
> it to show better results.
Life expectancies continue to lengthen, people are healthier than ever (despite getting fatter), cancer survival rates are up. If that's not success, what is?
It'd be great to separate the money from the science in medicine, esp in the US, where it is indeed a racket. But the hippie stuff isn't much different. I recall some quack diagnosing my father with a cytomegalovirus infection - which is a pretty safe bet, since CMV is ubiquitous - and prescribing $100 infusions of vitamin C as a cure. Fortunately, he didn't bite. People like Gary Null are hardly exempt from the moneymaking trait.
And I don't doubt there are some useful remedies in the natural armamentarium. But they should be tested rigorously like this NIH program is doing. And the results are pretty often not what the hippies would expect - which I'm sure won't dilute their fervor, since they'll just see the NIH as a front for orthodox medicine.
Doug