Claytons Vaccines, Claytons Protection

This article was originally presented on National Radio’s Sunday Supplement

Be wary of “the health professional you see most often”. In some cases be afraid, be very afraid.

Why? Well in some cases, the advice you get from your friendly pharmacist could be deadly.

I try to ignore the herbs of dubious quality, the effusive claims for magnetic bracelets, the offers to feel my feet to see what ails me – all those things which seem a core part of pharmacy stock and trade. I do wonder about the business and medical ethics. After all, what’s worse – a pharmacist who apparently can’t distinguish between tested, regulated medicines and the hope and hokum variety; or the pharmacist who does know and doesn’t care because such stuff sells?

But the whole sorry state of that industry took a chilling turn recently with the report of an Auckland pharmacy selling a homeopathic meningococcal vaccine.

Many homeopaths would argue that the 300-year-old practice of diluting substances into infinitesimal amounts is akin to taking a vaccine. “Like cures like” as they say. What they don’t say is that the massive dilutions they use would require you to drink almost 8,000 gallons of homeopathic solution to get just one molecule of any medicinal substance involved.

You can pay a hefty price for this diluted water, but you can pay a much bigger price if you use it in place of stuff that actually works.

The Council of the Faculty of Homeopathy, the registered organisation for UK doctors qualified in homeopathy, recommends immunisation with conventional vaccines. As GPs, they know you ignore real vaccination at your peril. It’s a pertinent warning here when we’re considering a large-scale vaccination programme against meningitis.

Small wonder that the head of our Health Ministry’s meningococcal vaccine strategy was concerned about the sale of homeopathic vaccines, warning in a Herald article that it could give people a false sense of security.

However, I think the real false sense of security comes from the hopeful notion that we have some legislative protection from purveyors of such patently misleading products. There’s no protection under the Medicines Act it seems, for the Health Ministry’s compliance team leader Peter Pratt noted in the same Herald item that such preparations are permissible so long as they were “sufficiently diluted”.

Yet it’s the dilution that make this approach to vaccination so dubious in the first place, and not just to the skeptical. Alternative practitioner and homeopath Dr Dominik Marsiello states unequivocally that “there is no such thing as a homeopathic vaccine”. He goes on to acknowledge that “homeopathic remedies are too dilute to stimulate an immune response and confer immunity. There is no basis, historically or scientifically, for such a practice.”

Yet we have bottles of water labelled “meningococcal vaccine” and “hepatitis B vaccine” in our pharmacies, sold by health professionals, as a protection against these terrible diseases. Some apologists have said that “vaccine” in this case actually means “immune booster”. But “vaccine” has a specific meaning – it’s something which confers immunity through the production of antibodies. This is an easily testable claim, but apparently not one our Ministry of Health considers worth bothering about.

I shouldn’t be too surprised. After all, last time concerns were raised about a comparable product, our Commerce Commission – the organisation charged with protecting us from fraudulent claims – passed the buck to the Ministry of Health, saying it was a health issue. The health ministry, in turn, washed its hands of the business saying that “water is not a medicine”, thus it had nothing to do with them.

Contrast this with the activities of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, their state Health Care Complaints Commissions, their Fair Trading Ministers, and the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration. They are taking an increasing interest in those areas where bogus medicines, fraudulent claims and consumer rights intersect. The TGA took a very dim view of having a fake vaccine on the Australian market, banning it and warning consumers. And the New South Wales Fair Trading Minister referred to the earlier incident where people were paying a 400,000 percent mark-up on a small bottle of water as “a New Age spin on an old-fashioned rip-off”.

Strong words, but ones which need to be said, and said loudly. I know of one New Zealand baby dead of meningitis because homeopathic treatment was chosen over real medicine. I don’t want to see any more. I just wish our Health Ministry felt the same.

Good Company

What name do you give to a quirky bunch of people who are scientifically literate, who question fads, and who want their beliefs to rest on evidence from the material world — the sort of evidence that does not require one to ignore or reject all the laws of physics and other knowledge we have and that we rely on daily when flying, taking antibiotics or using the computer?

The group’s shortened name is the New Zealand Skeptics and in September in Christchurch they held their annual conference. What a delightful and idiosyncratic event this was, not least because there are so few lawyers in this group. I spend my professional life training would-be lawyers and writing articles for lawyers and other legal academics. You might think lawyers are instinctively sceptical. But actually, they’re not. They’re trained to take authorities — statutes, the decisions of judges — largely at face value. Yes, lawyers get very good at undermining certainty, at injecting doubt into the clearest of statutory provisions. But that is a different mindset than what one finds at the annual Skeptics conference.

This year, there was a host of interesting papers delivered. An academic from Canterbury University rubbished the trendy acceptance by some — under the false guise of being open-minded-of the possibility of psychic and paranormal knowledge. In fact, not one single police department in the US has found police psychics to be useful; only two or three out of nearly 500 National Enquirer predictions came true in the last dozen years or so; and not one single reproducible ESP phenomenon has ever been recorded, despite a huge reward being on offer to anyone who can demonstrate (that’s the key word) such powers.

Not really a surprise though, once you realise that if it were true, you’d have to jettison or re-write all we know about the physical laws underlying our understanding of the universe, knowledge that has doubled life expectancy in the past century, led to untold material advances and helped lift huge numbers of people out of poverty. The same sort of mindset was brought to bear in papers on organics (vastly over-rated), herbal medicine (how do you spell “placebo”?) and “biodynamic” approaches to eradicating the painted apple moth, just to name three. But two of the talks at the conference cry out for special mention, and praise.

The first was a talk on the Liam Williams-Holloway case. This included the chance to see the Australian 60 Minutes segment which broadcasters here have refused to televise. The most memorable line from that segment came from one of the alternative medicine practitioners: “All we care about is the wealth of our patients – I mean health.” That whole sorry and saddening episode casts a cloud over a good many people, and leads me to wonder why the parents of Liam have not been charged with a criminal offence.

Finally, I must mention the talk given at the conference by Lynley Hood, author of the prize-winning book A City Possessed: The Christchurch Civic Creche Case. If anyone out there thinks Peter Ellis should have been convicted, or still thinks he is undeserving of a pardon, that person should read this book. (See this month’s lead article –ed.)

I’d like to see a Commission of Inquiry headed by a tough-minded overseas judge — maybe the English judge who, in the height of a similar hysteria over there, acquitted two similarly placed crèche workers who have just won a big defamation case.

But if you think that’s likely to happen here in New Zealand, if you think the vested interests might break ranks, you need a good dose of scepticism.

Forum

Ritalin and ADHD

Professor JS Werry deserves thanks for his contribution in these pages regarding the present use/abuse of methylphenidate (Ritalin) and ADHD.

Despite the Professor’s reassurances regarding the reality of ADHD, I’m afraid I remain an unconvinced sceptic.

Perhaps Professor Werry could explain where ADHD comes from. It certainly wasn’t a feature of our lives in the fifties and sixties, and now millions of young children worldwide, many of them under 10, are being treated for many years of their lives with a powerful amphetamine-like drug for a “non-disease” epidemic.

Time magazine in its (admittedly dated) July 18, 1994 cover story reported that many European countries, notably France and England, have only 1/10 as many ADHD cases as the USA. Japan seems to have little experience of ADHD at all – yet it has been termed “the educational disorder of the 1990s.” The USA has experienced a four-fold increase in ADHD since 1990.

Contrary to Professor Werry’s assurances, academics are by no means united over ADHD and its treatment with methylphenidate/Ritalin. Indeed, an increasing number of professionals decry this alarming and controversial trend of labelling children with this psychiatric condition.

One of the dissenters is Thomas Armstrong, Ph.D., former special education teacher and author of The Myth of the ADD Child. Armstrong strongly questions the rush to label a child having problems in school as “ADHD.” He asks how ADHD can be a “mental disorder” when its symptoms are so selectively displayed – for example when an ADHD child is internally motivated to focus – as when deeply engrossed in a video game – the inability to pay attention is apparently not present.

I would be very interested to find out whether a diagnosis of ADHD at an early age has any bearing on later youth suicide, whether ADHD children are more or less likely to come from a dysfunctional family background, and the reason for the apparent prevalence of ADHD in some countries and not others. The overwhelming preponderance of young males in the statistics is also of concern.

Mike Houlding, Mt Maunganui

Possum Peppering

Perhaps John Welch is a little unfair to the Green Party when he condemns them for claiming that burnt possum testicles deter possums from eating vegetation. As a doctor, he will know that removing testicles not only annoys the possum, but also reduces its chances of reproduction.

The Green Party does not go far enough. If they would guarantee to remove every testicle from every possum in this country, they would certainly get my vote. the whole exercise would give relief to our forests, and possibly also to the female possums, who in one possum generation would die childless but lonely. (Abridged.)

David L Smith, Titirangi

Forum

Children & Quackery

It is hard to be sure what Mike Houlding is on about in his rather opaque letter but I gather that he is lumping the use of clairvoyants, homoeopathic remedies and ADHD under some collective rubric of quackery.

He seems to be some kind of medical practitioner in which case he should have received or known about the Ministry of Health’s publication on ADHD – its diagnosis and treatment published in August last year (available on the web under MOH publications). This publication, which is an evidential distillate of knowledge in the area shows first of all, that ADHD is a bona fide medical taxon that requires the same kind of professional diagnosis as does any other disorder in medicine and second, that its treatment with methylphenidate (which he calls Ritalin despite the fact that Pharmac no longer pays for that brand name) has more support in terms of efficacy and safety than many other treatments in medicine. The publication also sets out the standards by which this treatment is to be used and its effect monitored.

I take strong exception to his comment lumping the diagnosis and stimulant treatment of ADHD as “institutionalized child abuse”. This does little credit to the 40 years systematic research in the disorder and the care with which most medical specialists in paediatrics and child psychiatry in NZ take with children so affected.

If Houlding is a medical professional, then he needs to take some time properly to inform himself about this topic than shooting from the hip without the benefit of any intervening cognition.

JS Werry, Emeritus Professor, Child and Youth Psychiatrist

Global Warming

Pious thoughts from wise fools, by P J O’Rourke

Mom says, “Global warming or no global warming, it’s still winter. Wear a hat.”

Robin Capper

Two Views of the World Trade Centre Attack

  1. From Editorial in ‘Skeptical Inquirer’ Jan/Feb, 2002.
    Brian Farha, a professor of education at Oklahoma City University and member of CSICOP’s astrology sub-committee, wrote to me to propose we run a Forum column with this introduction: “Following are detailed summaries of documented psychic predictions-to this author’s knowledge-regarding the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on America.” That would be followed by a blank page.

  2. From the newsletter of the American Society for Psychical Research, December, 2001.
    Through our website, we have initiated a survey of pre-cognitive experiences specifically related to the terrorist attack.

Submitted without comment by Bernard Howard.

Not quite hot off the press

Three or four years ago Ralph Marinelli, a researcher at the Rudolf Steiner Research Institute in Michigan, made a great discovery. The heart is not a pump. Blood is self-propulsive, energised by the primary force of cosmic levity it is self-levitating. Scientists have been confused by mis-understanding the concept of centrifugal force. The research institute is very concerned that this major development in physiology has been almost totally ignored. If anybody can channel William Harvey [1578-1657] it would be very interesting to get his comments.
Jim Ring

Dummy pills just the trick

Dummy pills just the trick

The best paper in New Zealand (Waikato Times, May 6 – and it’s got nothing to do with the fact that I work there) reports that depressed patients tricked into thinking they are being treated have undergone healing brain changes.

The discovery is “conclusive proof of the power of the ‘placebo effect’ – the mind-over-body influence of believing that a drug will work.”

Scientists at the University of Texas, San Antonio say patients given a dummy pill experienced brain changes remarkably like those attained by taking Prozac.

World’s biggest ghost hunt

Hertfordshire’s Dr Richard Wiseman involved 250 volunteers and an array of hi-tech equipment in what became the world’s biggest ghost hunt, according to the Guinness Book of World Records.

The Evening Post (March 3) says despite a number of creepy tales from volunteers, no definite proof of the supernatural was found during the experiment conducted in Edinburgh early last year. Wiseman said it was truly fascinating but “…none of the stories convinced me ghosts exist … I used to be a magician and I saw how easily people could be tricked.”

The tour guide who worked in the underground vaults of the 18th Century chamber, was in no doubt of the presence of ghosts, the paper said. These included a little boy, a dog and “the spectre of a nasty man who whispers obscenities in people’s ears.

“He has foul, stinky breath and he’s really horrible … The vaults … have been closed for 180 years so I think all that paranormal energy has been bottled up and is only just now being released.”

Maybe the tour guide needs Scooby Doo to deal with the wee doggie.

Measles epidemic hits anti-vaccine town

A measles epidemic involving 700 children that ravaged a small German town is being blamed on two homeopathic doctors who denounced the MMR vaccine, says the Dominion on March 7.

Debate on the merits of the vaccine is reaching fever pitch and 30 children had been admitted to hospital where there were fears there could be deaths.

On one side are “alternative health enthusiasts” who dominate Coburg, an affluent Bavarian town. Two of the town’s seven child health doctors fiercely oppose MMR. And then there are the public health experts, who “accuse a ‘nest’ of militant anti-MMR activists … of putting children’s lives in danger.”

Germany, the paper reports, is becoming famous as a world leader in “exporting measles”, according to leading specialists.

Dr Helmut Weiss, head of the state health office in Colburg, said the stronghold of the epidemic was the Waldorf School.

He’s at it again

And the Evening Post (April 13) informs us that psychic Uri Geller is to look for the site of the battle featured in the movie Braveheart.

The “paranormal expert” has been called in by historian John Walker, to try to pinpoint the exact location of the Battle of Falkirk which was fought between King Edward I of England and William Wallace, in 1298. The location has been lost, and no bodies or artefacts ever found.

Mr Walker stumbled on to Uri Geller while on the internet one evening, and read how he’d helped discover the location of a wrecked submarine. Since, he said, conventional methods to discover the graves of the combatants had failed, “… we need to try the unconventional.”

And Mr Geller said the battle was mysterious. “…the fact that very little was found could mean they have not been looking in the right place for the site.”

As they say, watch this space. And, by the way, William Wallace was not a homespun-wearing, oatmeal-eating fighting man of the glens as depicted in that movie, but grew up in a genteel manor house where he probably had very good table manners. So there.

Forum

More Brocken sightings

I enjoyed Jim Ring’s “the Spectre of Kahurangi” (Autumn 2001). In Kahurangi National Park there is a bridge called “Brocken Bridge”, quite close to Ghost Creek. Could this be an indication of supernatural forces emanating from this enchanting region?

As a NZFS park ranger there for two years, I discovered a more prosaic explanation, at least for the bridge. It seems that someone stampeded a herd of cattle on to the old bridge during a flood, and the cattle – and bridge – were lost in the floodwaters. The name then became “Broken Bridge”. We Forest Service staff were not renowned for our literary skills, and various track junctions started sprouting signs saying “Brocken Bridge”.

Rather disappointing, really.

Piers Maclaren

Homoeopathy test?

As a result of an accident on State Highway One recently a quantity of rat poison was tipped into the sea near Kaikoura. At first sight this seemed to me to be Mother Nature setting up a large-scale test of homoeopathy. My reasoning was as follows: we have a poison diluted with an enormous volume of water (tides are strong and the sea very deep off the Kaikoura coast), and we have succussion (see the surf breaking over the rocks). The rat poison, brodifacoum, like the better known warfarin, is an anti-coagulant, causing death by extensive bleeding. So, by homoeopathic principles, a very high dilution should have the opposite effect, causing strokes and heart failure among the seals, dolphins and whales, brought on by clottability of their blood.

I could see that measuring this effect could be difficult, but I persisted with my calculations. Sadly, I abandoned the project, chiefly because the concentration of rat poison in the sea turned out to be far too high. The amount of material dumped in the sea, 18 tonnes, was quite large, and even allowing for only a low proportion of active ingredient in the bait, and assuming it to have been instantly and uniformly dispersed in deep water of some thousands of square kilometres in area, the final concentration was in the order of one molecule of poison in ten litres of sea. This is, of course, far too high for homoeopathic work, where concentrations of one molecule in a volume equal to that of the Earth are normal. Regretfully, I shall not be issuing an invitation to marine mammals to volunteer for a study of the after-effects of this accident.

Bernard Howard

Sensitive Issues

In the last issue of the Skeptic (Autumn 2001), I quoted the reaction of the Commissioner for Children, Roger McClay, to the news of Liam Williams-Holloways death:

“Whether a different course of action would have been better, there’s not much point in worrying about it now.”

That response troubled me as it seemed so out of character, so I rang the office and asked Mr McClay about it. It seems that news of Liam’s death was sprung on Mr McClay while he was at a conference and he was asked to comment on the spot. The news upset him but he didn’t think it appropriate to take the family to task at that time, and this was the result.

The question now is, having had time to think about the implications of the whole saga, what will the office’s/commissioner’s response be next time? We’ll get a chance to find out at this year’s conference when an advocate from the Office will be speaking, so come to Hamilton with your own questions!

Vicki Hyde

Rebirth of Quackery

G B Shaw once said that the only difference between animals and humans was that humans like taking pills. It’s clear things haven’t changed since his time when you visit a library and see the number of books on how to be healthy.

Many quack medicine producers have made their money here out of our gullibles and have moved on. Bowel cleansers, hair restorers, nail hardeners, bust developers and fat loss treatments to name a few.

As one example, Black strap molasses’s only virtue was that due to insoluble matter it acted as a bowel irritant with laxative results. Now if you have a lot of molasses left over from sugar refining, use it to make rum or stock lick and get rid of the rest as a good health supplement.

When deer lose their antlers in the wild they recycle them, but when farmed the antler is a dangerous weapon so they are removed at the velvet stage. Now because the Chinese have used them for medicine for thousands of years there is money to be made out of this by-product.

Bee keepers and retired politicians are extolling the benefits of pollen, bee venom and propolis. Their claims for vitamin, mineral and amino acid content are way over the top. All the bee venom rubs which claim to be the panacea of all our skeletal and muscular remedies have added counter irritants which give the impression that this wonder of bee venom is being absorbed, which fortunately it is not. Finally, we come to propolis, bee glue, a dark brown resinous substance collected by the bee from trees. This phenolic resin is used to seal the hive and retain warmth, the antispetic properties of the resin will have some effect in keeping the bacterial integrity of the hive intact.

These are but a few of the nonsense claims to which we could add, electrical devices, magnets, emu oil, homeopathics and a plethora of herbals. If proof of efficacy could be established then such items would be added to the orthodox medicinal armoury. Meanwhile remember “ashes to ashes and dust to dust, if the liquor don’t get you the free radicals must”.

Alan Pickmere, retired pharmacist

Hokum Locum

Recently returned from a posting in Saudi Arabia and now suffering from a cold and a bleeding nose, John Welch continues his column on medical matters.

Dilutions of Grandeur

As a Fellow of the Royal NZ College of General Practitioners (it came in the cornflakes) I receive a regular copy of their journal, the NZ Family Physician. There are some good contributions but I find it irritating to see reviews of homeopathy studies appearing in what should be a serious and scientifically based journal. In Vol 27 Issue 5, a study is reviewed in which mice were given nux vomica 30c, 200c and 1000c. 30c means that the “active” substance has been diluted 10 to the power 30 times. A mole of a substance contains about 10 to the power 24 atoms (Avogadro’s number) and this means that the 10-30 dilution is extremely unlikely to contain any active material. This is the main failing point of homeopathy, which depends on faith and the placebo effect. In the study reviewed a positive finding was made that mice treated with various dilutions of nux vomica, and then challenged with ethanol, regained their righting reflex more quickly. Such a result is a delusion.

I would add from my perspective: “The abuse of science will cause discomfort for many scientists.”

Integrated Medicine?

The same issue contains an article which should not have been published as it is a commercial for the use of Vega (read “vaguer” and you are on the right track) testing. There is no place for this unscientific rubbish to be practised by any medical practitioner and it is a matter of regret that the Medical Council do not have the power to ban the use of such machines. I have written before on the subject of this quackery and at the last Auckland Conference Dr David Cole gave an excellent presentation on the evolution of “black-boxes” which allegedly test “biofields”. The article frequently uses the following words and expressions (with my translations):

  • Biofield = imaginary energy aura which can only be detected by trained observers
  • Paradigm shift = more of a lurch into another dimension of foolishness
  • Energy based Quantum Physics = the author is ignorant of any physics
  • Dramatically improve = an excellent placebo effect was obtained

A double-blind randomised study of Vega-testing published in the BMJ (Vol 322, 20 Jan p131) concluded predictably: “Electrodermal testing cannot be used to diagnose environmental allergies.”

Re-birthing Backfires

Because a young girl was having trouble bonding with her adoptive mother, a couple of loony therapists decided she had a “reactive attachment disorder” and decided that a spot of rebirthing was in order. This unfortunately went tragically wrong when the girl suffocated inside the sheet which had been wound around her. This is a graphic reminder of the sometimes appalling outcomes associated with the activities of the lunatic fringe. It need not actively cause death as in this case, but can cause death by neglect when effective measures are denied such as in the Liam Holloway case.
(Sunday Star Times 22/4/01)

Aromatherapy Flunks

Subjects had their reaction times tested with and without the benefit of essential oils sprinkled onto surgical masks they were wearing. I will quote directly from the article: “The essential oils appeared to make no difference to reaction times, but the volunteers who rated the oils highly showed small improvements in their reaction times.” (Presumably not a significant difference).

“Dr Richard Tonkin, president of the Research Council for Complementary Medicine, said the power of suggestion was a big factor in all medicine.”

I would only add that the power of suggestion is the main factor in all complemetary medicine.
(The Dominion, 20 April)

Teething, Feeding, Wind and Worms

One of the problems of an aging population is that there are too many “old wives” promulgating myths about childhood illness. Twenty-five years ago, my old Professor of Paediatrics, Fred Shannon, gave a lecture to us with the above title, and observed among other things, that wind was a meteorological phenomenon. He must have been ahead of his time because Australian researchers found no link between ill-health and teething in a cohort of infants over the period of 6-24 months of age. It is obvious that chance events such as a minor illness will occur when a tooth is erupting and a folk myth is soon created. When death certification began in the UK in the early 1800s, as many as 4000 deaths annually were attributed to “teething”. As Fred Shannon observed: “teething causes teeth”. I certainly found this to be true with my own series (N=2 daughters) of cases.
(Pediatrics 2000;106:1374-9)

Head-drilling again?

I have mentioned this subject before but thought it to be an uncommon procedure. In the US (where else?) two men pleaded guilty to practising medicine without a licence after drilling a hole in the head of a woman’s skull in order to “restore her childhood buoyancy”. Now I have been doing quite a bit of swimming lately and I am very sure that a hole in the head would not help my bouyancy at all!

It’s about time!

At a medicolegal conference reported in Doctor 14/3/2001, Fiona McCrimmon called for the Ministry of Health to act against the manufacturers of complementary medicines where misleading claims are made. Pharmacies are full of such products which are not registered and are only lawful if they do not make any therapeutic claims. Ms McCrimmon went on to observe: “It is a challenge to find a flyer (for complementary therapies) that complies with the law.”

Hokum Locum

Quack Aids Remedies

The Prevalence of HIV disease has continued to increase across the African continent and is a major public health concern due to cultural attitudes to sexuality and a degree of poverty which precludes effective pharmacological interventions. A quack Nigerian surgeon has been charging patients US$1000-1500 for a course of his vaccine which he claims has successfully treated 900 patients for HIV/AIDS. The Nigerian Academy of Sciences deemed the vaccine “untested and potentially dangerous”. The Surgeon’s response has been to allege that “he has been the victim of a conspiracy by transnational pharmaceutical companies, in league with the Nigerian Health Ministry, to steal his ‘wonder vaccine’….” This is the familiar paranoid conspiracy theories of the quack.

HIV/AIDS disease has continued to attract the same sort of quack attention as has terminal cancer, which is not surprising given that both progress to a fatal conclusion. Desperate people are given false hope as well as being robbed of their remaining wealth, which is siphoned away into the pockets of charlatans instead of passing to the descendants of the unfortunate victims. Using the late Petr Skrabanek’s rules (demarcation of the absurd) I would not even bother to test this AIDS “vaccine” and predict with complete confidence that should someone conduct a test the preparation will be found to be worthless.
Lancet Vol 356 August 5 2000 p 493

Acupuncture wins BMA approval

Like homeopathy practitioners, acupuncturists are irrepressible and in a neat example of Bellman’s fallacy (repetition leads to recognition) have prevailed long enough that they now have the imprimatur of none less than the British Medical Association. The full report is available at the BMA website (www.bma.org.uk) but seems to have been largely motivated by the fact that acupuncture is both widely requested and safe. I wonder if the BMA visited www.quackwatch.com or any of the other skeptical websites.

The study claimed that greater use of acupuncture could save the National Health Service “millions of pounds each year”. There was a call for minimum standards of training. As you will recall from Conference 1998, I modestly set the training standard by showing that a one hour training session was adequate for any lay audience. It may be necessary to gild the lily somewhat by devoting more time and training for a credulous medical audience. (BMJ Vol 321 1 July 2000 p11)

Perhaps this would be the time to share with you my memories of my acupuncture training course, during which the trainer demonstrated a popular alternative medical technique known as kinesthesiology. A patient with an allergy to tomatoes was shown to have reduced muscle strength when exposed to the alleged allergen. The test was an attempt by the examiner to separate the patient’s apposed index finger and thumb. The next step was to have the patient hold a packet containing a vial of depomedrol, a steroid. This was meant to show that the reduced muscle strength would be countered by the contact with this potent steroid. Unfortunately one of the other observers had mischievously removed the steroid vial from the packet and once the “patient improvement” had been triumphantly demonstrated he revealed his subterfuge. The trainer was unfazed and quick as a flash claimed that the improvement was maintained owing to “homeopathic residues on the packet”. It was at this point, as I gazed at the bovine and credulous faces of my fellow course members, that I became a confirmed skeptic.

Canadian Idyll

While recently in Canada for a military conference I suffered a recurring nightmare that I would arrive home to find a peremptory missive from our editor demanding a contribution for the next issue. (I did.) I was therefore relieved to find a supplement in the Vancouver Sun of Nov 16th 2000 outlining a “health show” and decided this must be worth a few column inches. I will summarise a few key points. Naturopathy/Naturopathic medicine diverges from allopathic medicine (translation: ordinary “scientific” medicine as practised by JC Welch) only “at that point where professionals in common possession of scientific facts conscientiously disagree on how best to use their shared knowledge in treating patients”. Before scoffing, I caution readers to be aware that “there is a common assumption that naturopathic treatments are placebos”.

Not surprisingly, there is a wealth of research carried out at Naturopathic Colleges showing that naturopathic remedies are very effective. You can choose from “Khamut”, a wheat grown from grain recovered from Tutankhamen’s tomb, Light therapy which uses biostimulation to promote efficient cell function, and “Trilovin” – the natural sex formula of the Ancient Greeks.

As a keen scientist I decided to administer some of this product to my wife and I am amazed to report that she has increased pain tolerance, enhancement of the immune system, improved mood and a sense of well being, reduced cholesterol and blood pressure and can now play tennis and ride a bike, but for some reason I’m tired and seem to have a constant headache.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

When I was at school 30 years ago I recall widespread concern that global cooling was going to lead to a new ice age. Now it’s global warming! I do not however, recall my fellow students exhibiting the behaviour alleged by those suffering from ADHD. I have long been suspicious that this is a fad disorder created by doctors in order to explain the exuberant but normal behaviour of some children. I will therefore conclude by quoting in full from the Guardian Weekly Vol 163/20 “Notes and Queries” column.

At school in the 40s I cannot remember pupils being hyperactive, disruptive or showing symptoms similar to ADHD. Is its growth due to a lack of discipline, or to pollution, radiation, junk food, etc.? There are always fashions in mental illnesses. In Freud’s day conversion hysteria was popular. Now it is rarely found. In Sydney, where I was working as an educational psychologist, any child with a behavioural or learning disability was likely to be labeled as autistic. Since then this diagnosis has come to be used much more discriminatingly.

Nowadays the psychiatric profession, supported by the drug companies, readily creates fashions in diagnosis. The committee that decides on the contents of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association needs only to ascertain that a group of psychiatrists agrees that a mental disorder exists to include this disorder in the manual. Another committee could reliably agree that the moon is made of green cheese. There have always been children who do not behave in the ways in which adults around them want. A few of these children have actual brain dysfunction. Many more, living under conditions that they find stressful, are constantly distracted by anxiety, and so are hyperactive and disruptive. Other children have parents and teachers who cannot tolerate the exuberant behaviour of ordinary children. The popularity of the recently created mental disorder ADHD means that many children are diagnosed as ADHD and prescribed Ritalin or other similarly potentially addictive drugs. These drugs’ long-term effects on a developing brain are yet to be discovered.

Hokum Locum

Colon Cleansing

Thanks to reader Alan Pickmere for drawing my attention to colon cleansing. In a radio advertisement Alan heard the claim that the average adult has up to 10kg of preservatives and toxic waste in their colon. The actor, John Wayne had 20kg removed at autopsy, doubtless dating from the time spent venting his spleen against commie actors facing Senator Joe McCarthy’s inquisition. Come to think of it, perhaps he should have “vented” more often.

These accumulations are not at all surprising to a skeptical doctor as I am frequently exposed to views espoused by people whose bodies hold far more toxic waste than this and it goes all the way up to their heads. If any readers would like to cleanse their colons please call 0800-CLYSTER.

Herbs Flunk

Although it makes sense to test herbs for therapeutic efficacy, there are few acceptable trials. An Australian study of herbal and Ayurvedic preparations found that only tumeric had any anti-inflammatory effect and 5 of 23 celery preparations had an anti-arthritic effect equivalent to 50mg of ibuprofen. Given the wide variation in the bioavailability of herbal medicines I recommend stick to ibuprofen, normally taken in a daily dose of 1600mg costing around 75 cents. I bet that herbal medicines cost a lot more than that. It’s important for any useless treatment to cost a lot because that helps people believe that it actually works. (NZ Doctor 19 Jul 2000)

Swadeshi

Third world countries such as India frequently seek pragmatic solutions to their health problems and in this case they have encouraged traditional practices such as ayurveda, sidha, unani, yoga, naturopathy, Tibetan medicine and homeopathy. I was reassured to see the addition of homeopathy and naturopathy, so much a part of mainstream New Zealand medicine. The Indian Health Minister has asked all other Ministries to ensure that its employees can be reimbursed for the cost of such treatments.

Perhaps this is where our own Health Minister got the idea for allocating a large sum of money for the evaluation of alternative medicine. The increasingly third world Wellington Hospital is reduced to waving its hands at patients. Will they soon be encouraging them to start the day with a freshly steaming glass of their own urine, perhaps followed by pills made out of lama’s faeces, a traditional Tibetan remedy. (Lancet Vol 355, p1252)

Silicon Implants

As Shakespeare so eloquently put it “God has given woman one breast and she gives herself another”. Minerva (BMJ Vol 320 p 882) reports a fourth extensive study finding no association between ill health and silicon implants. However, this will not have any effect on the millions of dollars given to litigants because the standard of proof is to have one’s personal account of suffering published in any women’s magazine. In the true spirit of the post-modern age I look forward to the first litigation for alien abduction. Those anal probes can hurt! All we need is a New Zealand Doctor brave enough to fill in the ACC forms.

This is yet another example of Welch’s law: “Claims expand to take up the amount of compensation available”.

Surgeon Amputates Healthy Legs

Since I have raised the topic of post-modernism, readers will be interested in this account from the BMJ (Vol 320 p332). Both patients reported on suffered from a rare body dysmorphic disorder known as apotemnophilia which makes them believe that they can only be normal once they have had a limb removed. The patients were delighted after each had a leg removed in a below-knee amputation. The hospital administration was quoted as saying that no more of these operations will be done.

Stokabunga

Obesity has been raised to an art form in North America and it is fitting that the American food industry has launched “Stokabunga”, a cookie containing more calories than an average meal, including 48g fat. Such excess is a fitting accompaniment to a recent announcement that for the first time the number of overweight people in the world equalled the number who were malnourished. In Britain, the average cat receives more protein per day than the average poor African. Sales of Stokabunga have been particularly strong in Belgium.

Ineffective Drugs

Of the 50,000 prescription drugs currently available in Germany, 33,000 have never been subject to clinical trials. They include homeopathic preparations, herbal remedies and in one case a useless preparation containing loess (a fine soil) used for the treatment of diarrhoea. Drug companies were able to suppress a report that gave advice on how to substitute cheaper effective drugs in place of the useless ones. During World War 2, Hitler’s doctor treated him with capsules containing faecal bacteria from “finest Bulgarian peasant” and such a product is conceivably still available. (New Scientist 4 Oct 97 p20)

As recently as 1997 it was possible to receive rejuvenating injections of fetal sheep cells. This treatment was popularised by Konrad Adenaur, the German Chancellor who remained in power until he was 87 years old. Unfortunately the Germans have a bad habit of blindly following rogue Chancellors.

It is quite clear now what has happened to their Pharmaceutical Regulatory authorities. Instead of a feral and vigorous staff dedicated to removing quack remedies, the excessive use of fetal cells has turned them all into sheep in sheep’s clothing. (New Scientist 25 Jan 1997 p6)

Finger-Licking Bad For Waist Reduction?

The herb Aristolochia gangchi was mistakenly used in weight loss pills by the Kentucky Fried medicine brigade. As well as causing kidney failure it is now thought to be responsible for cancers of the urinary tract. Staff at a Belgian weight loss clinic had prescribed the herb Stephania tetranda but the mixture also contained Aristolochia which has a similar sounding Chinese name.

Dr David Kessler, former Commissioner of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) notes that there are no controls over the quality of such products or their composition. The cause of this was the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, which deregulated the industry by limiting the role of the FDA and opening up this $15 billion-a- year industry. This ridiculous legislation does not require that dietary supplements be shown to be safe or effective. I have no doubt that an epidemic of renal failure and cancer will soon peel the weight off those hordes of fatties seen in every US shopping mall. (New England Journal of Medicine June 8 2000, p1742; BMJ Vol 320, p1623)

Tissue Samples and Cryptopathology

When confronted with unusual lumps and swelling it is a common medical practice to get some tissue examined by a pathologist and this will often reveal the diagnosis.

As a keen hunter I feel the same exemplary approach should be taken when examining phenomena such as “Bigfoot”, the Loch Ness monster and our very own Australasian “Yowie”. The Yowie is believed to be named thus after the cries recorded when it had come into contact with hunters and been wounded. It would be a matter of some pride to me if I were the first person to bag either of these trophies. Nessie would obviously require a large harpoon but depth charges would soon bring the shy and expiring creature to the surface. Bigfoot should prove no problem for my Winchester 0.243. I was therefore disappointed to read that a county in Washington has declared it illegal to kill Bigfoot. However, fur samples have been gathered from “close encounters” and delivered to Ken Goddard at a wildlife forensic laboratory. Ken found that Bigfoot has made a remarkable adaptation to its cold environment-polyester fur. Ken is waiting for a “close encounter of the turd kind” so he can examine the creature’s diet for evidence of Stokabunga. (New Scientist 22 Jan 2000 p40)

I predict that once tissue samples have been obtained, all of these secretive creatures will be found to share a puzzling 100 percent of their DNA with humans.

Of Con Tricks and Conferences

Many moons ago I packed into a dimmed lecture theatre along with 400 other keen-eyed stage I psych students to listen to a presentation on psychic ability.

The mood was festive – it was almost the last lecture of the year and promised to be a good one. Some bloke was going to demonstrate their prowess with telepathy and fix some broken watches. Students packed into the aisles and I’m sure there were a few economics or accounting students present.

I distinctly recall being suspicious. Honest. Probably aided by my brother sitting next to me who was trying to work out the tricks. What I remember most of all is the utter gullibility of the majority of the other students – they swallowed it hook, line and little lead balls. It was, of course, a setup brilliantly executed by Otago University psychologist David Marks. I was so impressed I went out and bought his book, Psychology Of The Psychic (written with the late Richard Kammann) – one of the earliest books on the topic that I ever read. (Could the person I lent it to please return it?) It was this incident, somewhere back in the early 80s, that first sparked my interest in skepticism.

So it is with considerable delight that I see Dr David Marks will give a presentation at the next skeptic’s conference (the one in Dunedin, the one you are about to register for straight away…). Dr Marks is these days professor of psychology at Middlesex University and we are grateful to the NZ Association of Rationalists and Humanists who have helped with financing his visit to this country. I also note he is pencilled in for Saturday night’s entertainment which alone could be worth driving 800km to listen to.

Unhappily the Taylor/Riddell household won’t be attending – having just settled in following six months in the deep south we’re not ready to turn round and go back again.

Which is a shame because the theme of this year’s conference is one close to our hearts – Evolution, Creationism and Education.

Another distinguished speaker who will need no introduction to most members is Australia’s Ian Plimer, professor of Earth Science at Melbourne University. His talk on the evolution of creationism will be a highlight of the programme.

Conference organiser Warwick Don has put together an excellent weekend – if only it was in Hamilton!

But welcome to the 56th issue of the NZ Skeptic in which we examine medical matters, with Dr David Cole looking at the history of black box devices and Dr Bill Morris’s article on the pill.

We also welcome back Dr (am I the only non doctor in these parts?) John Welch who for many years wrote the Hokum Locum and is picking up his pen again. Many thanks to Dr Neil McKenzie for his contributions.

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From ERA to EAV, the Sorry Saga of the Black Box

As Professor Cole explained at the last Skeptics’ Conference, “Quantum Booster”-like devices have been around a long time.

If you include the Roman physician, Scribonius, who treated patients with shocks from electric eels, then electro-medicine has a very long and distinguished history indeed. But its recent history really began in the 1920s, with the flowering of America’s Black-Box supremo, Albert Abrams, of San Francisco. He was to become a millionaire from the sale of his sealed “black” boxes for diagnosing and treating almost everything from stretch marks to streptococci and, most seriously, cancer.

At the turn of the century Abrams recognised that so-called radionics and electro-medical gadgets were ripe for exploitation with their incredible (and I use that word literally) power of rapid and accurate diagnosis of diseases and their radio-frequencies. For therapy, other versions were designed to shatter the identified diseases whether bacteria or cancer. His own device became the Electronic Reaction of Abrams (ERA).

Abrams’ fame and machines spread to the UK, where the President of the British Medical Association spoke in strong support. Fortunately there were some sceptics in the Royal Society of Medicine (we would be proud of them) and Lord Horder was sent to investigate. In 1925 he returned from the USA to report, much to the relief of the medical establishment, that his team found “its use is scientifically unsound and ethically unjustified” and, they went on to say, they could “give no sanction to the use of ERA in diagnosis or treatment of disease”, … so diminishing, but not extinguishing, this strange manifestation.

It was not just in California, the capital state of medical fraud, that electro-diagnosis flourished, for there were many others to come: Rife in the ’30s, Ruth Down in the ’40s and in New Zealand, Dr Laurie Gluckman reported meeting an elderly Maori tohunga who had an old car battery and some wires, which, attached to his clients, served the same purpose.

Nowadays we are surrounded by black boxes in our home, and they are also the armamentarium of TV servicemen, car mechanics and the ultimate black boxers, the radiologists. It is easy to see how people in the 1920s would be impressed with dials and wires, solenoids and resistors. After all the Electrocardiograph – arguably the most successful black box of all time – had been discovered only a few years before in 1921 by Eindhoven, later a Nobel Prize winner for this work.

Spondylotherapy

But to return to the anti-hero of this confection. Soon after World War 1, Albert Abrams, holding an MD from Heidelberg, began treating patients’ spines by thumping special points, a technique he called “spondylotherapy”, a rival to Palmer’s chiropracty developed in Iowa two years before, or Still’s osteopathy, then a year or two older. Both have proved more durable.

As Maurice Fishbein of the American Medical Association commented wryly: “Abrams, having percussed the back to the fullest extent it would yield monetarily, he rolled the patient over and percussed the abdomen.” But strangely it was not the patient’s own abdomen, for Abrams did not need to have the patients themselves present and instead placed a specimen of their blood on a slide into the circuit. Wires led from this “dynamiser” to the forehead of a neutral test subject, standing on ground plates.

Diagnoses of illness were made, enthusiasts proclaimed, “with superb sensitivity”, aided by a remarkable chart that designated resonance areas for various illnesses (shades of iridology charts). Investigators were startled to find that, rather dramatically, these patients could also be further categorised by abdominal dullness patterns into: Catholic, Seventh Day, Jewish, Protestant and Methodist.

Very soon, delighted with his diagnostic machine and needing something with which to actually treat the patient, he invented an “oscilloclast” along the same lines. This was calibrated to respond to vibrations peculiar to the specific disease, after establishing the frequency with the “dynamiser”.

Shrewd Business

Abrams’ final entrepreneurial touch was not to sell his oscilloclasts, but instead to lease them out, insisting on a signed agreement that the machine would not be opened, examined or serviced by the lessees. A sound idea, replicated in 1998 by a New Zealand GP, who imported a $40,000 black box, ETG, whose function was “electro-trichino-genesis”, ie causing hair to grow. On the sealed generator was the statement “tampering with the box will lead it to self-destruct”.

Lord Horder was not the only official enquirer about Abrams’ remarkable boxes. It is a measure of the notoriety of this treatment that in 1924 Scientific American published 12 articles exhaustively examining ERA. The experts concluded that the claims were not substantiated and the treatments were without value. Abrams was of course not deterred, he continued to attract patients and died a rich man at the height of his fame in 1925.

One of Abrams many imitators in the 1930s was another American, Royal Rife, and he deserves brief mention here because his so-called generator has recently appeared in Rotorua under the name of Quantum Booster. This was used in the sad case of young Liam Williams-Holloway from Southland. The generator allegedly produces radio waves with precisely the same frequency as the disease, usually believed to be an infection but widely used for cancer.

It is now time to introduce another medical doctor from a very dubious Medical College in Missouri, Dr Dundas Mackenzie. Mackenzie was a New Zealander who had been at the Otago School of Mines, but did not really strike gold until some time after he returned to New Zealand in 1896 fresh from homeopathic training in the USA. His name plate stated he specialised in Cancer and Chronic Disease but he later, under cross examination, said that he was an “auto-haemic surgeon” who specialised in orificial surgery (orifices not specified).

Having visited Abrams in 1920, and realising the potential of the “box”, he soon ran foul of the BMA here, for he gave demonstrations of the Abrams machine in the Auckland Town Hall and claimed cancer cures. Application was made to stop him practising but the Medical Registration Board were slow to act, for he had powerful friends, including the Chancellor of the University of Auckland, Sir George Fowlds, who also believed in phrenology.

After a preliminary hearing in front of the Board, the case moved to the Supreme Court. The local doctors had assembled some firm if devious evidence, having taken some blood for testing from a donkey who gave rides at Mission Bay. Mackenzie reported that this test sample showed the “patient” had both tuberculosis and congenital syphilis, which was naturally of some concern to the mothers of the potential riders of the aforesaid donkey.

In his memoirs Vince Meredith, the leading KC who took the Board’s case, described this case as his most memorable as it “combined the ludicrous with the tragic in almost equal proportions.” He made great play in Court of the donkey subterfuge, and pitied this “always respectable animal” whose testing had apparently “revealed a past that was not always respectable”. Mackenzie’s opponents had also covertly submitted for testing some human blood samples from people with known disease. There was no correlation.

When asked if an official and supervised test could be arranged, Mackenzie declined to take part in any trial. In Court Meredith made the strong point that Mackenzie frightened innocent patients with spurious diagnoses of syphilis and cancer and then cured them with the oscilloclast machine. It worked well for these non-existent diseases, a technique for success that is believed to have been used by other New Zealand charlatans in cancer scams in the 1980s.

Honest Belief

At the Supreme Court Meredith convinced the Judge that having refused any tests Mackenzie could not “honestly believe” in the machine. This phrase was very appropriate as it came from the 1858 British Medical Act and later was introduced into the Medical Practitioners Act in New Zealand in a 1924 amendment of s58 concerning unorthodox practice, the so-called homeopathic clause. It is a worry to us that it still survives in the recent 1995 Medical Practitioners Act although all other Commonwealth countries have abandoned it.

The process of proving and successfully prosecuting these unorthodoxies can be prolonged and very expensive (“the black wine-box phenomenon”). This is illustrated by the tale of a Hollywood chiropractor, Ruth Drown, who had an enormous following. Her radionic instrument was especially valued as she claimed it worked at a considerable distance by a telephone connection. In this instance the FDA decided to act, and after a cancer test-case Drown was found guilty and fined $1000. The prosecution had cost the FDA $50,000.

Marriage of Convenience

By the early 1950s the reputation of black boxes was flagging. What saved them was a marriage of great convenience with acupuncture. A Japanese doctor had observed that many of the 361 classical Chinese acupuncture points in the body had reduced skin resistance when tested conventionally with a small current; these he called “ryodoraku points”. It was then a small step for a German, Reinhold Voll, to develop the machine he patented as the Dermatron. Using an electrode held by the patient, and with a probe, he tested the acupuncture sites noting the skin resistance changes. He claimed he could not only identify the diseased organ but diagnose and treat a variety of disorders in these organs.

Furthermore, he serendipitously “observed” that homeopathic substances introduced into the test circuit further altered the resistance in some subtle way and could thus be tested for relevance; for example, putting dilute Roundup in the circuit might identify it as the problem. This was the crucial breakthrough that ensured the commercial success of the method. Schimmel in Germany also produced a “Vegatest” machine which has found increasing favour and similarly allows for the introduction of test samples.

We are told of course, there is “enormous” skill required to find the right points and apply the correct pressure. This became apparent when a New Zealand medically qualified, now deregistered, eco-medicine specialist was asked during his trial to allow patients with known disorders to be put through the circuit, even when he was the operator. Just like Mackenzie he refused because he considered these were unusual and misleading situations, not comparable to natural patient diagnosis.

Detached observers have repeatedly commented that the degree of skin pressure of the probe, and hence the resistance reading, is entirely, and unreliably, in the fingers of the operator.

The Vega Machine

Unlike the Abrams oscilloclast, the Vega machine does not seem to be used for treatment on its own, but has usually been linked to treatment by homeopathy. In the case referred to above the doctor had relied heavily on the Vega readings in his management of the cases by “complex” homeopathy and hyperbaric oxygen. The Medical Council found this and other aspects unacceptable, and he was deregistered.

In another case put before the disciplinary authorities, a GP described the manner in which he identified a baby’s food allergies by Vega-testing her mother’s foot. Indeed it seemed it was not even necessary to have the baby in contact with the mother and in one case under discussion the practice nurse had been required to remove the crying child to the office so the examination could proceed. The startled mother was assured the machine could still work up to five metres. Indeed very few questions were asked of the mother for the doctor had, he explained, a subconscious link with the baby and was getting the answers directly. Worse still was his frightening of mothers with old-fashioned homeopathic miasm warnings of ancestor disease and criminal activity, the inherited basis for the baby’s problems.

No Substantial Benefit

In this case, and the preceding one, the medical tribunal steered clear of any evaluation of the efficacy of the procedures. It was transparently clear, that for the patients assembled as witnesses, no substantial benefit was provided. But more than that, proper and standard medical treatment, as expected from a registered medical practitioner, was seriously absent. This is what led to the penalties.

The final generation of these diagnostic machines are inevitably now computerised. In Canada withdrawal of medical license followed a Dr Korman’s use of his “interro-computer” for what the registration body described as “totally useless and unproven tests while working under the cloak of respectability of his medical licence”.

His prescriptions for the patient to observe after diagnosis, can only be described as bizarre. These including having all dental amalgam removed (under hypnosis), removing the microwave from kitchen, use of a dustless vacuum cleaner and watching TV via a mirror. Two mirrors might have allowed her to at least read the text.

Here is a quote from the 1991 American Journal of Acupuncture:

“Western allopathic medicine is founded and supported on the reductionist-mechanical scientific paradigm that originated in the 17th century. Unlike Western medicine, science is becoming holistic” [the magic word], “based on quantum mechanics, new laws relating to the chaos theory, fractals and the discovery of self organised criticality and non linear science”.

These words, like “chaos theory” conveniently plucked from sister sciences, are implying that we are far from up to date. Has the unorthodox world found something we are missing? I think not.