[received via email, from a trusted source.]

Nutritional Medicine The Allopathic Paradigm

A paradigm is a model for how things are. It is so deeply believed as to be unexaminable by the person who holds to that paradigm. A paradigm is an unconscious belief that organizes the perception of reality. For example, the paradigm for war is conflict. When you hear the word "war," you assume conflict. A paradigm is not examined or questioned and almost all of what we know to be "true" is paradigm derived. It is not possible to think for yourself until you become aware of the nature of paradigms and conscious of your own particular paradigms. Very few people ever attempt this, and fewer still master it.

Standard medical care is based on the allopathic paradigm. An "allopath" is a standard mainstream doctor following "community standards." These folks assume the body to be basically a machine that functions normally until attacked by a specific disease with a single cause. Find the cause, kill it (usually with a synthetic drug, radiation or a scalpel) and pronounce a cure, if the patient does not die from the treatment, of course.

This paradigm - this unquestioned assumption - is the foundation stone of standardized medical care. From the point of view of a holistic doctor (a "teacher of the whole person") this is a woefully inadequate and mediocre paradigm from which to render medical care.

The Holistic Paradigm

A holistic doctor is necessarily one who has overcome medical school dogma and thinks for him/herself. He/she thinks from a different model of illness and health: the holistic paradigm. This kind of doctor believes illness is almost always multifactorial in cause, and that an important factor in causation of overt illness is the condition of the patient when in the "healthy" state, that is to say, an apparently healthy person may be ill without yet showing symptoms. The holistic doctor believes it is best to treat the patient before symptoms appear because of the difficulty involved in treating after symptoms appear. This is called "preventive medicine."

The holistic doctor believes correction of illness before it is apparent also is the best way to contain health costs. And finally, the holistic doctor sees his or her role as that of an expert advisor with the goal to create an informed patient more able to prevent disease on his own. (This book is meant to assist that process.)

This is the paradigm, or model, with which the holistic doctor approaches the patient. However, the allopathic model with its single cause, doctor-as-God approach is still the predominant medical model in North America. It is popular, because it gives over responsibility for health matters to the doctor.

All professions practice their skills in a socioeconomic context. There are great political pressures on holistic doctors to conform to "community standards" of medical practice. Therefore, your holistic doctor is, by nature, a person willing to think and act in your best interests, despite pressure from his allopathic peers. Your holistic doctor also is termed an "alternative" physician, meaning that because she/he is not of the allopathic paradigm, he/she provides an alternative to that approach.

Perhaps the state of medicine can best be made clear by making what Albert Einstein (a real doctor, a teacher) called a "thought experiment." In this case, our experiment is a social-political-economic-medical thought experiment. Imagine for a moment a plant is discovered having the following characteristics: the seeds are readily available; it is easily grown in any climate; eating this plant instantly cures all of the diseases of aging including arterial occlusion, spinal problems, and also cancer. In addition, this plant works to prevent all other diseases.

What do you suppose would be the reaction of the medical establishment to such a plant? By the term "medical establishment" I am not referring to individual doctors, rather to the advertising/propaganda machines created by the various trade unions associated with medicine: the American Medical Association, the American Pharmaceutical Association, the American Dental Association, etc. I also refer to the FDA, which is staffed by former members of the medical establishment and thus has the same mentality, even though it is supposed to impartially regulate the rest of the medical establishment. The medical establishment is a state of mind created by propaganda machines.

Individual doctors listen to these propaganda machines just as does the rest of the public. Doctors believe most of what they believe about medicine because these trade unions have told them to believe it and have overwhelmed them with propaganda to support their point of view.

To get the answer to the question about the plant that cures all disease, you have to remember this plant, if properly understood by the public, will replace most of modern medicine, putting doctors, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, medical insurance companies, the professional trade unions (AMA, APA, ADA, etc.) and almost all related industries out of business overnight.

Trauma surgeons, emergency rooms, cosmetic surgeons, obstetricians and a few others still would be in business, everyone else would be scanning the "help wanted" column of the newspaper along with the multi billion dollar pharmaceutical industry and the manufacturers of most medical equipment. An entire industry would be rendered obsolete.

The reaction of the medical establishment to this plant would, of course, be more than negative. Given any chance whatsoever, the medical community would mount a propaganda campaign to discredit this new discovery. This propaganda campaign would be unmatched by any the world has ever seen. Powerful vested interests would not yield easily to this simple plant.

If such a plant were discovered, you probably would never hear of it, or if you did, it would be in the form of the medical establishment's denouncement of this plant as a hoax.

Pure medical science and capitalism do not mix in the same pot. All medical advances occur in a political/economic context. If there is no great profit to be made from an advance in medicine, that advance is downplayed, ignored, or attracts a powerful negative reaction that brands it a hoax.

The fact is, as far as I know, such a plant has not been discovered. However, if you take a handful of relatively obscure medical treatments, that currently are in use, you will have something close to the equivalent of such a magical plant. Probably, you have never heard of them, because they have been downplayed, ignored, or (if that failed) outright attacked by the medical establishment.

In this book I will be telling you about this handful of therapies. The claims that can be made by these therapies are truly astounding and hard to believe. "Why hasn't my doctor told me?" you will ask. "Why haven't I read about these therapies in the paper?" you will want to know. Your doctor hasn't told you, because probably your doctor is also unaware.

Doctors listen to the medical establishment, as does the general public, and doctors believe what they are told by the medical establishment, which they trust. You haven't read about these therapies in the paper, because the media print only that which has general medical agreement. Therefore, the therapies I describe in this book are not for everyone.

Most people are hypnotized by the advice to "Listen to your doctor, and do exactly what your doctor tells you!" This is good advice, if you have not informed yourself in such a way that you can become a partner in your own health care rather than merely the passive recipient. Most people should listen to their doctors, and do what those doctors tell them. I am not writing this book for "most people." This book is for the exceptional person, the person who has the intellect and will to question authority, not to be rebellious, simply in recognition of the fact authority is not always correct. This book is for the person who can, and will, think for him/herself.

Let me tell you about the revolution underway in American medicine and in medicine worldwide. On one side is the old order: the medical establishment, espousing allopathic medicine - one disease, one cure - supported by the pharmaceutical industry, churning out one laboratory-made drug after another, providing short-term benefits with significant risks and sacrificing long-term health. Also, lined up with the old order is the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) which collects over 200 million dollars for its participation in the approval process of each new drug, drugs which, after they are approved, are estimated to cause 25,000 deaths outright every year in the U. S. alone and contribute to another 115,000 deaths each year.

On the other side of this war are people who believe in healing by natural means, people who know synthetic drugs are universally toxic and who also know there is no job done by a synthetic drug that cannot be done better by natural agents - vitamins, herbs, botanicals (plant derived), homeopathic preparation, or some other agent derivative from nature. These doctors also know that many times diet and lifestyle changes alone will effect a cure much better than any synthetic drug.

The pharmaceutical industry also is aware of these facts and is extremely anxious to prevent the public from learning about these superior preparations. Above all, they are terrified doctors will come to appreciate these facts and cease handing out synthetic drugs as if they were candy and begin practicing medicine in a more sensible way. When doctors make this change the pharmaceutical industry is history, and they know it. For this reason they provide a never-ending stream of propaganda aimed at doctors and medical schools (future doctors). They buy large amounts of advertising space in the major medical journals, effectively coercing these journals not to publish research on botanicals, vitamins, and minerals, etc. that would undermine their profits.

The FDA is heavily allied with the pharmaceutical industry with a high priority on protecting drug company profits (and thus their own 200-plus million dollars per drug approval). They have proclaimed regulations to shut the mouths of the manufacturers of vitamins, botanicals, etc. These companies are prohibited from printing the truth on bottles of vitamins, minerals, botanicals, etc. regarding their health benefits and uses. They are forbidden from distributing books and brochures proclaiming these truths. For this reason only people who have taken the time to educated themselves in these matters are aware of the situation.

When these dictatorial regulations are breached, the FDA has no problem putting on their flack jackets, loading their guns, busting into doctors' offices, vitamin stores, vitamin and botanical companies etc., roughing people up, stealing patient and research records, stock, property, and pat-searching personnel, including women. (I can back these assertions up with data.)

The FDA would like to ban the sale of books proclaiming these truths. They would like to regulate vitamins as if they were dangerous synthetic drugs and, if not ban them, at least put them on prescription or, failing that, at least permit only the sale of greatly reduced dosages. These things have actually happened in many countries and if we are not eternally vigilant, they also will happen in the U.S.

All doctors participate in this monumental struggle for the future of your right to be informed and to make informed decisions regarding your health care. Unfortunately, most doctors are participating by doing nothing, by staying locked into the "system," practicing medicine as it was taught to them in medical school and as they are encouraged by the American Medical Association (AMA), the FDA, their state medical boards and other organizations such as the American Cancer Society (ACS) and the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

By the way, if you think these assertions are outrageous and hard to believe, let me invite you to educate yourself. All of these assertions, and many more, are documented in a book entitled The Assault on Medical Freedom by P. Joseph Lisa. You can order this book by dialing (800) 357-2211. The cost is $14.95 plus shipping. You will be amazed. I especially encourage other doctors to order this book. So many of us are not informed.

The Transformation of Medicine

There exists a network of doctors in America and throughout the world, among whom I include myself, who are not satisfied to live out their lives practicing the kind of medicine they were taught to practice in medical school, regardless of how obscene the income it can generate. These people understand time marches on, things change, and advances are made. They understand the medical monopoly and choose not to participate in it. Indeed, these doctors want to break the medical monopoly and create a condition some have called "freedom of health care." These doctors think for themselves, practice their art with integrity and courage, and are open-minded to the newest advances in the healing arts whether or not these advances were taught in medical school-and even if these advances do not further line the pockets of the medical establishment.

The latest advances, even if they favor the generation of large incomes for doctors, hospitals, and medical insurance companies, take ten years to make it from research labs to teaching centers, and at least another ten years to make it to the medical practice of typical doctors. This twenty year lag period makes it too late for many people. Those advances which are not patentable - which reveal the power of vitamins, nutrients, natural human hormones, and other natural substances to heal - would never make it to the consumer except for dedicated practitioners of progressive medicine and their colleagues in research labs and compounding pharmacies.

The network of doctors of which I speak believes in bypassing this pyramid of medical authority and bringing these advances directly to the public. This was the way medicine was designed to be practiced before it became big business. We commit ourselves to a renewal, a renaissance, a transformation of medicine.

This transformation seems to be provoking an inquisiton as doctors are harrassed, persecuted and even prosecuted by the FDA and state medical boards for nothing more than beating the timetable by twenty years and offering therapies which actually work. But, never mind, we can handle the inquisition.

[again, received via email, from a trusted source.]

-- Anonymous, August 13, 2001

Answers

I have not read the book, and do not endorse it. I have not called the number provided. Just posting the message for all to read.

-- Anonymous, August 13, 2001