When Healing Becomes a Crime: The Amazing Story of the Hoxsey Cancer Clinics and the Return of Alternative Therapies: The Amazing Story of the ... and the Rise of Alternative Cancer Therapies [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

This book tells the story of how an alternative treatment was sabotaged by the medical community and by organizations that are supposed to protect our health (such as the Food and Drug Administration). As a European, I have been quite skeptical about this agency for some time, and this book doesn’t help at all! The picture this book gives you is that the main reason a drug gets accepted or not might be linked to serious lobbying inside the conventional medical community and to the financial gains that are linked to it. This isn’t hard to believe if you see how the tobacco lobby succeeded for years to cover up the problems smoking causes.

Yet, there is hope as far "conventional medicine" is concerned. Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) teaches doctors that they should stay current with recent research on drugs and learn how to interpret studies before administering drugs to their patients. I studied this subject in preparation of my Ph.D. I believe that EBM practices do drastically enhance our chances as patients to get the right treatment, especially if you read that 50% of doctors risk giving you a wrong or outdated treatment. No wonder many doctors admit that many patients get better DESPITE their doctor’s treatment.

The problem with EBM is that apparently some often used treatments such as many current forms of chemotherapy lack the statistical data to back them up, and that doctors seem to treat patients with those cures because they don’t have anything better. When I was doing my own research concerning whiplash, I was faced with a similar dilemma: conventional treatment in which patients have to wear a cervical collar may actually worsen the condition of patients. Yet 50% of MD’s still prescribe it today. On the other hand, if you would recommend a patient to throw away this collar, you might be pursued form “medical malpractice”.

On the other hand, I have known for years that the problem of many alternative cures (whether they are herbal remedies or psychological assistance) lies in the fact that they have not been proven scientifically. But, not being proven doesn't mean that the cure isn't valid, it only lets you know there is no way to tell. Therefore I keep trying to convince “alternative therapists” to do the necessary “homework” with regards to proving their protocols. The drama is that it doesn’t pay to do the scientific research for those cures, whereas there are billions to be gained from doing research for registered drugs.

Given that the death rate of cancer today isn't much better than in the 1950s, it's no wonder that today over 60% of cancer patients supplement their conventional treatment with one or more forms of alternative treatment. Reading this book should at least help you to be a bit more skeptical to what your doctor is telling you, and to be more willing to inquire for yourself what therapy will help to cure you.

Related books: “The Cancer industry” and “Questioning Chemotherapy” by Ralph Moss...

Despite being involved in alternative medicine (specifically homeopathic medicine) since 1972, I have always had strong skepticism of alternative therapies for cancer. I questioned their true effectiveness, and even more, I questioned the ethics of their advocates. After reading Kenny Ausubel's newest book, I realize now how effective the propaganda against alternative cancer therapies have been on me, despite my own predilections towards alternative medicine and my strong skepticism of conventional approaches. I was truly blown away by WHEN HEALING BECOMES A CRIME. What the SILENT SPRING did for the environmental movement, his book does for the alternative cancer movement (perhaps this book should have been called or sub-titled THE SUPPRESSED SPRING, since the AMA, the FDA, and the drug companies have been so effective in suppressing any positive information about these therapies and have been extraordinarily effective in providing misinformation about them). The general public is interested in alternative medicine, not only in recent times, but Ausubel references a Chicago Medical Society survey that discovered that 85% of Americans used "drugless healers" in the early 1940s. The misinformation and demonization of alternative medicine by the AMA and the FDA is quite remarkable and sad (no, St. Johns wort won't cure this depression!). This McCarthyization of alternative healers predated McCarthy and didn't simply destroy people's lives as McCarthy did, but also led to earlier death of hundreds of thousands of people by foisting upon them as the only appropriate treatment for cancer, the notoriously ineffective and dangerous primitive radiation and chemotherapy of the day. This book details the experience of Harry Hoxsey and his herbal formulas for people with cancer. Despite getting arrested over a hundred times in one two-year period and hundreds of more times before and after this, Harry Hoxsey's leading nemesis, AMA leader Morris Fishbein, acknowledged under oath that Hoxsey's therapy was indeed effective in treating certain types of cancer, though this statement never changed his heavy-handed efforts to make access to Hoxsey's treatment difficult or impossible. Hoxsey's clinic has been forced out of the US and into Mexico since the early 1960s, but it still provides care for people, even though, remarkably enough, it STILL is not allowed back in the US. The book also provides a fascinating history of the AMA's rise to respect in the 20th century, in large part to its leader, Morris Fishbein, MD, who never practiced a day of medicine himself and who flunked anatomy in medical school. His efforts to get drug and tobacco companies to advertise in AMA journals made the AMA rich and ultimately powerful, and it led the AMA to attack any others who questioned conventional medical treatment or who offered viable alternatives. This book is riveting but can and will lead to fits of anger at orthodoxy's impressively effective PR efforts to make successful spokespersons for alternative medicine into quacks and criminals. This book is also extremely well referenced, both to historical records as well as modern scientific literature. The amount of scholarship that went into writing this book is admirable. Dana Ullman, M.P.H. Homeopathic Educational Services

Personally, I have never been able to take Hoxsey the man seriously, but what erudition Hoxsey lacked, Dr. Frederic Mohs had in abundance -- and what is extraordinary is that their bloodroot paste formulae were essentially identical. Hoxsey was persecuted for his efforts to make his treatment available; the Mohs microsurgery method is now widely accepted and practiced in such illustrious institutions as Harvard Medical School.

Ergo, the pattern of suppression detailed in Ausubel's book is all the more important because it was not based on science but rather on the politics of medicine, something that demands questioning since fifty years later, the basic problem is not solved.

There is no question but that the public deserves access to anything that might alleviate suffering, prolong lives, or cure them of their illnesses. The Government is charged with protecting the public from fraud; but in its zeal to brand outsiders as quacks, it has lost focus on the humanitarian as well as clinical aspects of healing.

I therefore disagree vehemently with the review posted below by fraud investigator. Hoxsey made his money in oil and operated affordable facilities for people seeking a cure for cancer. Yes, he was lacking proper credentials, but knowledge and experience can be acquired in clinical settings where keenly observant people can by-pass indoctrination and determine whether or not patients are responding well to treatment. This point is important because in the greed for patents, the factors that determine patentability are seldom well aligned with the factors that determine efficacy and safety.

The Pacific Yew/taxol issue is a case in point. In its whole form, there are cytotoxic agents and those that protect the patient from harmful side effects. However, to patent a product, one must choose one or the other of the active principles of the herb. The end result is a product that poses significant risk factors to the patient.

In 1000 words or less, one cannot end the debate. My point is simply that the formal approval process is a patenting process, not a test of what is in the long-term best interests of the patient. If investors are to develop a drug that is unique enough to be patented and destructive enough to be approved, laboratories must ignore the whole in an effort to maximize the economic rewards of the part.

In my opinion, this system has gone too far. At this point, it serves industry rather than humanity. Kenny Ausubel has presented a detailed and insightful and extremely well documented case of persecution of a person and a method that constitutes a crime against the very patients who might benefit from a treatment that often succeeds where others fail. Read the book and make up your own mind.