Archive for the ‘News’ Category

My patients, relatives and friends are regularly sending me messages asking about the veracity of the role of Camphora 1M or Arsenic Album 30 as preventives for COVID-19.

Regarding the message circulating about Camphora 1M, it is not a fake message, the Pune police force have been given this remedy as a preventive. Bajaj Auto with its large presence in Pune, are distributing it to their staff.

Regarding the message circulating about Arsenic Album 30, yes, it was recommended in end of January by our AYUSH ministry and the Central Council of Research in Homeopathy.
I believe that now, in middle of May, groups of homeopathic physicians are in talks with the government, regarding distributing of this remedy to the Mumbai Police Force.

Different doctors have suggested different things – how many suggestions are we going to follow?

In Pune, they’re using Camphora 1M, in Mumbai they’re planning on giving all police force Arsenic Album 30.
In Italy, Camphora did not work as preventive. In Iran it may have.

Would a remedy work as a preventive?

There is a group of about 10-12 remedies that we are finding useful to treat the Covid symptom picture. Different strains of the virus may be creating different intensities of the problem, also, the patient’s own state of health, presence or absence of co-morbidities, is very important in determining how Covid affects the person and to what extent it creates complications.

A remedy would work as a preventive on someone, if that person was going to develop that same kind of picture when affected by Covid. A remedy with a very different picture would not work.

Hence it gets difficult to say what remedy can be used as a sure-fire preventive in a large population where there are individuals of all different levels of health.

For eg., Camphora is known to be able to treat a condition where the patient is in a state of collapse, where vital functions are shutting down, etc. Hence, for those people who have a poor state of health, co-morbidities, high risk individuals, etc., it might work as a preventive IF those people were going to manifest a Camphora picture when they caught the COVID infection. On anyone else, it may not work.

Similarly, different remedies would work as preventives on different members of the population… it would be incorrect to say that one or two remedies would work as preventives for entire populations.

If and when someone were to start developing symptoms, that is the best time to start homeopathic treatment to nip the infection in the bud, which can be done, when the picture the patient develops can be matched with the corresponding remedy.

Hope this helps!

Jan 21st 2014.

A controversy is raging in India at this point in time over whether homeopaths should be allowed to practice allopathy after a 1 year bridge course in Pharmacology. The Courts have given permission but the allopathic associations are up in arms against in and will probably move court against it.

In today’s Mumbai Mirror, part of The Times of India group, an article by Dr. Altaf Patel was published – Admission of Failure – this article tries to imply that homeopaths want to practice allopathy because they see the failure of alternative systems of medicine.  The article reeks of bias and hence I felt the need to respond to it. I have posted the same comments on Mumbai Mirror’s website, we shall see if the newspaper will publish a contrary view.

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With due respect to Dr. Patel’s views, I have to differ. There are several angles to this issue, hence it is inappropriate to say that failure of alternative systems of medicine make homeopaths want to practice allopathy.

I will first introduce myself by saying that I am a homeopath and proud to be one. I joined my homeopathic college (despite having the required percentage for entry to government/municipal MBBS colleges)  because I wanted to study homeopathy – I grew up with homeopathic medicines and I know what they can achieve when well-practised.  Saying that, I also know that a majority of students join homeopathic colleges because they have missed admission to MBBS colleges.

Regarding course study, homeopaths study all the subjects an MBBS student studies except Pharmacology. We have homeopathic subjects in addition – which are very detailed subjects; hence I would actually conclude that the homeopathic course is more intensive than the MBBS course. Homeopathy is a system of medicine (I refuse to call it alternative) that seeks to cure a person’s ailments from the root. Real cure; which is very different from just palliation or suppression that is the mainstay of allopathic treatment.  It is easy to mask symptoms and troubles with strong chemical drugs; bringing about an inner real resolution of health problems by safe energy medicine is much more difficult and challenging.

It is a sad fact that many homeopaths do not want to take up that challenge. It is an easy way out to practice allopathy and earn their money. It may also be reflective of the quality of homeopathic education outside larger cities. It is probable that colleges in small towns are unable to impart enough skills and knowledge to fledgling homeopaths. Since good homeopathy is difficult to practice,  this probably leaves a lot of homeopathic graduates in the lurch, unable to practice good homeopathy and hence unable to earn decent money. This makes them want the alternative of practising as allopathic GPs which is not that difficult with average pharmacology knowledge. (I am not talking about the extra skills and knowledge that a post-graduate allopath acquires after many years of dedication and hard work).

Dr. Patel writes that he does not see allopaths wanting to practise homeopathy or other systems of medicine. Again I need to differ. The founder of the homeopathic system of medicine was an allopath to start with, who quit allopathic practice because his conscience did not allow him to continue. Even today, there are plenty of allopathically qualified physicians in India and abroad who, having an open mind and a strong conscience, have chosen, voluntarily to learn and practice homeopathy because they find it a superior system of medicine to bring about true healing.  There are also plenty of allopaths who refer patients to homeopaths when they feel the need. In fact, Dr. Patel would be well-advised to contact some of them and discuss pros and cons of different systems of medicine before making biased blanket statements.

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UPDATE:

Well, they did publish it as comment on the article web page. There are some other worthy replies there –

http://www.mumbaimirror.com/columns/columnists/dr-altaf-patel/Admission-of-failure/articleshow/29124304.cms

As a homeopath, I oppose the bridge course which is being contemplated for practitioners of homeopathy and other AYUSH (Ayurveda, Unani, Siddhi and Homeopathy) streams. The bridge course will allow AYUSH practitioners in India to practise basic conventional medicine. Here are my thoughts on this and I write it from the point of view of homeopathy being my field of medicine:

1. We have a very effective and strong system of medicine ourselves, so why do we need to prescribe conventional medicine? In an emergency, if life-saving conventional treatment is needed (if the homeopath is not skilled or confident enough of treating it), patients can go to trained doctors in that field. The bridge course is not going to provide high-level ER training in any case.

2. It is said that the reason the government is planning this move is because there are insufficient doctors in rural areas and people living in such places have no access to healthcare. Fine. Why does rural India need conventional treatment only? Why can’t the other systems of medicine be practised there? In fact, this is a good chance to show, in comparative terms, how the other systems of medicine contribute positively to healthcare.

3. This bridge course is not going to help the cause of AYUSH. As students and young practitioners, many want to practise conventional medicine because of status and the perception of higher incomes. It is also a fact that to be a good homeopathic physician, one needs a great level of skill which only comes with hard work and constant learning. It is not as easy as prescribing ‘this for that’. Hence, this bridge course will serve as a back-door entry to conventional medicine practice and will be an escape route to avoid putting in the effort needed to be good homeopaths. Over time, this will reduce the number of skilled homeopaths and will be a dangerous matter for the future progress of our system of medicine. I presume the same would be the case for the other AYUSH streams.

4. Pharmaceutical companies will be very happy at the increase in their profits by getting lakhs of more practitioners who will prescribe their medicines.

5. As it is, conventional medicines unfortunately have loads of side effects. We regularly see patients in our practices, who come for problems and actual diseases that have arisen due to some side-effects of conventional therapy. It is possible that the AYUSH practitioner will be easily blamed for every side-effect that a patient suffers from. The side-effect will be attributed, not to the chemical drug which is actually responsible, but to a lack of skill in the AYUSH practitioner.

6. As a final point, let the Government ensure that every student receives good training and practical experience before they venture out as physicians. Let every physician develop the skill, and practise the field of medicine they were trained in. As homeopaths, let us not forget that we have the possibility of doing great things to improve the lives of our patients, bringing cure in so-many problematic chronic cases, and yes, we have the ability to be life-savers as well, if sufficiently skilled in our science. And this satisfies the soul. Isn’t it worth it?

 

In recent times, when several countries have clamped down on the rights and freedom of individuals to make choices for the health of themselves and their children, lots of articles have been circulating, accusing non-vaccinated populations for spreading diseases.

Fear-mongering is one of the easiest ways to scare a population into vaccinating. Hardly anyone questions motives or seeks data on what vaccines do or do not do.

The fact that vaccine manufacturers have been given immunity from any lawsuits resulting from vaccine damage is mind boggling. When Mc Donalds can be sued over a cup of hot coffee, vaccine maunfacturers cannot be sued for lifetime damage or even death resulting from vaccines. The US government has a VAERS program, Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, and data shows that millions are paid out every year for vaccine damage in cases where it has been conclusively proved that damage resulted from the vaccines. However, the government payout occurs from tax payers’ money, so the vaccine manufacturers laugh their way to the bank, with no motivation to make vaccines any safer.

Tetyana Obukhanych, Ph.D., came to the USA from Ukraine to pursie her education. In 2006, she defended her Ph.D. thesis in Immunology at the Rockefeller University, New York, NY. She subsequently held postdoctoral research training appointments in prominent immunology laboratories affiliated with Harvard Medical School and Stanford University School of Medicine.  In 2015, she became a Founding Director of Physicians for Informed Consent, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to safeguarding informed consent in vaccination and educating the public on infectious disease and the immune system.

Dr. Obukhanych’s personal reason to start questioning vaccination programs began with her desire to gain clarity about why she ended up contracting childhood diseases for which she was fully vaccinated.  Indoctrinated to believe that the equivalence of vaccine immunity and naturally-acquired immunity has been scientifically established, Dr. Obukhanych nevertheless took a “second” look at the relevant scientific findings.  Her e-book Vaccine Illusion articulates a view that challenges mainstream assumptions and theories of lifelong vaccine immunity.

Her personal journey from disillusionment with the vaccination paradigm toward embracing the immune system care paradigm has motivated her to lecture at conferences and educational events throughout the USA and Canada.  Dr. Obukhanych’s mission is to promote the understanding of the immune system’s optimal function for benign resolution of infections, thereby preventing health complications and deaths from infectious diseases.

My first introduction to Dr. Tetyana Obukhanych was from reading an article of hers on someone’s blog.  Here, she has written an open letter explaining why unvaccinated children pose no risk to their vaccinated counterparts.

http://asheepnomore.net/2017/05/15/harvard-unvaccinated-children-pose-zero-risk/

On her website, I have found links to some more articles of interest in connection with vaccination –

http://www.tetyanaobukhanych.com/articles/my-journey-of-disillusionment

http://www.tetyanaobukhanych.com/herd_immunity.html

http://www.tetyanaobukhanych.com/tetanus_shot.html

Worth reading!

As I always say, everyone has the right to make informed decisions – coerced decisions encroach on one’s fundamental rights.

 

More than a year has passed since I made the blog post on the use of papaya leaf juice for curing dengue.

Time for an update!

During this period, I have myself needed to use papaya leaf juice for what was probably dengue. I did not undergo the blood test for dengue but all the symptoms pointed to it. My Complete Blood Count showed a drop in platelets, a drop in the White Blood Cell count and a raised Haemoglobin count; all of which pointed to probable dengue. 5 days of papaya leaf juice followed. I took it twice a day for 3 days and then once a day for 2 more days. The fever was gone by day 1 of the Papaya Leaf juice therapy, probably because I was already taking homeopathy for it.

Making papaya leaf juice

Making papaya leaf juice

We (my husband was a BIG help at this time – I felt incredibly weak) used 2 leaves at a time, getting fresh leaves everyday. After washing the dust off the leaves, we would break off small bits of the leaves, removing the bigger veins. Once this was done, we found it best to put them into a grinder, running it for just 2-3 seconds, just so that they were finely chopped. Then we put them into a damp muslin cloth; (adding a sprinkling of water to them, so that it got easier to squeeze. When we tried it completely dry, we were unable to get any juice out.) Then holding it over a bowl, we would squeeze it as best as we could to get the juice out. About 2 desert spoons of juice is enough. It’s bitter like hell, but worth it! At the end of 5 days, I almost missed it!

Some say that the leaves have to be from a ‘female’ tree or a fruit-bearing tree. I don’t know what tree was used for the leaves I got. Some said the leaves have to be young and tender; I used whatever was available – a few times I got young tender small leaves, some times I got big dark green leaves. I think all of them work. Many of the studies I read mentioned no specific type of tree or leaves.

Over this year, I have recommended this method to several patients suffering from Dengue – this has worked every time. So it’s best to find and keep in mind where your nearest papaya tree grows! Just in case!!

(Also published on the author’s other blog – www.firuzi.hpathy.com)

ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) is a topic that concerns and interests me, esp. since I have quite a few children who come to me for homeopathic treatment as referrals from a school counsellor. Very often, I find that the counsellor herself does not believe that these kids have ADHD but just regular behavioural issues. To prevent these kids from being put onto ADHD medication, this wise counsellor refers them for homeopathy.

Unfortunately, the schools seem to be putting the parents under a lot of pressure to have these kids seen by a psychiatrist and then put onto medication for ADHD. Initially, one of the psychiatrists even argued with the school about holding off on medication as far as possible. However, his present stand seems to be to put the kids on medication. As he tells the parents, “If your child does not have ADHD, the drugs won’t work and then you can stop medication.” From all my reading, I do not think that this is what will happen. Even if the child does not have ADHD, these drugs will show an initial improvement in the symptoms of restlessness, lack of focus and concentration, etc. These drugs will work on anyone and have some kind of initial beneficial result. Why else would the US armed forces be giving these to their cadets? It is not possible that their cadets all have ADHD!

It is sad that schools nowadays lack teachers who can cope with different children. For the sake of ease and convenience of the teachers and the school, children are being put onto medication unnecessarily so that they comply. Pharmaceutical companies promote medication in their own interests and advise doctors accordingly. It would be truly disheartening to believe that a huge number of doctors are hand-in-glove with the companies and hence medicate children. It is possible that doctors, either from being too busy or from trust in the companies, remain ignorant about the ill-effects of these drugs and the absence of any long-term benefit despite a myriad studies and experience with their patients.

In such a scenario, widespread awareness is the need of the day.

Here is an article which strikes the right chord –

http://www.naturalnews.com/023334_child_children_brain.html

Sometimes, I find such articles an exaggeration but this one seems to be spot on. Get aware.

Acetaminophen, also known as Paracetamol, is a commonly used drug in modern medicine, which has been considered ‘safe’ even for children in normal dosage. New studies are raising some questions about its safety and long-term ill-effects.

In the last 30 years there has been a dramatic rise in the incidence of childhood asthma and this has perplexed doctors, scientists and researchers alike.
This increase in incidence was noticed soon after doctors stopped using Aspirin (because it was causing Reye’s Syndrome in children) regularly and started using Acetaminophen instead.

An initial paper published in 1998 suggested the use of acetaminophen to be causing increased asthma in children. Over time, more than 20 studies have reached the same conclusion, with data of over 200,000 children being analysed.

In November 2011, Dr. John T. McBride, a pediatrician at Akron Children’s Hospital in Ohio, published a paper in the journal Pediatrics arguing that the evidence for a link between acetaminophen and asthma is now strong enough. He now explains how acetaminophen might provoke or worsen asthma. Researchers found that even a single dose of acetaminophen can reduce the body’s levels of glutathione, a peptide that helps repair oxidative damage that can drive inflammation in the airways. Acetaminophen causes increased bronchial constriction and wheezing.

This association linking acetaminophen with asthma is consistent across age, geography and culture. Studies also found an increased risk of asthma in children whose mothers who took acetaminophen during pregnancy. A big analysis in 2008 found that children who had taken acetaminophen for a fever during the first year of life had a 50 percent greater risk of developing asthma symptoms, compared with children who had not taken the drug. The risk rose with increasing use — children who had taken acetaminophen at least once a month had a threefold increase in the risk of asthma symptoms.

This leads us to question the use of this drug. Are parents unknowingly, in their haste to quell even mild fevers, pushing their children towards a chronic disease like asthma? Parents do it unknowingly. Doctors often do it despite knowing. Are pharma incentives worth turning a blind eye to the welfare of patients?

I hope this study and all the preceding ones will not be pooh-poohed by the Pharma companies who will come up with some other study (sponsored by themselves and hence baised) refuting these.

May knowledge and awareness prevail.

References:

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/11/04/peds.2011-1106.abstract?rss=1


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/20/health/evidence-mounts-linking-acetaminophen-and-asthma.html

http://chestjournal.chestpubs.org/content/127/2/604.full

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/08/13/acetaminophen.may.double.asthma.risk/index.html

http://debbybruck.hubpages.com/hub/Fosamax-Drug-Effects-Causing-Severe-Femur-Fractures-Brittle-Bones

Ever since drugs to combat osteoporosis started being prescribed, I began to wonder whether they would not be interfering with the normal bone health regulation cycle. Healthy bone is, at all times, being built and remodelled; old bone cells being killed within the body. Osteoblasts are the bone building cells and osteoclasts are the cells that take away old cells, unhealthy cells and hence help to remodel bone tissue. As age progresses, the bone building activity reduces, hence the breakdown of bone cells takes on a predominant role.

Drugs for osteoporosis inhibit the activity of osteoclasts. Common sense then tells me that under the influence of these drugs, healthy bone remodelling will not occur as it should. Old bone cells, unhealthy bone cells will not get destroyed as they should. Could this even lead to an increase in bone cancers? If there is a major reduction in osteoclastic activity, bone might then get too dense and rigid, lacking the amount of elasticity that it needs; this can then make the bones hard and brittle, thus increasing the risk of fractures after even slight trauma.

Studies are now showing that the osteoporosis drugs ARE in fact, leading to more brittle bones and more fractures. The excessive calcium deposits are leading to eye problems, heart ailments and embolic stroke.

To read more details, please click on this link

http://debbybruck.hubpages.com/hub/Fosamax-Drug-Effects-Causing-Severe-Femur-Fractures-Brittle-Bones

Last year, in November 13, 2010, the prestigious Journal of Rheumatology published an article with the following heading:

“Homeopathy has clinical benefits in rheumatoid arthritis patients that are attributable to the consultation process but not the homeopathic remedy”.

http://rheumatology.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2010/11/08/rheumatology.keq234.abstract

World famous Greek homeopath, George Vithoulkas responded with an answer to Rheumatology Journal but they refused to publish it.

The article was then sent to another peer review journal “HOMEOPATHY” and here is the answer for those who are interested in defending homeopathy and understanding the truth.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1475491611000555

Now, the answer to Rheumatology Journal by Prof. Vithoulkas is available through the website of the International Academy of Classical Homeopathy.

http://www.vithoulkas.com/images/stories/Articles/letter_to_the_editor_homeopathy_rheumatology.pdf

I had put up this fantastic article as one of my health resources and to my dismay I found that the original article has been removed from the internet. The author has been hounded and no wonder!

My tech-savvy husband showed me the website waybackmachine.org from which I could find a cached copy of the article.
So here it is, uploaded as a pdf.
Dr. Andrew Moulden’s Interview – What You Were Never Told About Vaccines _ vactruth

All parents need to read this and take informed decisions about vaccination.