How to Improve Medicine.
The contemporary medical approach to understanding health is rooted in an industrial-era mentality. We need to abandon blind love of synthetic instruments.
Background
Sometimes my work can get on a bit of a critical streak. But, criticizing is easy. We need solutions. After one of many extended conversations on the issue, my brother recently asked how I would 'reinvent' medical education. I replied that I do not think it needs 'reinventing,' per se - more like, updating. Although, his point is taken, and sometimes I think a complete reconstruction is warranted.
The contemporary medical approach to understanding health is rooted in an industrial-era mentality. The apparent admiration with which society & government have accepted the products of our pharmaceutical industry is dizzying.
The sheer contrast between what I was taught
...wait 7 years after FDA approval,
to what I was accused of,
if you oppose mandating this EUA novel drug, you are an anti-vaxxer.
It is almost as if we are stuck in a World War I-era infatuation with technologic innovation. Blinded by this naive optimism, we cannot see the ways in which these revolutions have been co-opted by duplicitous interests.
Every industry, including food...
...household items...
...and, of course, medicine.
In addition to several technological revolutions that catapulted the early-20th century, there were also shifts in marketing campaigns. Major chemical manufacturers began to rebrand themselves as 'Pharmaceutical' companies to ally themselves with healthcare - an industry with a potentially endless source of revenue given the increasing Western demand for taxpayer-funded healthcare & research. In fact, many of the major modern pharmaceutical companies started out as chemical manufacturers - Novartis, for example.
Take a chemical manufacturer and pair it with a transportation & logistics company, and voilà - you have a legal drug cartel. But, I digress...
The awe with which we received products of the industrial revolution was used to convince us of the wonders of modern pharmacy. Whereas the world of naturally occurring medicine was relegated to naturopathy, alternative medicine and supplements.
Rise of Medical Industry
This Rockefeller Foundation-driven initiative decided to rebrand the oldest & wisest medical traditions as "alternative," whilst insisting that the modern allopathic medical practice (MDs) is the one true path. Below is a great tweet-thread on the history.
Unfortunately for the pharmaceutical industry, most success stories of synthetic medicine have their roots in naturally occurring substances: Penicillin, Insulin, Aspirin, Ivermectin, and even anti-depressants.
Pharmacology aims to substitute the naturally evolved and infinitely complex medicines of mother nature (such as avermectin) with a synthetic blunt instrument.
Problem with Pharmacy
Pharmaceutical research often tries to reduce the complexity of natural medicine to a single mechanism of action, and produce drugs in high concentrations with a limited window of therapeutic efficacy. This unnaturally potent substance is developed in parallel with research that monitors the potential toxic and lethal effects of such a concoction.
Natural medicines tend to be less potent, and confer a benefit over a longer period of time. Maybe - that's how it's supposed to be.
Maybe, you aren't supposed to perturb the complex homeostatic balance your body has achieved with a devastatingly disruptive synthetic drug.
As a result, these blunt instruments tend to come with more side effects. They tend to be less comprehensive (and more focused) in their therapeutic benefits, and simultaneously less sensitive to the needs of the bodies which ingest them.
They also tend to be more expensive - and consequently, have more advertising dollars behind them.
Your immune system is a little too active? Let's not concern ourselves with the underlying cause - just take these steroids!
Oh, the steroids are waning in efficacy? No problem! We have even more potent immunosuppressive drugs!
It isn't looking good for blunt instruments, unless you are a profit-monger.
If you are still not convinced of the futility of modern pharmaceuticals, which has now entered into the era of altering the genetic makeup of the host (i.e. CRISPR)...let's think about this another way.
It seems to me that health is a state which depends on the harmony and compatibility between the subject (the person) and the object (its environment). That environment can consist of anything from the food you eat to the drugs you take, and even the thoughts you have. Whatever your physiology can interact with, we can consider the environment.
It is for this reason that it is far healthier to consume naturally occurring animal fat, than industrially processed vegetable oils.
Just look at what has to happen to a sunflower seed to become this concoction we've allowed to be called vegetable oil. Is it any wonder that seed oils (and polyunsaturated fatty acids) are deleterious to our health? Look at the intensity of the energy stored in the creation of this oil. There isn't a single naturally occurring thing about it.
Thus, it should come as no surprise that it is not compatible with organ physiology.
Check out this prior article for a full description of how PUFAs harm our bodies:
The same applies to something like Paxlovid, a drug recently given emergency use authorization - you know, cause there’s still an emergency going on.
Paxlovid aims to provide an effective early treatment option for people with covid. But, there are already several naturally sourced or derived generic options on the market, that are being actively diminished by the mainstream, regulators, and their academic cronies:
In contrast to Paxlovid, none of the generic & fringe-supported drugs are demonstrating a recurring pattern of 'rebound covid-19.' Rebound covid-19 is when the person gets sick(er) soon after feeling better - which is what is happening to people who take Paxlovid. It recently happened to St. Fauci himself, who (allegedly) took the new drug.
But, of course, Pfizer's crack team of marketers (at the CDC & NIH) are suggesting we need to take more Paxlovid.
The problem isn't that this new garbage drug is harmful - we just aren't taking enough! Duh!
How to Improve Medicine (?)
I recognize that I haven't yet pointed out a solution to improving medicine, but I hope the problem has been adequately illustrated.
When I said that we don't need to re-invent medicine...what I meant was that the art, tradition & practice of medicine that has developed over millennia is a sufficient starting point, and simply needs updating.
Unfortunately, this ancient art of medicine is not the same as current western Medicine. Western Medicine is taught as de facto medicine - all other schools of thought are either accessory or inadequate.
I propose we re-define what is considered the de facto practice of medicine, and relegate western medicine to a niche occupied primarily by the priests of medical industry. It certainly has its benefits in some situations, but equally lacks a unified & harmonious understanding of the human body.
To illustrate that final point, I'd like to share a passage from the book Healing from the Source by Dr. Yeshi Dhonden:
Let us briefly examine the functions of each of the seven bodily constituents and the three waste products. Blood is produced from the nutriment of the food and drink that one ingests. Blood has the function of supplying moisture to the body, it is of primary importance for sustaining the life-force, and it allows for the growth of the flesh, which fills out the body.
Fat lubricates the body, and the function of the bone is to supply a firmness and structure to the body. The function of the bone marrow is to provide the vital essences for the body, which are closely linked to the body's vitality.
The regenerative substances (the sperm and the ovum) have two functions, they give the body its luster, and they are instrumental for procreation.
As for the three waste products, excrement has the function of retaining the subsequent residues in the intestines so that partially digested food is not expelled prematurely. Urine has a similar twofold function with respect to fluid waste products. And finally sweat has the two functions of providing pliancy to the skin and of supporting the growth and maintenance of hair.
The above passage is an excerpt from an introductory chapter on the science and lore of Tibetan Medicine. What struck me about this book was the narrative structure around the understanding of body and health.
This ancient practice depends on far more than just knowing cellular physiology, anatomy, and pharmacology. They have an elaborate story which takes into account the complexity of life & living.
Medicine needs to return to the root of life:
What is the flesh of the body?
What is the purpose of eating?
What are the interactions within and outside our cells that impact our health?
How do our thoughts impact our physiology?
What about our relationships?
These are questions that western Medicine is not concerned with. The questions I hear every day are something like this:
What is the chief complaint?
Is she up-to-date on her vaccinations?
Should we put this person on aspirin & statins?
Have they had their screening colonoscopy?
To conclude, I humbly ask the reader to consider:
Why support synthetic blunt instruments?
They are less compatible & harmonious with life than the natural alternatives with which we evolved. Just like the seed oils, the synthetic instruments of western Medicine are too 'refined' and processed for them to have strictly benign and comprehensive effects on the body.
We need to abandon blind love of synthetic instruments.
We need to elaborate on our understanding of health and life.
Only then can we update medicine.
It often seems to be, 'this person wants us to do something symbolic to give the illusion of fixing an unfixable problem -- what prescription can we write so they feel like something has happened?'
Like the modern equivalent of lost rituals, with less attractive interior decoration.
Now imagine if these chemical companies combine with a programmable digital currency, your income and ability to participate in society dependent upon you taking your bimonthly mRNA multiboosters.