jmg@houxk.UUCP (10/15/83)
Steve Dyer apparently likes to misquote those he disagrees with and then refute the obviously flawed concocted misquotes. Anyone who cares to read my article without prejudice clouding his vision will see that I never used the words "wanton removal of organs" which he put in quotation marks in his response. And I never suggested that anyone should suspend their medical therapy. Thank God everyone in this free society has the right to decide what will be done to their body. And we don't send people to insane asylums for expressing unpopular viewpoints - you have to go to the USSR for that kind of thought control. The harmlessness and flexibility of the macrobiotic diet is that it can be used without interrupting standard medical therapy, but we all know of instances where all treatment is withheld from large groups of people in control groups when our medical system experiments with a new form of therapy is tried. I know you agree that, Steve. Have fun with your next set of misquotes!
smb@ulysses.UUCP (Steven Bellovin) (10/15/83)
> From: jmg@houxk.UUCP (J.MCGHEE) > Subject: Misquotes > Message-ID: <106@houxk.UUCP> > Date: Fri, 14-Oct-83 17:25:26 EDT > > .... And I never suggested that anyone should suspend their > medical therapy. Let me include your exact words: What could be dangerous to someone under a death sentence from cancer? And I've never heard of macrobiotic people wanting to cut organs out of people. Isn't that much more dangerous and debilitating than a beneficial (according to U.S. Government publications and studies) change in diet? I find it reasonable to infer from this that at least some proponents of a macrobiotic diet feel that (a) removal of organs is dangerous and debilitating; (b) feel that it is purposeless (since these people are "under a death sentence"); and hence (c) is wanton -- do you have a better word? I agree that quote marks should be reserved for exact quotations, of course, but I don't think Steve Dyer's reading of your article was incorrect. As for "suspend[ing] their medical therapy" -- some proponents of macrobiotic treatment of cancer do indeed advocate that; they claim that removal of organs is "dangerous and debilitating", and that radiation burns healthy tissues, and that chemotherapy poisons people. All of these claims are obviously correct -- if you don't consider the tradeoff between an unpleasant course of treatment and a painful death. Modern medical practice on treatment of cancer is very conservative; doctors will remove as much tissue as they think necessary to guarantee that they've removed all of the cancerous cells. As new, and less drastic, treatments are shown to be effective, they're adopted. Treatment of breast cancer has moved (in some cases) from radical mastectomies to simple mastectomies to lumpectomies -- depending on the the patient's exact condition, and the confidence the doctor has in the less agressive forms of therapy. The latest figures I've seen put the aggregate 5-year cure rate for all forms of cancer at close to 50% -- an impressive change from 20 years ago. So much for death sentences. > The harmlessness and flexibility of the macrobiotic diet is that > it can be used without interrupting standard medical therapy, but we all > know of instances where all treatment is withheld from large groups of > people in control groups when our medical system experiments with a new > form of therapy is tried. You raise on interesting point of ethics: how do you suggest we assess the validity of any proposed treatment. Current practice calls for convincing data from animal experimentation before any human trials are instituted; when there is sufficient data to warrant it, a trial is conducted on human volunteers. If appropriate, this trial is on terminally ill patients, who, as you have noted, have little to risk. Granted, some patients are not given this new form of treatment. On the other hand, there is no assurance that it actually does anything, or that the side effects won't be more lethal. But how do you know, and how do you form any sort of rational judgement without such tests? I confess, I'm quite uncom- fortable with the process, but I don't know of any alternative. Uncontolled studies are too vulnerable to coincidence and wishful thinking -- as has been demonstrated many times before. I'm not claiming that this model is always followed; everyone knows that it isn't. The most notorious violation of it was the famous Tuskegee syphillis experiment, where a group of black men was denied even the medications available at the time. Far worse, when penicillin became available and was known to be useful, the study was continued! I regard such behavior as criminal. (Those interested in this sordid story can read "Bad Blood", which came out about two years ago.) On the other hand, a recent study on treating heart attack victims was interrupted early because the researchers found that results were so dramatic that it was unethical to withhold the drug (an anticoagulant, I believe) from anyone. Let me ask you this. You claim that macrobiotic diets are useful in treating cancer. (Incidentally, I agree that many elements of the macro- biotic diet are useful in preventing cancer, though I have my doubts about fried foods -- the frying process seems likely to produce nitrosamines. But we're talking here about treatment, not prevention.) I claim that more conventional medical techniques -- surgery, chemotherapy, and radio- therapy -- are more useful. How do you suggest that our disagreement be resolved? --Steve Bellovin