Forget hi-tech cures and dig out Granny's recipe

This article was first published around the year 2004

The heir to the throne, hardly a stranger to controversy, is being publicly told off once again, this time for his promotion of alternative medicine. The rebuke comes in a week when Gwyneth Paltrow, ever the celebrity fashion leader, is accessorizing her boob tubes with this moment’s must-have - a string of Chinese "cupping" blotches.

Prince Charles has recently established his own Foundation for Integrated Health and has urged the NHS to offer both orthodox and complementary treatment under one roof.

As a result, Professor Michael Baum, a leading breast cancer specialist, has erupted in fury in an open letter to the Prince in the latest British Medical Journal. The professor really has a go, accusing the Prince of abusing his power. The power which comes from "an accident of birth" he fumes as he denounces Charles. (So, there goes his OBE, then.) "He hasn’t changed his tune in 20 years," the professor states. "He is still promoting the same unproven remedies."

Scientific proof, medical evidence, clinical trials... Aren’t these the medical magic words which used to convince us that doctor knows best? But we’re not so gullible now, are we? Now that hardly a week goes by without a nasty little tale popping up in the press about the said medical science and scientific proof. MMR, that troublesome vaccine launched on us after a trial, as a combination, of... oh... several weeks, wasn’t it? Or how about the anti-depressant Seroxat? Clinical trials which apparently showed it made teenagers suicidal (I’d say that’s pretty depressed) were covered up.

We should never, never underestimate the pressure medical researchers are under to get their work funded and the pressure the drug manufacturers are under to get their new medicines trialed, licensed, patented and out there in every chemist shop across the globe. Of course, the ‘alternatives’ remain ‘unproven’. Which drug company is going to pay for clinical trials of the alternatives? What if fasting on carrot juice turns out to cure cancer? No one’s going to make any money from that, are they?

Hardly anyone these days doesn’t at least dabble with complementary therapies - Echinacea and Aconite for colds, osteopathy and yoga for bad backs, massage for stress, banana peel for verrucas.

It is absolutely bigoted for a leading doctor to dismiss the wealth of wisdom held within the wide umbrella term ‘alternative’. And isn’t good science all about making leaps and trying out some pretty far out theories? Injecting yourself with a cowpox vaccine or medicine made of the mold must once have seemed very alternative. Many ‘orthodox’ wonder drugs - Aspirin and Tamoxifen for instance - are chemical copies of plant medicines. There is so many Western doctors do learn from the long and venerable traditions of Chinese medicine and Asian ayurvedic medicine. Both of these disciplines - from my slim understanding of them - treat the body as a whole, rather than in isolated parts, and treat patients as individual cases.

Surely therein lies the problem. Detailed case studies need to be made, doctors have to know their patient, understand the patient’s constitution, history, diet, and lifestyle. How much easier to have a seven-minute appointment and issue a one-remedy-fits-all prescription. And it’s so convenient for our hectic modern lifestyles to take a symptom suppressant rather than get to the root cause of an illness.

Also, just as the art of home cooking threatens to be lost forever, so does the art of home nursing. Babies and children were once carefully nursed through fevers, rather than dosed with paracetamol (over-use can cause liver damage and has now been linked to asthma, but it doesn’t say that in the Calpol ads does it?). You used to die at home of old age, rather than in hospital being treated for something incurable.

There was a whole range of kitchen remedies: garlic, pepper, honey, lemon, ice, hot water, kaolin poultice, camomile tea, even brandy, which our great grandmothers would have used with confidence and to good effect. Previous generations nursed their families through all kinds of illnesses, held measles parties to ‘catch it young’, delivered babies in bedrooms and only called for the ‘bone setter’ in an emergency. Well, for surgery really, because this is the one area in which Western medicine excels. Shame about the superbugs though.

Not convinced? Here’s a fun statistic for you: In the US, a 2001 survey of 994 hospitals showed the leading cause of death wasn’t cancer (553,251 deaths), or heart disease (699,697), it was medical drugs, surgery, or medical procedures (783,936).

Prince Charles is a strapping 55-year-old, who is only ever in the hospital when he’s fallen off his stallion in the polo field. He has two equally radiant-with-vitality sons, so I’m taking all the health tips he offers

For regular English Lessons follow: https://planetenglishonly.blogspot.com/