Hilary's Desk

There are none so blind as those who appear to be control freaks.  Peter Gluckman’s words - “For the first time ever, we have a way of working out what mothers should eat” – were considered worthy of the subtext box front page of the paper version of the Herald on Tuesday. You have to wonder why.  Here’s the online version.  Read Full Blog

Yesterday, in discussing the cozy relationship of the medical profession with big pharma while paying lip service to nutrition, I remembered an old book I have on this topic.  It's quaint title is, "Intestinal Gardening for the Prolongation of Youth". It was written by Dr James Empringham, and published in 1926.  It's fascinating; makes me chuckle, and roll my eyes at the same time.  Why?  Because it shows just how insular the average doctor was.  And by proxy, still is.  Much of what he writes is just plain common sense, which us fruitloops have long been wise to.  There are a few interesting gems in this book, so have a gander at this lot: Read Full Blog

Open Letter to the Hon Minister of Health, Tony Ryall,  Dear Mr Ryall,  We realise that health policy is determined by your advisors, but we believe that it's time for you to independently do some research on Pubmed, Google Scholar and apply some commonsense to the escalating industry entrenchment around the expensive testing for and treatment of rheumatic fever.  What most concerns us is the apparent reading and research deficit suffered by the New Zealand medical profession regarding rheumatic fever, resulting in employment of chemical solutions rather than application of meaningful preventive strategies which if enacted would not only prevent rheumatic fever, but a whole raft of other medical conditions as well. Read Full Blog

In his book, "How Doctor's Think", Dr Jerome Groopman describes an ultrasound doctor, who detects in a baby, inside a woman 5 weeks from giving birth, a strange shaped space inside the baby's brain which should look like a tear-drop with sharp edges, but just doesn't look quite right.  Not badly wrong, but just not quite right. Because the shape is pretty near normal, she almost doesn't tell the mother.  Two things change her mind. She wants to protect any obstetrician from being charged with causing damage to a baby, should it turn into something significant... and she also thinks parents should know in advance in case they need to consider the realities of bringing up a damaged child. The mother has an MRI, and a brain haemorrhage in the baby is discovered, so the birth is attended by paediatric neurologists.  Read Full Blog

It never ceases to amaze me, when people who put themselves out as scientists, display woeful researching skills, and appear not to hear what is said on programmes they criticise. Peter Griffin at Sciblogs had this to say about the 60 Minutes documentary “Living Proof”. Amongst his various ramblings, he misses the fact that experts were asked to comment.. but refused. He also asked heaps of redundant questions:   Read Full Blog

It’s mind numbing to me, that in 2010, the medical system would still expound this myth. Oy Vey. But so we read, “Study looks at why mum’s kiss is good for baby”; “Sterile when they are born, babies inherited bacteria from their main carer, usually their mother” … right there, the fundamental premis, which underpins this study, is not supported by the medical literature.  Read Full Blog

The telephone rings. It’s someone with a fully vaccinated child, whose kid has earache. Again. And was prescribed antibiotics. Again. Did the doctor run tests to see what it was? No. So let’s toss an antibiotic napalm bomb into a kid, which will nuke what good bacteria there are that have a job to do in keeping bad bacteria under control. Dumb, dumb and dumber. But this is “infectious disease” medicine we are talking about. And it has been this way for decades, and its time it stopped. Read Full Blog

You read that right. It comes right at the end of an astonishing article talking about how the 1976 Swine flu vaccine, (which never needed to be used in the first place, and was stopped because it caused serious neurological damage in recipients) produced really good levels of functional antibodies... However, the 2009 H1N1 vaccine did not. But here's the irony of it all... Point out one "good" thing about a needless vaccine, and accidentally admit that the current, also needless, swine flu vaccine  ---  is rubbish. Read Full Blog

The medical system knows that the flu data is misleading, but that doesn’t matter. They will do each other a good turn at every possible opportunity. So Professor Robert Scragg, who co-authored this paper which shows that vitamin D deficiency is the driver  as to whether or not anyone gets influenza at all, isn’t going to stand up and say, “Don’t worry about the flu vaccine. Just make sure your doctor prescribes 12 wee vitamin D tablets, which will cost you $3.20 at the pharmacy, and you take one a month. This will stop you getting the flu.” But no. See, Dr Scragg is immovably pro-vaccine. Though I’d be surprised if he takes the annual flu vaccine. Read Full Blog

Yesterday, in the Far North, Dr Jonathan Jarman had high blood pressure because he feared that 28 cases of measles in the last two months, in pakeha homeschooling, alternative life stylers in Hokianga, could trigger measles cases and deaths left, right and centre. His advice to health workers was to bail up everyone unvaccinated, born after 1969, and shoot’em up with an MMR vaccine, and to rope in anyone who hadn’t had an MMR, and see to it that they were injected. Not in that kind of language, but given information passed on from Kerikeri, the hard word tactics have already started.  Read Full Blog