Only a few years ago, measles – a potentially lethal disease – were deemed to be almost eradicated. Now we hear that, in the UK and the US, cases of measles have been rising again. The latest UK outbreaks are centered in the West Midlands and London. The UK Health Security Agency has thus declared a national incident after the outbreaks in the UK West Midlands. Health officials are encouraging people to have the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) jab, after figures showed uptake at the lowest level for more than a decade.
I have long warned that the rise in measle cases is due to proponents of so-called alternative medicine (SCAM). Particularly implicated are:
- doctors of anthroposophical medicine,
- chiroparactors,
- homeopaths,
- naturopath,
- other healthcare professionals who employ these methods.
A recent case seems to suggest that this is as true today as it was years ago.
A midwife in New York administered nearly 12,500 bogus homeopathic pellets to roughly 1,500 children in lieu of providing standard, life-saving vaccines, the New York State Department of Health reported yesterday. Jeanette Breen, a licensed midwife who operated Baldwin Midwifery in Nassau County, began providing the oral pellets to children around the start of the 2019–2020 school year, just three months after the state eliminated non-medical exemptions for standard school immunizations. She obtained the pellets from a homeopath outside New York and sold them as a series called the “Real Immunity Homeoprophylaxis Program.” The program falsely claimed to protect children against deadly infectious diseases covered by standard vaccination schedules, including diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis (covered by the DTaP or Tdap vaccine); hepatitis B; measles, mumps and rubella (MMR vaccine); polio; chickenpox; meningococcal disease; Haemophilus influenzae disease (HiB); and pneumococcal diseases (PCV).
You might say that this is just one silly midwife, but I’m afraid you would be mistaken. Here is the very first websites that appeared today on my search for measles/alternative medicine:
Few studies have examined the effectiveness of specific homeopathic remedies. A professional homeopath, however, may recommend one or more of the following treatments for measles based on his or her knowledge and clinical experience. Before prescribing a remedy, homeopaths take into account a person’s constitutional type, includes your physical, emotional, and intellectual makeup. An experienced homeopath assesses all of these factors when determining the most appropriate remedy for a particular individual.
-
- Aconitum , for symptoms that come on suddenly including fever, conjunctivitis, dry cough, and restlessness. It is best used very early in the course of the disease.
- Apis mellifica , for individuals with swollen lips and eyes and a rash that is not fully developed. Warmth increases itchiness as well as swelling.
- Belladonna , can be used either during early stages of measles or after the rash has erupted. It is useful for those who have difficulty sleeping and symptoms that include fever, headache, and drowsiness.
- Bryonia , for individuals with a delayed rash who have a dry, painful cough, headaches, and muscle pain that worsens with movement and warmth. This remedy is most appropriate for people with a rash primarily on the chest, a dry mouth, and a desire for cold drinks.
- Euphrasia , for nasal discharge, red eyes, and tears associated with measles. This remedy is most appropriate for people who have a strong sensitivity to light.
- Gelsemium , for the early stages of measles when there is a slow onset of fever and chilliness, cough, headache, weakness, and a watery nasal discharge that burns the upper lip. This remedy is most appropriate for people who are apathetic and have little or no thirst.
- Pulsatilla , can be used at any stage of the measles but often used after fever has resolved. This remedy is most appropriate for people who may have thick, yellow nasal discharge, a dry cough at night, a productive cough in the daytime, and mild ear pain. Symptoms are frequently mild.
- Sulphur , for measles in which the skin has a purplish appearance. The individual for whom this remedy is appropriate may have red mucus membranes with a cough and diarrhea that is worse in the mornings.
Similar nonsense can easily be found on ‘X’; here are but a few examples of the dangerous BS that fans of SCAM posted recently:
- Measles are extremely mild, alternative medicine is better than petroleum-based drugs that don’t even promise to cure anything, and JK Rowling is a Christian.
- 1. Can we now talk about the fact that MMR does not produce life long immunity? 2. Can we talk about the Hep A, tuberculosis and measles that are now community spread due to not vetting the health of illegals? 3. Can we finally discuss actual homeopathy remedies that work?
- I so regret obeying our local school district and having my kids vaccinated. Homeopathy has SAFE medicines to prevent childhood illnesses such as chicken pox, measles, polio, small pox, etc, and more SAFE medicines to cure these illnesses.
- My kids had chicken pox and pertussis & covid. Cured all 3 with homeopathy. Never had measles.
- How to Treatment of Measles with Dr.Reckweg R.No.62 Homeopathy Medicine
I think it is high time that:
- we realize that SCAM providers can be dangerous through the irresponsible advice they tend to give,
- we change their attitude through educating them adequately and, failing this, penalize them for endangering our health.
7 Responses to Measles are back – not least thanks to so-called alternative medicine (SCAM), I fear
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Hi Dr Ernst,
I have recently been reading your posts and in my opinion you are researching SCAM’s about alternative medicine and then claiming because you are able to find real scams in homeopathy that all homeopathy should be banned and nobody should ever consider homeopathy for any reason because they all should be tarred with the same brush.
You say everyone should be ‘educated’ to know that all homeopathy is a SCAM. Is this really an ‘educated’ approach to the subject of homeopathy or anything else ? I can’t read much of what you are writing because it is all so opposed to the idea of education. You are claiming to champion education. If I wanted to know about homeopathy ( I have almost zero interest in homeopathy except the occasional browse around Holland and Barrett ) you would be the last person on earth I I would ask about the subject. What you call education is finding scientific fact based information for your own gut instincts and one sided views. Reading your writing is unbelievably , intensely irritating even for someone with no desire to defend Homeopathy.
“all homeopathy should be banned and nobody should ever consider homeopathy for any reason because they all should be tarred with the same brush”
I am not even for banning H.
I am for informing the public that homeopathy is useless and potentially dangerous.
If you have different evidence, let’s see it.
Welcome to the blog, Philip!
I am looking forward to being educated by you! 😂
(after you stopped with your pointless ad hominem comments, of course).
That wasn’t his first comment:
Philip Corless on Sunday 24 September 2023 at 13:06
https://edzardernst.com/2014/11/alexander-technique-some-evidence-and-plenty-of-wishful-thinking/#comment-147945
Philip Corless on Sunday 24 September 2023 at 15:09
https://edzardernst.com/2014/11/alexander-technique-some-evidence-and-plenty-of-wishful-thinking/#comment-147949
Philip Corless on Saturday 30 September 2023 at 10:07
https://edzardernst.com/2015/04/a-sound-study-of-the-alexander-technique-as-a-treatment-for-neck-pain/#comment-148000
For someone who claims to have almost zero interest in homeopathy and no desire to defend it, you seem remarkably exercised by criticisms of it. Is this a case of “The lady doth protest too much, methinks”?
Perhaps you should learn more about homeopathy yourself before offering an opinion as to whether “nobody should ever consider it”?
If you don’t want to learn from the professor here there are plenty of other reliable sources available such as Wikipedia.
There is a web-site dedicated to the backgrounds of anti-vaxxers: http://www.pharmamafia.com
Alas, aside of few pieces in English it is plain German. That web-site is the largest in the whole WWW for that topic. It was written in 2006, which is quite a time now.
The web-site in special deals with measles, homeopathy and Anthroposophs. One of the key elements is something utterly insane one really would not believe it, but it is true: Anthroposophs do want children to become ill.
Even more disturbing fact: it is pediatricians, who want children to become ill. I translated a part for you with deepl.com:
[*QUOTE*]
——————————————————
Anthroposophs WANT children to become ill.
Anthroposophs WANT children to become ill. Yes, you have read correctly
see the following quote from
Cult of Death “Anthroposophic Medicine”
(http://www.ariplex.com/ama/ama_im37.htm)
Walther Bühler and Wilhelm zur Linden, two anthroposophical doctors,
write in 1982 (!) in “Vom Sinn der Kinderkrankheiten”
literally:
——————————————————————————-
From this one can recognize the desperate strength with which a
born healthy child once, just once, really wants to experience
really wants to experience and get through an illness.
——————————————————————————-
It actually says that a HEALTHY child WANTS to be ill. And
this idiocy isn’t just anyone saying it, it’s what doctors say. Not
just any doctors, but anthroposophical doctors.
According to the Anthroposophs, the children are PREVIOUSLY
completely unprotected from disease.
Why? Because of the “incarnation”, or in German: out of sectarian delusion.
See Walther Bühler and Wilhelm zur Linden:
——————————————————————————-
Severe measles lead to a kind of swelling of the skin and mucous membranes.
of the skin and mucous membranes. This leads to rhinitis,
conjunctivitis, coughing with mucus secretion, but above all
but above all to a softening of the facial features, the contours become
blurred, which often leads to a grotesque change in facial
facial shapes. But then, after two or three days, all the swelling
swellings disappear, the fever and all catarrhal symptoms in the eyes
catarrhal symptoms in the eyes, nose and bronchial tubes subside.
Slowly, but more and more clearly, a new, often strange
facial expression appears and after some time attentive parents
attentive parents notice that perhaps even the child’s previous
resemblance of the child to the father or mother has diminished, that
a new, more individual face has emerged. Also otherwise
a change can be seen in the child. Peculiarities or
or difficulties in character, which were previously noticeable, recede.
recede. The child has obviously entered a new
stage of development. If you want to express it precisely, you can say
can be said: “The child is now better incarnated”, body and soul have
soul have found each other better. A deeper explanation for
for these processes can only be given if we look at the more intimate
connections in the human being: the child was able to develop certain
certain peculiarities that it had inherited with the help of the fever process.
with the help of the fever process.
——————————————————————————-
Measles and fever as instruments in the process of becoming human…
If one assumes that the child has already “incarnated” once, one also assumes that
death is not a bad thing. The fact that parents do not want to lose their child
is completely irrelevant. They bear their fate. The fact that the child
wants to live is also irrelevant. It has to die for the higher
purpose. And if it doesn’t die, then something positive will show up.
Even if it is SSPE in five years’ time.
Parents usually don’t know that when they go to the anthroposophical doctor.
They don’t know what’s going on in his head. Because they are not told.
Who would sit for more than five minutes with a doctor
who says it doesn’t matter whether you die or not?
——————————————————
[*/QUOTE*]
To make on thing absolutely clear: Bühler and zur Linden are no nobodies. They were highly acclaimed lecturers for Anthroposohical medicine in southern Germany. The quotes given above are from a brochure they wrote in 1982.
Would you be astonished to hear that the very same persons behind the anti-vaxxer scene are a) Anthroposophs, and b) fight against the Covid vaccinations AND against masks?
And do note that the German association for evidence-based medicine was controlled for nearly 2 decades by at least one Anthroposoph.
Things are much worse than you might ever guess.
This should surprise no one. As I have previously said anthroposophy is a pernicious cult which hides behind a hippy image.
It is anti science, anti education and racist. And deceit is part of its founding philosophy so that the naive can be drawn in by its superficially attractive aspects.
Frankly its anti vax stance is the least surprising of its many failings.