"Re: Abraham Cherrix and your coverage of it - and 2 reasons why your an idiot..."
The movies have been a disappointment lately, except for the entertaining new Amy Sedaris pic, Strangers With Candy, which was a silly but hiliarous trip in time to high school.
Luckily, I always have my e-mail to amuse me. For example, this e-mail from Tuesday (see subject line above) about the Abraham Cherrix case. The first line is from my nimrod pen-pal:
NIMROD PEN PAL: 1. Smoking cigarettes which is PROVEN to cause cancer and to kill you, is legal and acceptable and government sanctioned...ME: Not for minors.
NIMROD PEN PAL: 2. 13 year old girls, without parental knowledge or consent, can get a goddamn abortion...
ME: Abortion is proven to work. You can't say the same for Hoxsey.
No responsible clinician who looks at evidence rather than wishful thinking-based treatments would ever prescribe Hoxsey. I love that the "doctor" referred to on the TV station link (posted in my comments section), who said Hoxsey was valid, was actually a doctor of...hypnotherapy!
NIMROD PEN PAL: P.S. Chemotherapy is 2.4% effective, as determined by the industry itself... sounds like a winner to you, huh?
ME: wouldn't trust stats coming from a person with so little grasp of rational thought or evidence-based medicine, first of all. Second, I neither have the time nor the interest to get the correct stats at this moment. Third, "cancer" is actually a name applied to many forms of overgrowth of cells, all of which have different survival rates. Fourth, many cancers are found when they're past the point where they can be eradicated by chemo. I have a number of friends who are living because chemo eradicated their cancers. This isn't supposition on my part - the x-rays showed the shrinkage after chemo.
PS "Your an idiot" is correctly written like so: "You're an idiot."
In the future, please refrain from e-mailing me and post your contentions on my blog, as I don't have time to respond personally to every letter, and there are plenty of bright, rational regular commenters there who will make quick work of your lightweight thinking.
She (I think it's a she, anyway) kept writing to me, and claimed in her next e-mail that Otto Warburg's work was valid, so I simply sent her this article from Quackwatch by Dr. Saul Green, a retired Sloan-Kettering cancer researcher, and deleted the rest of her e-mails without reading them, which always gives me this squishy little rush when the person's an utter nitwit.
Posted by aalkon at July 21, 2006 7:20 AM
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» Some questions for those who decry the decision in the Abraham Cherrix case from Respectful Insolence
Not surprisingly, since the court decided that Abraham Cherrix, a Virginia teen who was diagnosed with Hodgkin's disease at age 15, underwent chemotherapy, relapsed, and then refused to undergo any further chemotherapy, opting instead for an "alternati... [Read More]
Tracked on July 24, 2006 9:28 AM
Comments
I think you are missing the point, although I agree largely with your response to the E-Mail. It should not matter if he choosing some alternative therapy. The government has no right to order anyone to submit to any medical procedure. If this person has made a decision that will result ultimately in his death, that is his decision. (Would this be in court if he had just decline treatment altogether?_In this case it is his decision and that of his legal guardians. To take that right away from them requires PROOF that they are incompetent. I don't want someone in a court in the future forcing me to under treatment because there is strong evidence it will work. You always have to weigh the benefits against the consequences.
Posted by: Shean Monahan at July 24, 2006 7:15 PM
I saw this story on Geraldo at Large. I wanted to somehow track down the kids email to show him some people are on his side.
This "diet" he wants to go on to help treat him probably would work.
A man in Australia and in I think China or Korea use an alternative method to treat cancer that consist of nothing more than eating certain foods daily for the rest of the persons life, which seems like a fair trade. These men have had 100 percent success rate with thousands of people. The only reason people find this to be bogus is because it isnt very well known and accepted, and it will hurt all the doctors paychecks knowing such an easy alternative is available. Also, I believe if it seems "to good to be true" people tend to laugh at it as a fraud.
He is a kid, so of course they don't respect his opinions. But I am a huge health nut, and I am only 20. And If I know anything it's that kids become passionate about something and thanks to the internet they study it to death!
Therfor they have resources,information, and methods that normal people would never know of because of its obscurity.
Take dermatologists for example. My mothers friend is one, and I respect her and her treatments,they do help my skin, but she had NO clue that I could improve my acne by going on a 3 day diet. She said "no one at my work has ever heard of acne being cured from inside. Its all bacteria on your face or hormones"
a few days after my fast, my acne was cured,and has remained cured,thanks to detoxifying my body. And she was shocked.
Sorry for the ranting, my point is it's a shame that this kid will be forced to do this, because endless research helped me cure my acne and no professional doctors believed it would work, so whats stoping this kid from being right?
Posted by: Peter at July 24, 2006 11:34 PM
To Peter:
Because cancer cells aren't caused by nutritional imbalances?
Posted by: Anthony at July 25, 2006 7:05 AM
Peter, yes, the Internet is filled with information, much of it debunked on Snopes.com. Critical thinking is absent for many people, and an uncritical mind doing "research" on the Internet is a dangerous thing.
Posted by: Amy Alkon at July 25, 2006 8:11 AM
If it was I, chemo would be the only course of action. In looking at the issue, though, I realize that what is at stake here is whether life is more important than freedom to choose one's own fate. We Americans have ceded more and more of our liberties to the whim of the government and a bureaucrat or two who makes decisions from a flow chart, rather from a personal knowledge. If this young man chooses an "alternative" that is not effective he will experience the consequences of that decision. If he is not allowed to make a choice, but has it dictated by the courts because a doctor complained, then he has lost something greater than life, and we have lost it as well. Good luck to all of you who choose government decisions over personal freedom, but be careful what you ask for. You may get it.
Posted by: kb at July 26, 2006 7:52 AM
Yeah: What kb said.
Exactly.
Posted by: Memory Harker at July 26, 2006 3:58 PM
From an AP story:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SOU_SICK_TEEN_VAOL-?SITE=WDUN&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
"I've got nothing to lose by what I'm doing," Abraham said. "I truly do believe that this (alternative treatment) is going to cure me."
Sad.
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