Fw: Multi-D News Fw: Flesh-Eating Paste Doctor Busted...

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- RedJewel1111

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Tuesday, August 30, 2005 11:36 PM

Multi-D News Fw: Flesh-Eating Paste Doctor Busted...

 

 

 

 

 

Red Jewel 1111

 

 

 

Flesh-Eating Paste Doctor Busted...

 

Ga. Healer Targeted Over Cancer Treatment

 

By ELLIOTT MINOR, Associated Press Writer

Mon Aug 29, 8:32 AM ET

 

ROCHELLE, Ga. - Curtis Brown carries business cards with old pictures of

his tumors, including an egg-sized growth on his neck. He says they were

each shed after the application of a flesh-eating paste containing the

medicinal herb bloodroot. "I cured myself of cancer," the cards read.

 

Georgia's medical board and the Food and Drug Administration don't share

Brown's enthusiasm for the paste.

 

The state board has accused its maker, Dan Raber, a

pastor-turned-healer, of practicing medicine without a license. FDA

agents recently raided Raber's business, and a doctor could lose her

medical license for allegedly knowing Raber was giving people the paste

- not approved for the treatment of cancer - and not reporting him.

 

Raber's paste is described by the medical board as "a caustic,

tissue-destroying substance that eats away human skin and flesh." On his

Web site, Raber displays graphic before-and-after photos of those who

have used the paste, including women with scabs on their breasts and men

with scarred faces.

 

While the state board has leveled serious allegations against Raber, he

has not been charged with a crime. Prosecutors are studying the case.

 

Raber has never responded publicly to the board's allegations. In an

interview with The Associated Press, his son, Kelly, defended his father

and his products.

 

"The herb does not kill healthy tissue," Kelly Raber said, smearing some

of the paste on his nose. "Instead, it performs a process known as

apoptosis that allows the (cancer) cells to self-destruct."

 

He said his father's paste is being singled out because it's an old

remedy that can't be patented and therefore wouldn't generate large

profits for the medical establishment or giant pharmaceutical companies.

 

Dan Raber was named in a state complaint filed against Dr. Lois March,

an ear, nose and throat specialist who risks losing her medical license

for allegedly providing pain medication to 12 patients who had received

Raber's bloodroot treatments. The board said seven of the patients had

breast cancer and that the doctor knew or should have known that Raber's

use of bloodroot "mutilated their breasts and caused excruciating pain."

 

March has denied any wrongdoing. "These are wild accusations that aren't

true," she said when reached by telephone at her office in nearby

Cordele.

 

During a 2003 crackdown on alternative medicine merchants who made false

claims on the Internet, the FDA shut down a Louisiana company that sold

a bloodroot paste and its owner was sent to prison. An Indianapolis

woman who said she used products from that company and Raber's in 2001

contends in a lawsuit that her nose was eaten away, forcing her to have

seven reconstructive surgeries.

 

A settlement was reached in the suit against the company; Raber is also

expected to settle soon, said the woman's lawyer, John Muller.

 

Mark Blumenthal, executive director of the American Botanical Council,

said bloodroot has been used for years by nontraditional healers to

treat skin cancers, but he acknowledged "the efficacy has been unproven

from a scientific point of view."

 

Brown is a believer. After years of sun exposure, the retired farmer was

plagued with skin cancer. Doctors surgically removed cancerous growths

from his face and arms, but when a 3-inch-long tumor grew on the left

side of his neck in 2002, Brown instead tried the paste.

 

"None of my people ever survived the conventional way," said the

71-year-old Brown, who listed relatives who had succumbed to cancer. "I

knew there was a better way."

 

___

 

On the Net:

 

Dan Raber's Web site: http://www.cancerx.org/

 

Food and Drug Administration: http://www.fda.gov

 

American Cancer Society: http://www.cancer.org

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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