English Don given 6 months to live survived 11years, rejected conventional cance

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English Don given 6 months to live survived 11years, rejected

conventional cancer treatment

Sat, 6 Aug 2005 16:32:45 +0100

 

 

 

 

English Don given 6 months to live survived 11 years, rejecting

conventional cancer treatment.

 

http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=OICHBDD1NJ5YZQFIQM\

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Obituary

 

Michael Gearin-Tosh

(Filed: 04/08/2005)

 

Michael Gearin-Tosh, who died on July 29 aged 65, was, for 35 years,

Tutor in English at St Catherine's College, Oxford, but he became

famous as the author of Living Proof - A Medical Mutiny (2002) in

which he described how he had challenged the medical establishment

after he was diagnosed with myeloma - cancer of the bone marrow - in

1994 and given six months to live.

 

Urged to undergo chemotherapy, Gearin-Tosh examined the case with the

rigour he had previously reserved for his favourite poet, Andrew

Marvell. He discovered that, according to one cancer statistician,

chemotherapy brought significant hope of survival to just four per

cent of patients with the same cancer, and that many doctors would not

prescribe it for themselves. His conclusion was simple: " Touch it, and

you are a goner. "

 

Instead he embarked on a series of " alternative " treatments. He

devised an exhausting regime consisting of 12 freshly-made vegetable

juices a day, high-dose vitamin injections, acupuncture, raw garlic,

coffee enemas, Chinese breathing exercises and the visualisation of

his immune cells attacking the tumour. Confounding the medical

prognosis, he survived a further 11 years and when he did eventually

die, it was from a blood infection rather than cancer.

 

Living Proof triggered angry responses from doctors and from patients

undergoing chemotherapy. Some accused him of peddling false hopes and

ignoring statistics which indicated a higher survival rate for

patients given chemotherapy. " If there was anything in this stuff, "

wrote one consultant physician, " don't you think that the medical

profession would have grasped these 'cures' with both hands years

ago? " But for others Gearin-Tosh was living proof that alternative

therapies do work, and that it is possible not to be dehumanised by

the disease or its specialists.

 

Michael Gearin-Tosh was born on January 16 1940 at Nambour,

Queensland, Australia, and always remained an Australian citizen. His

father, a surgeon, died when Gearin-Tosh was a baby. When he was four,

his mother remarried and the family moved to Scotland, where

Gearin-Tosh attended Aberdeen Grammar School and then Dundee High School.

 

He had an unhappy relationship with his step-father, who treated him

unkindly. Until the age of 11 young Michael refused to part with the

small leather suitcase which he had brought with him from Australia.

It contained his favourite collections of fairy tales; no one was

allowed to touch it and he insisted on carrying it everywhere, ready

for the journey " home " .

 

Despite his step-father's scorn, Gearin-Tosh excelled academically; he

possessed, as one colleague later put it, " a mind one only comes

across very rarely " . At one stage he could not decide whether to read

Botany, English or Classics. In December 1957 he was elected to an

open scholarship at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, which he took up

after studying philosophy at St Andrews University. He was made a

Tutorial Fellow at St Catherine's in 1971.

 

Gearin-Tosh excelled as a tutor. He did not believe in spending time

on publications and finished nothing until his book Living Proof. He

disapproved of those scholars who neglect teaching for their research.

Gearin-Tosh's students were at the heart of his life. He had a genius

for picking people at the entrance interview whose talent had been

frustrated or overlooked in some way, and then taking them up and

helping them to succeed. He enjoyed rogues: " You will really like

him, " he said of one student, now a film director; " he keeps guns in

his room. "

 

This commitment continued after graduation and " Michael's Mafia " -

friends and successful former students with something to offer - was

often roped in to help. On one occasion bemused female friends were

ordered to have an outfit made up by a fashion student whom

Gearin-Tosh was helping through St Martin's.

 

Gearin-Tosh was passionate about theatre. He was a member of the Open

Space Theatre built by Thelma Holt in 1968, and frequently wrote the

programme notes for her productions. He directed Twelfth Night at the

Oxford Playhouse with many of his students in the cast; Richard Curtis

played the sea captain. In 1987 he helped found the Oxford School of

Drama, now one of the country's leading drama schools. He established

an award in memory of a former pupil, Nick Young, which enabled

students to train with London Weekend Television, and also

collaborated with Thelma Holt in showcases for students at the

National Theatre.

 

His enthusiasm led to the association of the Cameron Mackintosh Chair

of Contemporary Theatre with St Catherine's, and Gearin-Tosh catered

for the needs of the remarkable series of professors who occupied it:

Stephen Sondheim, Arthur Miller, Richard Eyre and, most recently,

Patrick Marber.

 

A man of generous spirit and a wicked sense of fun, Gearin-Tosh won an

eclectic group of admirers, from Margaret Thatcher to Iris Murdoch and

John Bayley. He is survived by his partner of 11 years, Arkadiusz

Weremczuk.

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