WHERE IS YOUR COURAGE?

[Guest guest]

I just came upon this today. It is from 1993, so I do not know if

was previously posted here. URL at end.

 

Alobar

 

Berkley Bedell is the Founder and Chairman of the National Foundation

for Alternative Medicine. This foundation is a leader in supporting

complementary and alternative medical research. We are cooperating

with it, particularly in the areas relating to cancer.

I believe the following speech by Berkley Bedell entitled " Where is

Your Courage " is as important now as when it was first made in

December 1993. Unfortunately his comments on the obstruction by

government bureaucracy of the development of new medical treatments

are still valid.

 

I support his call for our government legislators to have the courage

to pass the needed reforms.

 

Charles A. Reinwald

 

 

Former US Congressman and proponent of complementary medicine, the

Honorable Berkley Bedell, will be the keynote speaker at Beyond the

Dura. Mr. Bedell served on the Advisory Council for the National

Institutes of Health, Office of Alternative Medicine. An advocate of

the Access to Medical Treatment Act (S-1035 and HR-2019), he searched

beyond the realm of conventional medicine to combat his own serious

health problems and found effective treatments with nontraditional

methods. Since then, he has been involved in helping establish

individual rights to choose health modalities. In his presentation,

Mr. Bedell will discuss the current condition of healthcare and what

can be done to improve it. He will also participate in a panel

discussion on healthcare and politics, along with other experts.

 

WHERE IS YOUR COURAGE?

" Mr. Chairman and members of this Committee, I appreciate this

opportunity to communicate to you some of my findings since leaving

the United States Congress.

I served six terms in the US House of Representatives from 1975

through 1986 as a liberal Democrat representing a conservative

Republican district in Northwest Iowa. I believe I therefore have a

unique appreciation of the problems facing legislators such as you, as

you grapple with issues such as this.

 

I left Congress because I contracted Lyme Disease from a tick bite. I

was treated with conventional treatments three times; each time I had

a strong antibiotic injected in to my vein for periods three, four and

six weeks. Each time I would feel better for three or four weeks and

then my symptoms would return. Finally, I turned to an unconventional

treatment.

 

Let me tell you about that treatment. There is a farm in Iowa that

makes veterinary medicine by injecting killed germs into the udder of

a cow, prior to the time the cow has a calf. They then take the first

milk that comes after the birth, which is called colostrums, and

process it into whey, so it will keep. The theory is that the cow will

then communicate the disease to the unborn calk, and then develop in

the colostrums what is needed to cure the calf of the disease in has

contracted from the mother.

 

I obtained some killed spirochetes that cause Lyme Disease. I took

them to the farm that makes the veterinary medicine and the 'ran them

through' a cow. I took one tablespoon of the whey every hour while I

was awake. My symptoms disappeared, and I clearly no longer have Lyme

Disease.

 

This treatment cost about $500 as compared to the approximately

$26,000 that had been spent on my unsuccessful pharmaceutical

treatments.

 

After I left Congress, I was also diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Again, I went the conventional route. I had my prostate removed and

had six weeks of radiation. When tests indicated my malignancy was

returning I again turned to an unconventional treatment. I learned of

this treatment from a scientist in Quebec, Canada.

 

He claims that cancer has a tremendous affinity for nitrogen, and that

it robs the immune system of the nitrogen it needs to function

effectively. His treatment consists of an injection of a compound into

one's lymph area; this floods the area with nitrogen so that one's

immune system can fight off the cancer. I went to Mexico, where I

purchased the medication, and, coming home, I gave myself daily

injections for two 21-day periods. That was four years ago and all

tests indicate that I no longer have cancer. That treatment cost me

$600, as compared to the over $10,000 that I calculate was the cost of

the conventional treatment I had previously received.

 

These experiences have caused me to spend my retirement years in

the investigation of alternative treatments for disease.

I have been shocked at what I have found.

 

Americans are repeatedly told that they are unable to make sound

decisions about their own health, and are therefore vulnerable to

practitioners who would wish to take advantage of them. But I have

found a group of dedicated practitioners and scientists who are

working with findings that I believe hold great promise.

 

And they are stopped at every turn by a government bureaucracy that is

opposed to everything except pharmaceutical drugs, and by state health

boards and medical boards that consider anything new, not taught in

medical school, as quackery.

 

Mr. Chairman and members of this committee, I had not idea of the

influence the international pharmaceutical companies have on the

health care available to our people:

 

At medical school, students are taught to use pharmaceutical drugs to

kill germs and relieve symptoms.

For continuing education, doctors go to seminars put on by

pharmaceutical companies

Salesmen from pharmaceutical firms are constantly calling on doctors

to inform them about new pharmaceutical drugs and to give out free

samples

Medical journalists depend upon advertising revenues from

pharmaceutical companies, and their editorial content reflects that

face.

Colleges and universities get grants from pharmaceutical firms for

research on drugs

Who can blame a doctor, a member of a board of health; or a licensing

board; and indeed, even a legislator for believing that anything

except pharmaceutical drug treatment is quackery? That is all the

information we receive.

 

But the sad fact is that whereas pharmaceutical drugs such as

antibiotics are very effective for some communicable infectious

diseases such as meningitis, pneumonia and the like, they have not

proven to be similarly effective for degenerative diseases such as

cancer, Alzheimer's, MS and the like.

 

And whether the medical profession and licensing boards are aware of

it or not, the public realizes it. Just be told that a member of your

family has cancer, Alzheimer's or MS. In fact, a recent study found

that there were more visits to providers of unconventional therapy

than to primary care physicians.

 

An A+ for Public Relations and a D For Performance

I come from a business background. I started a fishing tackle

manufacturing business when I was in high school, with $50 saved from

my newspaper route. Today, Berkley and Company is one of the world's

largest fishing tackle manufacturers. As a businessman, I grade the

international pharmaceutical industry with an A+ for public relations

and marketing, and a D for performance of product for major

degenerative diseases.

If one has a product that is not very effective, it is greatly in your

interest to keep everything else out of the market. The problem is, in

this case we are not talking about fishing line or golf clubs. We are

talking about people's health.

 

Are we going to let people be treated by non-toxic treatments that

hold great hope, or are we going to let the international

pharmaceutical industry maintain a monopoly with toxic medicines of

limited effectiveness?

 

Mr. Chairman, I told you that I am a liberal Democrat. I became a

Democrat because I saw the abuse of power in corporate America. I

became a Democrat because, among other things, I felt that the

Democratic Party was more supportive of the people as compared to

large corporations.

 

Now it breaks my heart that some of my Democratic colleagues

in Government seem to be on the side of the international

pharmaceutical industry instead of the rights of the people.

 

I do not think they mean to be on that side. I believe they have

simply been incorrectly informed. By their desire to " protect the

people, " they have been playing right into the hands of the giant

pharmaceutical firms.

 

Make no mistake, Mr. Chairman and members of this committee: there is

a worldwide battle going on. It is whether the international

pharmaceutical drug industry is going to be successful in maintaining

a monopoly and prevent the use of lower cost non-toxic treatments.

 

They have already succeeded in cutting back on the availability of

over-the-counter vitamins and supplements in Europe and in Australia.

They are trying to do the same here in the United States. They have

succeeded in selling their message to many members of the medical

community and some members of government.

 

But the people are not to be fooled. There is a growing army of angry

people who are demanding a great say in their health care. They have

seen the limited effectiveness of conventional treatments for major

diseases. In increasing numbers they are demanding the right to be

treated by the treatment of their choice.

 

It was not easy for me to come up here from Florida. I could be

fishing in Naples Bay this morning. But someone has to point out what

is happening. I care about the health care available to my friends,

children and grandchildren. I hope you do too.

 

Alaska, Washington state and North Carolina have already enacted

statutes that give the people greater freedom of choice by preventing

the removal of a practitioner's license just because that person may

be treating in a non-conventional manner. The legislation before you

is a weak effort that goes part way towards that goal.

 

My gosh, Mr. Chairman and members of this committee,

where is your courage?

 

The public knows that current treatments for diseases like cancer,

Alzheimer's, MS and the like are of limited effectiveness. Surely you

do too.

 

I urge you to not just pass this legislation, but to show that the

government of the great state of New York is as supportive of its

citizens as are the states of Alaska, Washington and North Carolina,

by striking those weakening provisions that remove some of the

protection those states have given to the freedom of choice of their

people.

 

How can we ever find better treatments if we say that a practitioner

can lose his or her license for using anything other than treatments

that do not work very well?

 

Can anyone really believe that in America we should have policies that

say in effect, " If your 'allopathic' doctor sends you home to die, you

cannot be treated by a different doctor who has a treatment he or she

feels might help you? "

 

What a disaster for the American public.

 

The preceding keynote speech was given by the Honorable Berkley Bedell

on 12/14/93 at the public hearings of the New York State Assembly's

Committee on Higher Education and Health. The issues in this speech

still continue to affect the public. Berkley Bedell continues to

advocates on these issues through his work at NFAM

 

 

http://www.cancercurecoalition.org/articles/courage.html