YL: A Published Article

[Guest guest]

The following was published by a medical doctor acquaintance. This

person has given me permission to use it as I see fit. Butch

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Always one to keep an open mind, I took a visit to a recent local talk

by self-proclaimed essential oils " expert " Don Gary Young, founder and

president of Young Living Essential Oils. His multilevel marketing

company peddles products with catchy names like Sacred Mountain and

Highest Potential.

 

Nearly 400 people shelled out $15 each to attend a three-hour show that

tried to be part scientific assembly, part religious revival, and part

motivational speech. Unfortunately, it was not particularly successful

at any of those roles.

 

Young projected slide after slide of data to suggest incredible

antibacterial and anti-tumoral properties for essential oils. Young

admitted that the studies were performed in vitro - that is, in a test

tube. He neglected to tell the audience that it’s a quantum leap from

killing cells in a laboratory to developing safe and effective cancer

treatments. Young likes to bash doctors and medicine. True to form, he

ranted about the medical establishment. " They don’t want you to get well

using God’s medicine. "

 

" God’s medicine? " Yes, according to Young Living, there are 188

references in the Bible to substances such as frankincense, myrrh, and

rosemary. Somehow this is supposed to prove that essential oils can cure

disease.

 

Oops, did I say cure disease? Sorry, I meant to say that essential oils

can support your various body systems. That’s the legal doublespeak

permitted when promoting supplements. Claims to prevent, mitigate, or

cure any disease are strictly taboo.

 

Even so, the company is affiliated with the pompously named Young Life

Research Clinic Institute of Natural Medicine in Springville, Utah.

Young presented a clinic case history of a man bedridden with Lou

Gehrig’s disease. Allegedly that man is now able to pour concrete in his

yard. And the clinic supposedly has restored the health of a half dozen

others with that same incurable illness. That sounds suspiciously like a

disease claim to me.

 

Young bills himself as an authority on essential oils. His chief

educational credential is a doctorate in naturopathy issued by Bernadean

University, a notorious California diploma mill. His public career

started in Spokane in 1983, with an arrest for practicing medicine

without a license. From there he moved to Mexico to open a cancer clinic

using the infamous scam drug Laetrile. In 1988, San Diego police

arrested Young for selling misleading and deceptive health cures.

 

Young Living’s hottest product is Berry Young Juice, an elixir whose

principal ingredient is the Chinese Wolfberry. This fruit is reputed to

be " the only food in the world documented to reverse the aging process. "

Ponce de Leon, where are you?

 

I politely declined Young’s invitation to speak with me after the show

because of his history of hostile behavior. In 1993, Spokane police

detained Young for battering the door of his precursor company with an

axe, terrorizing his wife and daughter within. He was angry because the

board of directors fired him for a long list of improprieties including

fraudulently misrepresenting himself as a doctor to the stockholders,

misusing company funds to support his personal endeavors, and more.

 

When I departed at the end of Young’s talk, he and his wife blocked my

exit. Young was clearly furious and barely controlling his temper, so I

again refused his gracious offer for an interview. If Young’s assertion

that negative emotions cause the liver to secrete " acid mucous " were

anything other than nonsense, he should have corroded on the spot and

melted like the wicked witch of the west. I do hope that he used some of

his Peace & Calming oil afterward.

 

Of course, there is a kernel of truth in Young Living. A video presented

at the talk warned consumers to beware of the false claims rampant in

the supplement industry. Well said, Mr. Young. Amen.