Deadly Medicine

Thousands are annually slaughtered in the quiet sick-room. Governments should at once either banish medical men, and proscribe [condemn] their blundering art, or they should adopt some better means to protect the lives of the people than at present prevail, when they look far less after the practice of this dangerous profession, and the murders committed in it, than after the lowest trades. — Dr. Frank, eminent European Author and Practitioner, 1800s

Russell Thacher Trall, MD, Water-cure for the Million, 1860, New York, p. 11.

Not only did the many positive changes from the later 1800s into the mid-1900s result in the massive decline in mortality from smallpox, measles, whooping cough, scarlet fever, etc., but another major factor was also causing deaths for centuries – the medical treatments themselves.

For upwards of twenty-three centuries to starve, bleed, purge, and torture, had been the all but exclusive business of the man of medicine. From the days of Hippocrates till within the last few years, this was the undoubted practice in almost all diseases. In truth, what from the gloom of the sick room, and what from the obscurity that enveloped the science, no question was ever asked by the public at large about medical matters. The possession of a diploma or degree from a school or university of reputation was the only requisite for practice. The practice itself, no matter how destructive, signified little so long as it was the “established practice.” ― Samuel Dickson, MD, Glasgow, author of The “Destructive Art of Healing;” or, Facts for families, 1855

Samuel Dickson, MD, Glasgow, The “Destructive Art of Healing;” or, Facts for families, Second Edition, 1855, London, pp. 5-6.

Less than thirty-five years ago [1850] millions of human beings up to that time had gone to untimely graves, begging piteously for a cup of water to cool their parched lips, while the burning fire of fever was consuming their lives. Doctors in those days said: “Cold water is death; do not give a drop. Give the patient a dose of calomel and a spoonful of warm water.” Not only were fever patients denied cold water—nature’s remedy—but light and pure air were also denied them; and they were drugged with calomel; physicked with jalap [a strong purgative], depleted of their life blood by the lancet, and starved until they gave up the ghost—a tribute to this medical delusion. ― Alexander Milton Ross MD, Toronto, 1888.

Fallacies and Delusions of the Medical Profession

The single, uncombined, different and confessed poisons in daily use by the dominant school of medicine number one hundred and seven. Among these are phosphorus, strychnine, mercury, opium, and arsenic. The various combinations of these five violent poisons number, respectively, twenty-seven combinations of phosphorus, five of strychnia, forty-seven of mercury, twenty-five of opium, and fourteen of arsenic. The poisons that are more or less often used number many hundreds. — Dr. Broady, Chicago, author of Medical Practice without Poisons, late 1800s

Honest Confessions of Weakness,” Journal of Osteopathy, vol. IV, no. 5, October 1897, Kirksville, Missouri, p. 228.

Mankind has been drugged to death, and the world would be better off if the contents of every apothecary shop were emptied into the sea, though the consequences to the fishes would be lamentable. The disgrace of medicine has been that colossal system of self-deception, in obedience to which mines have been emptied of their cankering minerals, the entrails of animals taxed for their impurities, the poison-bags of reptiles drained of their venom and all the inconceivable abominations thus obtained thrust down the throats of human beings suffering from some fault of organization, nourishment or vital stimulation.  ― Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1860s

Honest Confessions of Weakness,” Journal of Osteopathy, vol. IV, no. 5, October 1897, Kirksville, Missouri, p. 228.

Keeping people deprived of water and fresh air, often drained of blood until fainting, using toxic medicine like mercury and arsenic, and other harmful notions killed vast numbers. However, those deaths were never recorded as medically caused. Instead, countless souls died, counted as having died of a disease the doctor was treating.

More harm than good has been done by the use of drugs in the treatment of measles, scarlatina, and other self-limited diseases. In their zeal to do good, physicians have done much harm. They have hurried thousands to the grave who would have recovered if left to nature. — Prof. Alonzo Clark, MD, New York College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1800s

Emmet Densmore MD, How nature cures, comprising a new system of hygiene, 1892, p. 205.

The drugs administered for scarlet fever destroys far more than that disease does. — Dr. B. F. Barker, New York Medical College, 1800s

Henry Strickland Constable, Our Medicine Men: A Few Hints, 1876, p. 80

The art of healing is like an unroofed building—uncovered at the top and cracked at the foundation. I am incessantly led to make apology for the instability of the theories and practice of physic. Dissections daily convince us of our ignorance of disease, and cause us to blush at our prescription. What mischief have we not done under the belief of false facts and false theories? We have assisted in multiplying diseases; we have done more, we have increased their fatality. — Benjamin Rush, MD, University of Pennsylvania, signatory to the U.S. Declaration of Independence, 1700s

“Statement of Mr. Henry R. Strong of St. Louis, Mo. Editor National Druggist,” The Pure Food and Drugs Act. Hearings before the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, Part I, 1912, Washington, Government Printing Office, p. 359.

The science of medicine is barbarous jargon, and the effects of our medicines on the human system are in the highest degree uncertain, except that they have already destroyed more lives than war, pestilence and famine combined. — Dr. John Mason Good, early 1800s

Thomas R. Hazard, Civil and Religious Persecution in the State of New York, 1876, Boston, p. 102.

Physicians have slain more than war. As instruments of death in their hands, calomel, bleeding, and other medicines, have done more than powder and ball. The public would be infinitely better off without professed physicians. — Dr. Eliphalet Kimball, New Hampshire, author of Thoughts on Natural Principles, 1867

Dr. Eliphalet Kimball, Thoughts on Natural Principles, 1867.

By the late 1800s, many recognized that fresh air, sunshine, clean water, not bleeding someone to the point of passing out, avoiding toxic medications, and stopping other wrongheaded medical notions were in patients’ best interests. Once many of these horrifyingly destructive practices fell out of use, so did many deaths from the diseases they intended to treat.

Much like it has happened in previous centuries, medical errors are still rarely acknowledged. Today, a quarter of a million people die annually in the United States alone due to medical errors. Yet, the CDC and other medical organizations simply ignore medical errors.

For the better part of two decades there’s been a growing recognition that medical errors kill too many patients in the U.S. While exact numbers are elusive, a new analysis and estimate portrays an even grimmer picture. The new paper finds that as many as 250,000 people die each year from errors in hospitals and other health care facilities. That would make it the third leading cause of death in the U.S. ahead of respiratory disease, accidents and even stroke. Dr. Martin Makary a professor of surgery at the John Hopkins School of Medicine let the research joins me now.

Dr. Martin Makary: It turns on what we learned that the CDC does not consider medical error to be a cause of death in listing our national health statistics each year, even though the point estimate comes right in between number 2 and number 3 on the list, which means medical error is the third leading cause of death in the United States, we’re just not measuring it.

Dr. Martin Makary: These are studies of 100s of thousands of hospitalizations in the top medical journals and they are updating the 1999 Institute of Medicine report. And there’s broad consensus that the range is somewhere between 200 and 400 thousand. Our analysis came up with 251,000. No matter what number you pick, it’s well above the currently listed number 3 cause of death.

PBS NewsHour Is fatal medical error a leading cause of death?

Richard Griffith: According to a 2013 article published in the Journal of Patient Safety, Dr. John T. James reports that patient adverse events, his politically correct term for hospital, medical mistakes,  contribute to the death of approximately 440,000 patients in America each year. That’s roughly 1/6th of the 2.5 million total deaths that occur in the United States each year. 37% of Americans die outside of hospitals. So, in fact hospital medical errors contribute to the death of roughly 1/4th of all patients who die in U.S. Hospitals.

Retired anesthesiologist Richard Griffith, The Battle of Hospital Medical Errors

Part of the blame of over-medication rests, as I have said, with the profession, in yielding to the tendency to self delusion, which seems almost inseparable from the practice; in our mode of inference, too often adopted, of counting only our favorable cases, and in falling into the not uncommon error known in scholastic phrase as “post hoc ergo propter hoc”: The patient got well after taking my medicines, therefore he got well because of taking them.

The greater Portion of this blame, however, rests properly with the public, which insists on its right to be poisoned by somebody... Like Barnum of illustrious memory, they believe in and practice on the measureless gullibility of a public which actually enjoys being humbugged. The whole dishonest and shameless business is built, as on a rock, upon the popular delusion that sick people must feed upon noxious substances, the more the better, the nastier the more effective.

The outside pressure upon the physician is very great, tending to force him to active treatment, whether in his judgment necessary or not. Some error of diet, some improper habit of the patient, may only need correction, and the administration of drugs be unnecessary or hurtful. ― H. Brown, MD, Huntsville, Kentucky, 1892

H. Brown, MD, “The use and abuse of medicines,” The American Practitioner and News, May 21, 1892, vol. XIII, no. 11, pp. 322-323.