Quack Troops

‘LET’S face it – who can really be bothered to train as a proper doctor?

‘Sir Cliff, we’re ready for you now!’

It takes something like six years just to qualify as a junior doctor, at which time you spend 23 out of every 24 hours trying to keep alive patients that your colleagues have spent the previous 23 out of 24 hours trying to kill.

No, being a doctor is far too stressful, especially when you can become an alternative therapist with no training, no late nights and no professional body to tell you what to do.

No wonder the Times says there are some 40,000 ‘complimentary therapists’ operating in Britain, with a quarter of the population believed to seek their services every year.

But, according to Edzard Ernst, the country’s only professor of complimentary medicine, many of these people – shock, horror – are doing more harm than good.

For instance, a study of 32 of the most popular alternative therapy websites for cancer sufferers found that many were hastening the deaths of their patients.

And none of the treatments, which include things like shark cartilage, coffee enemas and mistletoe extracts, have been shown definitively to have a beneficial effect.

‘Not everything that is natural is risk-free,’ Professor Ernst tells the Times. ‘People should use their common sense and think twice about the motives of these websites.

‘If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.’

NONSENSE! Anorak’s ‘Peter Panacea’ TM (made from Sir Cliff Richard’s sperm, kangaroo droppings and a secret ingredient) not only cures all known forms of cancer, but can reverse the signs of aging.

Simply send your life savings (plus £4.50 P&P) to us at the usual address. Allow 28 years for delivery.’

Posted: 3rd, August 2004 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink