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Post by Mr. Jon Donnis on Nov 14, 2007 22:47:46 GMT
A few days ago I read an article from an Australian news site, it tells of Gloria Thomas a 9 month old baby girl who had chronic eczema, and how she died of infection. Unfortunately this story is not completely unheard of, but what made things worse was that the father had been treating the poor child with homeopathic remedies. Read More
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Post by Tetchy on Nov 14, 2007 23:01:21 GMT
I think she died of malnourishment and neglect more than a homeopathy treatment. Homeopathy for me in this case is just a poor also ran in the overall descipable treatment of this poor childs parents. Homeopathy does not work so would have had no effect on the babe, but the fact she was malnourished speaks volumes of the mentality of the parents to allow their baby to become so ill that they need hospitalisation with the ailment which eventually killed her. T
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Post by Dippy on Nov 18, 2007 15:59:59 GMT
Death of baby Gloria sparks hunt for truth
Nine-month-old Gloria Thomas was in such distress that her crying alarmed some passengers on a plane trip from India to Sydney. She had been overseas for two months receiving medical treatment, and homeopathic medication from an uncle for severe eczema. But in that time she missed two appointments which separate doctors had made for her at specialist dermatologists.
In May 2002, less than 10 days after her return, she was admitted to the Children's Hospital at Randwick severely malnourished and with infections to the skin and eyes.
She had died within three days of sepsis (bacterial infections) which had caused bleeding in her lungs and airways. Even though she was born a normal weight, she was underweight for her age, and had a zinc, protein and vitamin A deficiency, the Glebe Coroner's Court heard.
Nurses at the Earlwood Early Childhood Centre had diagnosed that Gloria, an only child, had failed to reach developmental milestones from an early age, counsel assisting Chris Hoy told the court. Her father, Thomas Sam, who practised and taught homeopathy, had applied homeopathic remedies to try to cure Gloria's eczema since she was diagnosed with it when aged about four months, he said.
The inquest, which will examine the role of nutrition in her death, will also examine the actions of her father and mother, Manju Samuel, and advice they received from doctors and homeopaths. Mr Hoy said the inquest would reveal if homeopathy should be better regulated or scrutinised.
A forensic pathologist, Ella Sugo, told the court a micro-organism which was commonly found in broken skin, was isolated in Gloria's blood, urine, skin and eyes. She had abnormally pale skin and hair. Dr Sugo found her immune system was weakened. Her thymus gland, a part of the immune system, had shrunk after originally being in good condition.
Geesche Jacobsen/Sydney Morning Herald, Australia - Nov 5, 2007 While malutrition has played a large part in this by the sounds of it, homeopathy also appears to have played a part. It is very sad that the parents did not attent two appointments with a dermo clinic which could have helped this little girl. To linger on to such beliefs that homeopaths pedal, that they can make you well really upsets me. I guess when Mr Hoy says: 'the inquest would reveal if homeopathy should be better regulated or scrutinised.' has me in agreeance. More regulations should be taken against people who treat with homeopathy. Another needless death.
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Post by Dippy on Nov 18, 2007 16:03:56 GMT
Another story on this case: ONCE we laughed at primitive superstitions. Now we teach them in TAFE colleges.
You’d laugh, if children like nine-month-old Gloria Thomas weren’t paying for our retreat from reason in this Ylang-Ylang Age.
A coroner in Sydney this month held an inquest into Gloria’s agonising death from severe bacterial infections.
The child had been so riddled with eczema that her skin was paper dry and split in many places.
The court was told Gloria’s parents, of Indian background, had preferred to treat her not with drugs tested under the Western scientific method that has made us so healthy and long-lived, but with homeopathic cures.
Homeopathy is one of the “alternative therapies” now so fashionable among people who burn incense.
Its theory, developed by a German quack in the 1770s, is that a very little of what hurts you will make you better. Mimic the symptoms to trigger the cure.
As the British medical journal Lancet reported two years ago, the one problem with this theory is that none of the trials of this “therapy” over the past 150 years have shown it actually works.
The University of Berne even checked the findings of 110 trials of homeopathy, only to discover - what a surprise - nothing worked better than sugar pills.
And so, of course, it seems to have turned out with Gloria, who screamed from her pain before she died.
That some of us are superstitious isn’t news, I know.
Nor is it news that some of us are so superstitious that we’re a menace to ourselves and to others.
Four years ago in Melbourne another coroner investigated the death of a toddler whose parents had refused to treat her epilepsy with anti-convulsant medicine.
They, too, tried homeopathy, which worked exactly as as it did with Gloria.
There are other deadly “alternative therapies”, of course - alternative, that is, to therapies that work.
Another inquest was held just last June to find out why a Melbourne man had sweated to death in an allegedly Native American ritual to “purify” his body.
And Victoria’s Health Services Commissioner is investigating the death of a cancer patient who thought “ozone therapy” - worthless injections of ceseum chloride administered by a former dentist - would somehow cure him.
But what astonishes me with homeopathy is that a treatment so bogus should be taught in our TAFE colleges and even a university.
What should be damned in our temples of reason is now preached instead.
The global warming panic, or the naked rain dance funded by VicHealth, aren’t the only signs we’re becoming steadily more irrational - and are perversely proud of it.
Victoria University is the most scandalous example, offering a Bachelor of Health Science - Naturopathy and Homeopathy last year, with courses even in “vibrational medicine” to teach “energy healing, the role of intuition, spirituality and all other areas related to the metaphysical”.
For this New Age trash to be packaged by a university into a degree is tragic.
For it to call this abomination “science” is a fraud.
Where Victoria University led, TAFE colleges have followed - so enthused to be tripping the pixie path that Further Education Minister Andrew Robb this year complained they had slashed engineering courses while offering another million hours of teaching of “complementary therapies” from naturopathy to reiki healing.
Add homeopathy to that, too.
Thanks to taxpayer-funded TAFE colleges, graduates are now floating out with eyes of newts in one hand and Advanced Diplomas of Naturopathy in the other, certifying that they are trained in “herbal medicine, nutrition, relaxation massage and homeopathy”.
A little of what will hurt you can make you strong, is the homeopath’s creed.
But a little homeopathy has instead made our brains all too weak. blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/column_lesson_in_silly_superstitions/
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