Rejecting Modern Science

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Rejecting modern science might sound crazy. Science has done so much for us, hasn't it? Yes and no. I find that a lot of modern scientists have blinders on, and cling just as strongly to beliefs that don't make any sense as they say we -- religious people -- do. The more research I've done, the more flawed I've come to think modern science really is. Now, just in case you still think I'm crazy, I'll explain why I do not believe in modern science.

First -- I'll tell you what I do believe in. I believe that trauma medicine is great. If we had a car accident and had horrible injuries, I'd be in the hospital getting stitched up. I think our trauma doctors do an awesome job of saving people who otherwise surely would have died, and experienced great pain. I also believe in the scientific method in general -- that we can look at an issue openly and examine the evidence to come to a true conclusion.

However, I think doctors have overstepped their bounds (especially in obstetrics, an issue I'll be discussing more in a few weeks). They have dogmatic beliefs in drugs, vaccines, and interventions. They have overly simplistic explanations for the way the human body works, and they don't look for reasons WHY or for underlying causes. They only observe and assume. I also think that the scientific method is rarely used anymore. Researchers start out with a question, and they know what answer they would like or what they expect to see. Research is conducted in such a way as to provide the expected answer most of the time. This is then called peer-reviewed research and is published in medical journals, and is the foundation for "evidence-based medicine," which I entirely reject. Using these two phrases, "peer-reviewed medical journals" and "evidence-based medicine," dogmatic scientists try to make people like me look like we are stark raving lunatics with no knowledge or brain function whatsoever. It's rude, and it's wrong.

Here is an example of typical medical thinking: Several breastfeeding women are tested for the presence of vitamin D in their milk. All the levels are found to be low. Doctors conclude that vitamin D must not get into breastmilk very much, and recommend supplementing all breastfed babies.

What the doctors failed to ask is WHY is vitamin D low in the breastmilk? They did not test the womens' blood to see if they were deficient. Most people in this country are deficient, so it's likely these women were, too. If the women were deficient, their breastmilk would be, as well. But, the doctors did not test this, and they assumed that breastmilk must just not have much vitamin D, since their samples didn't.

This is a fundamental problem: confusing COMMON with NORMAL. It is COMMON for people to be deficient in vitamin D...but it is not NORMAL. It is common for children to get frequent ear infections...but it is not normal. It is common for people to believe that injecting poison (i.e. vaccines) into themselves will prevent disease...but it is not normal!

Doctors and researchers believe that the way they practice medicine must be correct because it is "evidence-based." But in the above examples, doctors have "evidence." They can observe these things -- low vitamin D levels in breastmilk and frequent ear infections in children -- and so they make assumptions about this evidence. i.e. that they must be normal. Then they figure out ways to deal with this. The simplest way to deal with an ear infection (in their view) is to give an antibiotic. There is no thinking like "Why are these children getting ear infections? Why did children not get them so often in the past? What is different today? What might we change to remedy the ear infections so that children do not get them in the first place?" It is is more difficult to think this way because WHY each child is getting ear infections can be different -- food allergies, overly vaccinated, given too many antibiotics, ear canals too small/misshapen, etc. -- so this requires a lot of case-by-case calls. Perhaps individual doctors still address these issues, but these are not generally mentioned over all. Medical journals simply have taken ear infections as generally "normal" and not preventable through diet/lifestyle changes, and they are now working on a vaccine to prevent them. Yes, really.

What about the new GMO (genetically modified organisms) food, or irradiated food? Or even pasteurized milk? Scientists claim it is nearly equivalent to fresh, non-GMO food because by all the basic measures they use -- vitamin and mineral content, mostly -- it is basically the same, and it also looks the same. But when testing for enzymes, phytonutrients, amino acids, etc. it becomes clear that it is NOT the same. Animals fed GMO foods die or develop cancer or diabetes very quickly. Cats consuming irradiated foods also developed tumors and became very ill. Microwaves basically irradiate food, too. Plants watered with microwaved, cooled water die. Clearly, even though they LOOK the same and we may not see immediate effects (people don't just keel over and die when eating them), there are very negative effects present. Again, the "evidence" that scientists have seems to prove their point -- but they are being far too simplistic and asking the wrong questions.

As far as "peer reviewed" studies, it is easy to get the answer you want when you word your question a specific way. It is also easy if you exclude people who are "anomalies," in that they have several side effects. It is easy if you break down the side effects into sub-categories so they look rarer. It is easy if you report only the major side effects -- or only the minor ones. It is easy if you use only health individuals and exclude people who do not match very specific criteria. It is easy to misinterpret the data. All of these are techniques frequently used in studies which are later peer reviewed and published in medical journals.

For example, one study the CDC funded looked at "the age at which children with and without autism received the MMR." Supposedly this was to decide if the MMR caused autism, and they concluded it did not. However, if the MMR does cause autism, and the parents did not know their children were at risk, they ALL would have been vaccinated at 12 - 15 months as recommended, and autism would have become evident later. There would clearly be no difference at the age at which they received it, and this is irrelevant to whether or not it causes autism. But, it appeared that the CDC had looked into it.

For another example, doctors looked at pregnant women and GBS testing (Group B strep). Women are routinely tested by OBs at around 35 weeks along. It is known women can be positive and negative at different times, but is assumed this is close enough to delivery that it will be accurate. Something like 63% of those who tested positive at 35 weeks tested negative after 38 weeks or at the time of birth. Yet, the researchers concluded that this was "helpful" and "beneficial" to do the test at 35 weeks. MOST tests were not accurate! And supposing a woman really was positive at the time of birth, her baby has only a 1 in 10,000 chance of serious side effects of death from GBS, while it has a much higher risk of harm from antibiotics during labor and immediately after birth (standard treatment).

Modern medicine misses the point frequently. The answer isn't to observe what is currently happening and find a new drug, vaccine, or therapy for it. The answer is to ask WHY this is happening and how we can prevent it naturally. Why were people not overweight very often 100 years ago? Why are they overweight today? Modern medicine has only part of the answer -- trans fats and sedentary lifestyles -- but that is not all. Our diets have completely changed. Even more interesting, why did people not get skin cancer 100 years ago, and they do now? 100 years ago there were many more farmers and more people spent all day in the sun. Today many people are indoors all day, in office buildings, and they get skin cancer. Somehow, modern doctors have decided that the sun causes cancer and that sunscreen and/or sun avoidance is the answer. This has not led to a decrease in skin cancer (it has probably increased due to the chemicals absorbed through the skin in sunscreen, though I'd have to double check that), but has led to chronically low vitamin D levels (which also increases risk of cancer). Modern medicine has MISSED the big picture entirely!

For this reason (and many other examples), I don't have a lot of respect for modern medicine. I don't believe that they are asking the right questions. I don't believe they are seeking the best answers. Many doctors think they can intervene and do a better job than God. They think that by giving children vaccines and antibiotics and practicing "preventative" care, they can make a child healthier than they were at birth. They think they can hurry along pregnancy and birth, and that taking a newborn away from its mother (cutting the cord immediately) and putting it on oxygen and bottle feeding and heated beds, they can improve that newborn's outcome. If that is so, why does the U.S., which has the highest rate of intervention in birth, also have the highest infant mortality rate of any developed country?

Evidence that the current system is broken is popping up everywhere, daily. There is plenty of evidence that laboring mothers who are gently supported and not given drugs and whose babies are allowed immediate skin-to-skin contact have far better outcomes than those who have interventions. There is evidence that these interventions are linked to childhood illnesses, like cancer and diabetes. There is evidence that vaccines cause brain damage, including autism. There is evidence that today's lifestyle causes obesity. It goes on and on. Modern medicine continues to try new innovations, ignoring that the problem worsens every year. Clearly their interventions are NOT making the problems better, and they still fail to realize it.

Perhaps individual doctors are driven to help people, and feel powerless when there is really nothing they can do. Perhaps they feel bad sending parents home with a prescription for extra vitamin D and C and lots of chicken soup. Perhaps they feel the need to do something -- give an antibiotic, give vaccines to try to prevent suffering. This desire to help is admirable if misguided.

Some, however, are not so innocent. Some are concerned with profits. Some are more concerned about public health than personal health (which is NOT ever a reason to get a vaccine, since they don't work at all in the first place). Some are being paid by the drug companies, who, of course, are motivated by profit.

The entire system is broken. I have no respect left for it. I have some respect for individual doctors, but not for "evidence-based medicine" whatsoever. Too much harm has come from it. Medical errors and hospital-acquired infections are in the leading causes of death in adults in this country, as are properly-used medical interventions (which are actually unnecessary). Medicine is killing as many (or more) people as they help.

This is why I avoid the medical system as much as possible. I do not believe that doctors are magical and worthy of any extra respect. Certainly they deserve the same respect as any other human being, but they are not elevated above the rest, as many seem to believe (how many of you have been talked down to by a doctor if you disagreed with their recommendations? or even been thrown out of a practice for refusing to comply?). The arrogance is wrong, and unjustified.

Next time someone tells you that you should fall in line because this is "evidence based medicine" and the results are published in "peer reviewed journals," tell them just how little faith you have in these, and exactly why. Instead, tell them you believe God created us perfectly and we don't need these interventions in almost any case to continue to be perfect. God gave us all the medicine we need all around us, which Chinese medicine and other natural healing takes advantage of (a topic for another blog post later). Don't let them bully you into thinking they are right. They are wrong!

Stepping off my soap box now. But I had to say it. :)