THIS WEEK, The Associated Press told the story of a Florida woman who, diagnosed with rectal cancer, decided against surgery or other medical intervention. Instead, she sought a natural cure.
If life were an infomercial or a fairy story, today that woman would be free of cancer. But the AP told the real-life result of her decision:
With much of her lower body consumed by cancer, Leslee Flasch finally faced the truth: The herbal supplements and special diet were not working.
“I want this thing cut out from me. I want it out,” she told her family.
But it was too late. Her rectal cancer — potentially curable earlier on — had invaded bones, tissue, muscle, skin. The 53-year-old Florida woman could barely sit, and constantly bled and soiled herself.
“It was terrible,” one doctor said. “The pain must have been excruciating.”
Flasch had sought a natural cure. Instead, a deadly disease ran its natural course. And the herb peddlers who sold her hope in a bottle?
“Whatever money she had left in life, they got most of it,” said a sister, Sharon Flasch. “They prey on the sick public with the belief that this stuff can help them, whether they can or can’t.”
The cancer-cure scams are the sharp, cruel tip of the thriving business of phony “natural” medicine. Anyone who has gone on the Internet or watched television late at night has seen the promises for cures for everything from cancer to arthritis to disappointing sexual performance. Amazingly, each one of these cures is known only to unsung, selfless geniuses who must fight the “medical establishment” in order to save lives, ease joint pain or put a satisfied smile on a woman’s face.
The folks who prey on people with cancer are the worst of a greedy lot. At best, their cancer “cures” may ease the symptoms of the disease, while allowing the cancer to grow unchecked. At worst, the phony medicine only robs the patient of precious time to seek effective treatment or to make peace with the inevitable outcome of a disease that has already gone too far.
It is understandable that people can be reluctant to undergo medical treatment for cancer. Although treatments have improved in recent years, along with success rates, the prospect of surgery, chemotherapy or radiation therapy is still daunting. Treatments can leave patients sick and exhausted. It must be very tempting to believe in a secret, painless cure — a pill or a powder that will make everything all right.
If there were such a magic potion, it would not be sold by actors on television or by faceless vendors on the Internet. It would be stocked in every hospital and pharmacy in the country and would be the treatment of choice for every doctor who has ever had to look a patient in the eye and say, “You’ve got cancer.”
If there were such a medicine, Leslee Flasch would still be alive.
Patrick S. Kelley
Editorial Page Editor
driveonby (anonymous) says...
Doctors are selling the same hope. They will tell you that they cannot "cure" cancer. If it is surgically possible to cut out the whole thing, great. Chemo doesn't cure either. Do the math. How much are licensed practicioners and clinics making a year on cancer patients? Holy mackeral!!!!! Sometimes all a person has is hope. Go ahead, Kelley, take that away from them.
June 9, 2009 at 11:01 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )