DOCTORS' Lounge
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Medical Conspiracies
Mary G. Barry, MD
Louisville Medicine Editor
[email protected]
(Just in case you’re wondering, I am in fact
the non-anonymous author of this memo.)
I
am continually astounded at the amount
of money people will spend on useless
nutritional supplements, “cleansers” for
“toxins,” and supposedly health-enhanc-
ing devices. Most of the hunger for these
things stems from not wanting to be sick
and not trusting that regular food, exercise,
addiction avoidance, luck and preventive
medicines will be adequate. There is an
overlay of paranoia. Are They (meaning
we doctors and nurses) really telling us the
truth? Are They aware that “eating clean” is
better for you? Do They believe in antiox-
idants and free radicals? Don’t They know
that coconut oil and apple vinegar (but
only those with specially bought organic/
artisanal/locally sourced ingredients) can
prevent weight gain and illness? Don’t They
know that wellness is not possible without
kale and kombucha?
Wellness is now a billion-dollar business,
a word that means “in pursuit of something
unattainable by spending a whole lot of
money on what I can sell you.” That would
be my interpretation. The consumers of
these “wellness” products see it different-
ly. With great enthusiasm, they are buying
health and beauty. They are buying better
sleep. They are buying weight loss, better
sex and better-than-their-neighbor every-
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thing, because these products say so. They
are advertised to achieve these things. The
proprietors and drivers of these programs
strive minute-to-minute to seize a new
angle, to promote a new elixir, to devise
“personalized testing” for such things as
“salivary toxins” that might require “radical
cleansing,” or, in the case of Gwyneth Pal-
trow and her company, Goop, vaginal eggs.
Goop is a “lifestyle enhancing” business
worth over $250 million. Just last week, the
Associated Press reported that Goop agreed
to a settlement with the state of California
to the tune of $145,000, when an inves-
tigative task force found that insertion of
the specially designed Jade Egg and Rose
Quartz Egg was not in fact able to “bal-
ance hormones, regulate menstrual cycles
or improve bladder control.” The company
must also refund money, on request, to the
women who bought these.
Goop heavily advertises its “Eating
Clean” program, pointing out its design by
Dr. Alejandro Junger, a cardiologist who
turned to this way of eating after enduring
postgraduate training in New York City.
Its products are free from gluten, meat and
dairy, and are not genetically modified
foods. The Goop website advises a nightly
12-hour window without any food or drink,
“to send the signal we are going into deep
detox mode – allowing eight hours for di-
gestion and four hours for deep clean.” The
initial 21-day program costs $475 and the
maintenance monthly program is $138 (plus
you can buy the special shaker bottle to use
and you can buy the MOVE fiber shake for
your bowels). You can consult their Health
Coach. (If they recommend the vaginal
eggs, ask for outcomes data up front.) You
cannot buy Real Water on their website, but
you can find out that Ms. Paltrow drinks it.
Taffy Brodesser-Akner wrote a long pro-
file piece about her in the July 25 New York
Times magazine. Real Water is advertised
to replace “the valuable electrons stripped
from regular drinking water” thus rendering
our Louisville Tap, for instance, “acidic and
full of free radicals.” Free radicals “steal elec-
trons from the body’s cells, causing serious
health damage.” The company alkalinized
their water to a pH of eight. This water by
contrast has “E2 Electron Energized Tech-
nology which adds trillions and trillions of
electrons, producing stable negative ioniza-
tion and with antioxidants, neutralizing free
radicals.” Negative ions “are more accept-
ed by the body’s aquaporins.” A case of 12
one-liter bottles is $28 and you can – deal!
– get 24 for $36. Imagine those trillions
of electrons coursing through your veins.
Don’t you feel special now?
The dangerous part of all of these “health
enhancements” is not just the drain on the