The leading cause of death is a heart attack and stroke (52%)
The second cause is cancer (23%)
And the third cause is drugs,
prescribed both correctly and incorrectly
(from “Death by Prescription” by Ray D. Strand, MD)

*

The word pharmacy comes from the Greek “pharmakeuticos”, from “pharmakeus” which means “drug maker, poisoner”.

*

Western medicine is a (relatively) new modality and people often confuse Western medicine with health.

But that is not what doctors do. Doctors are trained to keep us alive. They have nothing to do with well-being, except to the extent that it helps us stay alive. They may advise us to keep our cholesterol levels low or to stop smoking, but these are (from the doctor’s perspective) survival problems, not well-being problems. That these things have an impact on our well-being is incidental (from the doctor’s perspective).

If it weren’t for the doctors, I wouldn’t be here today. When I was 25 years old, I contracted tuberculosis in the kidney, the most unusual because tuberculosis tends to attack the lungs. However, I received it in the right kidney and it was in bad shape, urinating blood and pus and it was coming out when the doctors intervened with their powerful medications and surgery and saved my life. I would have died without your help.

The point is … They kept me alive, which is what doctors do, but I WAS NOT HEALED.

After the operation, after all the signs of the tuberculosis germ disappeared, she was still ill. I had no energy, I was depressed, I fell asleep during the day for no apparent reason (the doctors prescribed methedrine to keep me awake!), I caught colds and flu easily, I had impossible amounts of body odor (a real problem for someone 25 and over! dating girls!) … in other words, he was alive but not well.

See, that’s the difference. Doctors have no training in healing people or wellness. They can get rid of the germ, or the invading substance, they’re good at it, but they don’t address the underlying CONDITIONS that allowed that germ to thrive in the first place.

Doctors are trained to intervene and can only intervene when symptoms manifest, at which point the disease has progressed to a stage where only severe measures (medications and surgery) can help. Which, of course, is risky, not to mention expensive.

Now there is a need for this. Many people (like me) let things slide to the point where nothing but drastic intervention will keep them alive and I would venture to say that many people (myself included) are alive today only because of drastic intervention.

But that comes at a cost and the collateral damage is high.

In a country as small as Australia (20 million inhabitants), 18,000 people die each year at the hands of doctors (The Bulletin, September 2006). That’s 345 people per week, or 49 people per day who die as a result of “medical errors” (as The Bulletin called them). There are many deaths in a country as small as ours.

Worse still, another 50,000 are injured as a result of medical treatment. That’s 961 injuries per week or 137 injuries per day.

That, again, is a lot, for a small country.

But wait! It gets worse …

The above figures are only the ones we KNOW.

According to The Bulletin, doctors and hospitals are “chronically underreported,” so the actual numbers are likely to be much higher again.

And these are not just numbers. They are real people who suffer real injuries or have their lives cut short. The September issue of The Bulletin, just cited, featured an incredibly beautiful Middle Eastern girl, about 19 years old, whose life still lay ahead of her, but came to an abrupt end due to a medical error.

AND WE HAVE TO ACCEPT THIS. If we want medicine to step in and keep us alive when our bodies break down, then we have to accept the downside.

We can’t have it both ways. We cannot have a benign medicine that is drastic at the same time. Western medicine is harsh and deadly. It keeps us alive by killing. The word antibiotics means just that: anti-bio, against life. Medical treatments indiscriminately kill cells, both good and bad cells, in the hope that our good cells will outnumber the bad ones.

And that’s a completely different approach to using mangosteen and other whole food supplements.

The difference is this. Western medicine eliminates or suppresses symptoms, while supplements (the good ones) eliminate the underlying conditions that caused the symptoms.

Based on the above, my recommendation is this:

1 – always opt for supplements first – (ie before noticeable symptoms) – for PREVENTION.

2 – if symptoms are present but not life-threatening, opt for supplements and a significantly altered lifestyle (ie nothing too radical).

3 – If the symptoms persist, or if it is a life or death situation, you may have to resort to medications or surgery, but … take the mangosteen (or a good supplement) AT THE SAME TIME. This will maximize the effect of the medical intervention and minimize side effects.

I must emphasize: drugs have their place, but only as a LAST RESORT! Drugs kill! Never feel complacent about taking them. Treat them like a rattlesnake, a little of whose venom can cure you, but too much of it will kill you.