Guest Lecture-Walter P. Drake
Given at Panama College of Cell Science March 1, 2016
Medical Corruption in the USA
And Why Stem Cell Treatments Have Been Tough to Get Started
My title for this lecture may seem a little strong, but there has been a pattern of abusive, corrupt practices in the USA, mounted by the big pharmaceutical companies in conjunction with the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and supported by their paid surrogates, the American Medical Association, as well as prominent research institutions, to obstruct and suppress beneficial medical treatments, and most recently, adult stem cell treatments using autologous stem cells. The USA is important because many countries follow the USA position in medical and scientific matters.
Now I am not talking about embryonic stem cells, which to me are just synthetic cells that one can play around with in the lab, and can lead to important understanding of cell mechanisms, but which, when we speak of the treatment of disease, have no role to play whatsoever. They need a lot of regulation because they are tumorigenic and dangerous in many ways. I am referring to autologous adult stem cell therapies, which use stem cells collected from a patient for use on that patient only, and which at this writing (November 2013) have shown to have beneficial effects in treating disease and/or injury both globally, and also even in the USA (regenexx.com).
Adult stem cells cannot be patented, and so there is no interest on the part of the pharmaceutical industry, nor the FDA, which serves the pharmaceutical industry rather than the American citizens, to pursue treatments or methodologies that cannot yield them any revenue.
But even more than ignoring this useful treatment modality, the pharmaceutical industry, the US Food and Drug Administration, the American Medical Association, and a host of lesser self-annointed players such as the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) are bent on suppressing, obstructing, outlawing, and lying about useful adult stem cell therapies.
It is alarming to note that such activity is not just some imaginative “conspiracy theory” relating only to adult stem cell treatments, but rather part of a long pattern of vilifying any treatment that does not emanate from the pharmaceutical houses.
Under the ruse of “protecting the public”, the FDA’s goal is to protect the profits of the pharmaceutical industry by disallowing any treatment, herb, or substance that might actually cure or make patients healthier. The FDA and the pharmaceutical industry want a lot of sick, sick patients, to whom they can then sell their dangerous, poorly tested, poisonous yet patented, expensive drugs.
As succinctly summarized on the Panacea.org website: “They have crushed Natural Doctors, Natural Medicine, and natural remedy education on self Self-Care. Their goal is to monopolize health care and make us dependent on medical doctors and pharmaceutical drugs. We have watched them pass more and more laws restricting our rights; they have made many healing herbs, foods and even nutrients illegal”
In this lecture, we will touch upon the following topics, and examine what the US Food and Drug Administration action has been in suppressing and obstructing their development:
1. Cansema Black Salve
2. The Burzynski cancer cure
3. Bio-identical hormones for hormone replacement therapy
4. Vitamin Supplements
5. Autologous Adult Stem Cells
1. Cansema Black Salve
Black Salve was used early on as a cure for every kind of skin cancer. It contains as its main ingredient, the herb Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis L., Papaveraceae). The modern formula derives from American Indian herbal combinations discovered in the 1800’s, which were used and developed successively by various medical practitioners since that time. Most of the early history has been handed down from one medical practitioner to the next, and can be found published on various websites.
CLICK HERE to download pdf file: PanaceaSummary
The recipe for Black Salve is here: recipe
In the 1950’s, Black Salve was picked up by Harry Hoxsey who at his peak was operating cancer clinics in 17 states. “Endorsing the treatment were senators, judges, and even some doctors. Two Federal Courts upheld its therapeutic value.”
As summarized in the story, the head of the American Medical Association attempted to purchase the formula from Hoxsey, and when Hoxsey refused, the AMA branded him a quack. Hoxsey sued the head of the AMA for slander and won. But the AMA turned around and in its Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published an “investigation” into black salve and deemed it “without any therapeutic merit in the treatment of cancer”.
Harry Hoxsey was arrested many times apparently and dogged by the FDA and the AMA, and finally eventually moved his main clinic to Mexico, where, although after his death, it still treats cancer patients using the formula.
Greg Canton apparently started producing and selling Black Salve in the 1970’s. In early 2003, he was arrested and jailed at the request of the FDA for apparently introducing an untested product. In 2008, he moved his operations to Ecuador, from where he sells the product internationally at http://www.alphaomegalabs.com/store/cansemar-black-salve.html
When one looks at the entirety of the commentary on the internet, containing charges and countercharges involving Greg Canton and Black Salve, it is hard to really know what is going on. Has the US Food and Drug Administration actively sought to suppress the black salve treatment for skin cancer? Is “Quackwatch” correct in stating the product does nothing? Australia banned the sale of Black Salve in 2012.
If you run a Google search “Black salve treatment of cancer”, or even just “black salve” and look for YouTube videos, you will find a lot of videos from patients that tried this remedy and obtained a beneficial result. I look at all the many videos demonstrating the efficacy of Black Salve in treating a skin cancer. These people do not appear to me to be liars and idiots. One fellow from Thailand who has posted a video I am familiar with, and give his video great weight. To me, these videos suggest something very beneficial is occurring in the treatment of various kinds of skin cancer using Black Salve.
Yet, nothing occurs. The FDA does not commission a study. Big Pharma does nothing. They just make it go away to the extent that they can.
Black Salve, containing Bloodroot, appears to be an effective cancer treatment for skin cancer, yet cannot be offered to a patient by any physician.
2. Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski’s Cancer Cure
The Story of the Discovery of AntiNeoplastins
In 1982, Dr. Richard Crout, Director of the FDA Bureau of Drugs, wrote: “I never have and never will approve a new drug to an individual, but only to a large pharmaceutical firm with unlimited finances.”
Although the Black Salve story is mired in charges and countercharges going back over 100 years, the strong arm tactics of the US Food and Drug Administration against a licensed physician who has discovered a cure for certain types of brain tumors is well documented.
Let’s start with a documentary movie concerning Dr. Burzynski (found in your Syllabus)
Please study the video. On November 19, 2012, all charges against Dr. Burzynski brought by the Texas Medical Board at the prompting of the US FDA were dropped. See BurzynskiTexasBoard
Apparently, Dr. Burzynski has beaten the FDA after almost 30 years of governmental efforts to either stop him from treating patients, or scheming to steal his patents through the filing of bogus copycat patent applications. Although Dr. Burzynski cannot treat any patients unless they are part of a “clinical trial”, the National Cancer Institute, having determined the efficacy of his treatment, is now undertaking such clinical trials and permitting such treatments.
3. Bio-Identical Hormones
Versus Adulterated Prescription Hormones
(Professor Doctor Piotr Beck assisted me in this section).
When I tell people that the hormones available by prescription for hormone replacement therapy, or even birth control pills, are not the same hormones as naturally occur in the body I get a blank stare…what are you talking about. And the fact of the matter is that such hormones are engineered by the pharmaceutical companies to be different, and thereby be patentable! When a woman receives estrogen for estrogen replacement, she is not receiving the chemical formula for estrogen, but rather some other synthesized compound the behaves “similarly” to estrogen.
The pharmaceutical companies spend billions of dollars annually to coverup this fraud, to disseminate false information about bio-identical hormones, to claim their hormones are “natural” or “the same as” a patient’s own hormones.
A bio-identical hormone is just that: IDENTICAL to the chemical structure of a hormone naturally occurring in a human body.
A prescription hormone is not identical, period. They are not “natural” and although the main mechanism of action may be similar, there are additional side effects with prescription medicine that DO NOT OCCUR with bio-identical hormones. Not to mention the increased incidence of cancer related to the use of prescription hormones that are not observed with bio-identical hormones.
Here is an example of bio-identical progesterone vs prescription progesterone:
Here is another example: Bio-identical Testosterone vs Prescription Testosterone
Bio-identical hormones can be created in a lab, so the pharmaceutical companies always refer to them as “synthetic hormones” because that is what the prescription hormones are as well, “synthetic”. They do this on purpose to confuse and to hide the fact, that the prescription hormones are purposely engineered to be different so as to permit patent acquisition.
As Dr. Beck points out: The proponents of prescription based hormones (i.e. the degraded corrupted kind) always state that bioidentical hormones have never been proven to be safer. They mean in a clinical trial. But the other side of the coin is that there never has been any report whatsoever of a patient getting cancer of the types associated with the synthetically altered hormones (prescription hormones).
The proponents of prescription based hormones (i.e. the degraded corrupted kind) always state: don’t worry about the extra molecule(s) we added, it is “cleaved off” during metabolism, leaving the patient with a hormone with the correct structure. I can tell you there is no truth to this. Hoping the patient will CORRECT the INCORRECT chemical formulation is a dangerous supposition don’t you think? Possibly the metabolism of the many women who got the cancers could not “cleave off” the added part of the formulation!!
One does not have to look very far or very deep to find the pattern of mis-information and outright lies being disseminated about bio-identical hormones in an effort to protect the market, confuse women (and men), and keep the fraud going.
4. Vitamin Supplements
The latest to come under the FDA gun
When Linus Pauling was alive, the government would not have dared to attempt to limit access to vitamins and supplements. The only person in history to have been awarded two unshared Nobel Prizes, Dr. Pauling is considered the founder of the fields of quantum mechanics and molecular biology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linus_Pauling). Wikipedia also presents:
“Pauling’s work on vitamin C in his later years generated much controversy. He was first introduced to the concept of high-dose vitamin C by biochemist Irwin Stone in 1966. After becoming convinced of its worth, Pauling took 3 grams of vitamin C every day to prevent colds.[1] Excited by his own perceived results, he researched the clinical literature and published Vitamin C and the Common Cold in 1970. He began a long clinical collaboration with the British cancer surgeon Ewan Cameron in 1971 on the use of intravenous and oral vitamin C as cancer therapy for terminal patients.[66] Cameron and Pauling wrote many technical papers and a popular book, Cancer and Vitamin C, that discussed their observations. Pauling made vitamin C popular with the public and eventually published two studies of a group of 100 allegedly terminal patients that claimed vitamin C increased survival by as much as four times compared to untreated patients.[67][68] A re-evaluation of the claims in 1982 found that the patient groups were not actually comparable, with the vitamin C group being less sick on entry to the study, and judged to be “terminal” much earlier than the comparison group.[69] Later clinical trials conducted by the Mayo Clinic also found that high-dose (10,000 mg) vitamin C was no better than placebo at treating cancer and that there was no benefit to high-dose vitamin C.[70][71][72] The failure of the clinical trials to demonstrate any benefit resulted in the conclusion that vitamin C was not effective in treating cancer; the medical establishment also concluded his claims that vitamin C could prevent colds was quackery.[1][73] Pauling denounced the conclusions of these studies and handling of the final study as “fraud and deliberate misrepresentation”,[74][75] and criticized the studies for using oral, rather than intravenous vitamin C[76] (which was the dosing method used for the first ten days of Pauling’s original study[73]). Pauling also criticized the Mayo clinic studies because the controls were taking vitamin C during the trial, and because the duration of the treatment with vitamin C was short; Pauling advocated continued high dose vitamin C for the rest of the cancer patient’s life whereas the Mayo clinic patients in the second trial were treated with vitamin C for a median of 2.5 months.[77] The results were publicly debated at length with considerable acrimony between Pauling and Cameron, and Moertel (the lead author of the Mayo Clinic studies), with accusations of misconduct and scientific incompetence on both sides. Ultimately the negative findings of the Mayo Clinic studies ended general interest in vitamin C as a treatment for cancer.[75] Despite this, Pauling continued to promote vitamin C for treating cancer and the common cold, working with The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential to use vitamin C in the treatment of brain-injured children.[78] He later collaborated with the Canadian physician Abram Hoffer on a micronutrient regimen, including high-dose vitamin C, as adjunctive cancer therapy.[79]
With Arthur B. Robinson and another colleague, Pauling founded the Institute of Orthomolecular Medicine in Menlo Park, California, in 1973, which was soon renamed the Linus Pauling Institute of Science and Medicine. Pauling directed research on vitamin C, but also continued his theoretical work in chemistry and physics until his death. In his last years, he became especially interested in the possible role of vitamin C in preventing atherosclerosis and published three case reports on the use of lysine and vitamin C to relieve angina pectoris. In 1996, the Linus Pauling Institute moved from Palo Alto, California, to Corvallis, Oregon, to become part of Oregon State University, where it continues to conduct research on micronutrients,phytochemicals (chemicals from plants), and other constituents of the diet in preventing and treating disease. Several researchers that had previously worked at the Linus Pauling Institute in Palo Alto, including the assistant director of research, moved on to form the Genetic Information Research Institute.”
Dr. Pauling died in 1994 at the age of 93, convinced that Vitamin C was a useful vitamin supplement.
See the material presented in your Syllabus concerning vitamin supplements. Like I said, when he was alive, the government would not have tried to suppress the use or sale of vitamin supplements. It is interesting that Dr. Pauling believed that IV (intravenous) vitamin C was necessary for patient therapy, which is exactly the formulation being sought to be banned or requiring prescription at this time. Once they move it to requiring prescription, then the use of IV vitamin C will diminish as physicians will be reluctant to prescribe it for non-FDA approved uses, even though it has never been shown to have any side effect whatsoever.
5. Autologous Stem Cells
Treatment with autologous stem cells is a medical procedure not a “drug”.
But, the United States Food and Drug Administration claims that a patient’s own stem cells are a drug which it intends to regulate. This means that “clinical trials” are required and a physician must submit his treatment for approval to them. The FDA, in an unprecedented case of bureaucratic overreach into the practice of medicine, has defined a person’s own stem cells as “biological drugs.” This designation makes the use of one’s own stem cells subject to FDA regulation, as opposed to being classified as “medical procedures” regulated by state medical boards, Surgeons transplant hearts and other body parts on a routine basis; these are classified as “medical procedures” and not subject to FDA approval. There are many stem cells in a transplanted heart, for example, yet heart transplants are classified as “medical procedures.” In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) is considered a “medical procedure.” IVF involves using sperm cells from one person, egg cells from another person and manipulating them in a lab to create a third person. In the case of surrogacy, this highly manipulated material is implanted into a fourth person. The entire process is defined as a “medical procedure,” therefore IVF is not subject to FDA regulation. However, taking one’s own cells, manipulating them and injecting them back into one’s own body now causes those cells to be classified as drugs.
If you run a Google search; “FDA says stem cell is a drug” you will find numerous recent articles on this.
You should also read the Centeno text presented in your Syllabus. And please emphasize the Berkley Bedell critique of the FDA position.
The FDA and Big Pharma are not going to willingly allow physicians to treat their own patients with the patients own stem cells. Why? Because as with every single example I have given to you above, if a pharmaceutical company is not making money on a treatment or procedure, then it is just not going to be allowed.
But Regenexx is doing battle with the FDA. And the State of Texas too has had enough. It adopted its own stem cell treatment rules April 13, 2012. See TExasStemcellrules
And as mentioned in the materials in Section 8 of your Syllabus, some work-arounds seem to be slowly developing.
Panama College of Cell Science 