Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Another update on Daniel Hauser

Three months after the last update on this story, Orac reports this latest update on Daniel Hauser. Despite all the fuss made by his family and crazy “alternative” “medicine” cranks about how chemotherapy would kill him, the 13-year-old boy with Hodgkin’s lymphoma is doing quite well. And now he’s completed his induction course of chemotherapy. Unfortunately, since the family is using quack remedies as well, they’re still deluding themselves into thinking it’s really the bogus remedies doing all the work. Orac sums it up nicely:

Unfortunately, for “alternative” medicine, it’s “heads-I-win-tails-you-lose.” If the patient lives, it’s always because of the “natural” remedies. However, if the patient dies, it was clearly the toxicity of the chemotherapy that killed him. Scientific medicine always loses in the minds of such people. That’s OK, though. We’ll tolerate it as long as science-based medicine keeps saving lives. Because of that nasty, reductionist “Western” medicine, a 13-year-old has a chance at living a long and happy life.

[Via http://skepacabra.wordpress.com]

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