The Dangers Of Drug Medication: Over-the-Counter And Prescription Drugs

Lesson 40 - The Dangers Of Drug Medication: Over-the-Counter And Prescription Drugs

Introduction

Since early Egyptian times, it has been recognized that obedience to physiological law is a prerequisite for maintaining health. Hippocrates is supposed to have said that the physician should have two special objectives regarding disease, namely, to do good or to do no harm. According to the Hippocratic concept, the doctor is the servant, the “helper” of pthisis (nature). He said, “It is important to help, or at least not to harm.”

The very early physicians knew of the importance of obeying these natural laws and their practices evolved around this concept. Today there is an increasing body of scientific evidence which supports these concepts and more attention is now being devoted to diet, exercise and the other natural essentials of health.

During the very early years when man was evolving into the being we know today, he knew nothing about science and medicine yet his bones healed, his wounds healed and life went on. Primitives, like animals, instinctively relied upon their own intrinsic powers of healing.

During the 19th century, medical sects arose out of opposition to the so-called “heroic” treatment of their day and they shared some success. When we study each of these sects which arose during that time, we begin to see certain patterns emerging. The highest success rate was among those practitioners who did the least harm and allowed “na- ture’s healing powers” to work unhampered.

By “nature’s healing power” I do not mean a specific entity for healing but a capacity which resides in all living animals to heal themselves and to maintain a steady state. The goal of life is to maintain life and the body always strives toward a healthy state. Problems arise when too many obstacles are thrown in the path of this effort. The role of the Hygienic practitioner is to remove those obstacles by teaching his students how to correct those errors in living which caused his illness and making sure that all of the conditions for health are supplied in the proper quantity and quality. It is important that all of these conditions are present at the same time as health cannot be achieved if any of them are missing or lacking. These conditions include proper food, pure air, pure wa- ter, sunshine, rest and sleep, exercise and emotional poise. The body then becomes the healing force. This is demonstrated in wound healing, healing of broken bones, in self- limited diseases such as colds, flu, etc.

When we consume such unnatural and unwholesome foods as the highly refined products which are so popular today, we build disease. We inflict our illnesses upon our- selves by poor dietary habits, lack of sleep, a sedentary lifestyle and other unhealthy habits. We then develop atherosclerosis, cancer, kidney stones, or ulcers from our own wrong actions. We cannot eliminate these errors in living by taking a drug. We must look amongst our practices for the “cure.”

The cell is a homeostatic mechanism requiring precise entry of nutrients and elimina- tion of wastes. These wastes result from ongoing metabolic activity and the deterioration of structural elements. With proper nutrition and detoxification, the cell is programmed for specific functions. Assuming these functions are healthy cells and tissue that lead to healthy organs that lead to a healthy organism.

Since illness is the result of unhealthful practices, then health should be restored by removing these causes and supplying the conditions for health. This is the philosophy of the drugless practitioners. They do not add further contaminants to an already toxic organism by dispensing drugs but rely on natural means which depend upon the body’s own ability to heal.

History Of Drugs

The oldest known written record of drug use is a clay tablet from the ancient Sumer- ian civilization of the Middle East. This tablet, made in the 2000’s B.C., lists about a dozen drug prescriptions. An Egyptian scroll from about 1550 B.C. names more than 800 prescriptions containing about 700 drugs.

Ancient peoples used many drugs. An Egyptian physician, for example, tried to cure blindness by pouring a mixture of honey, pig’s eye, and other ingredients into the pa- tient’s ear. But occasionally people who had taken drugs as remedies would recover nat- urally. As a result, they credited the drugs for their healing.

Throughout the Middle Ages, the demand for drugs remained high and pharmacies became increasingly common in Europe and the Arab world.

In the early 1500s, the Swiss physician Philippus Paracelsus pioneered the use of minerals as drugs. He introduced many compounds of lead, mercury, and other minerals in the treatment of various diseases.

The drug revolution began about 1800 and has continued up to the present. During this period, scientists have discovered hundreds of drugs. Scientists learned how to iso- late drugs from plants in the early 1800s. In 1806, morphine became the first plant drug to be isolated. Within a few years scientists had isolated quinine and several other plant drugs.

The pace of the drug revolution quickened in the 1900s. In fact, most of the major drugs used today have been discovered since 1900, such as hormones, antibiotics, and sulfa drugs.

Herbal Medicines

Since early Neanderthal man, plants have been used as drugs for “healing” purposes. Even as modes of medicine changed throughout the centuries, plants continued to be the mainstay of country medicine as methods and ideas on plant healing were passed down from family to family and within communities. Thus tribes, clans, villages, towns, some- times entire countries, tended to have similar styles in “healing.” Most of these plant remedies were based on local discoveries and pass-along uses, so many plants are used in exactly the same way.

For several thousands years the Chinese physicians used the Ma Huang plant. Later researchers extracted an alkaloid, ephedrine, from this plant.

Willow bark was used for thousands of years, even by American Indian tribes. Un- fortunately, consistent use of the bark affected the digestive system, and it became im- perative to find a substitute, or chemical version. This duplication took over fifty years of investigation, and was solved when a German scientist broke the chemical code by using the spirea plant family, instead of willow bark. He called his result aspirin, now one of the most used drugs on earth (resulting in much distress and iatrogenic diseases).

Curare arrow poison, another tropical discovery, is now used to control breathing during some surgery.

Digitalis was extracted from the foxglove plant, an herb, and is still prescribed by physicians for those with heart problems.

Shamen and Witch Doctors

In his book, The History of Medicine, the British physician and surgeon, Kenneth Walker says, “Thanks to the extraordinary recuperative powers of the human body and the resilience of the human mind, the patient generally managed throughout the ages to recover health in spite of the vicissitudes of treatment to which he had been subjected.”

During the early days of civilization, there were many types of ‘cures’ that were as- sociated with various cults. If the patient recovered his health, it was attributed to the healing ritual. If recovery did not occur, the disease was blamed. However, in all cases, it becomes evident that it was ‘vis Medicatrix Naturae’ which effected the recovery.

There was always a common denominator involved in all of these ‘cures.’ This is the force active in the organism in which healing takes place in spite of what was done and not because of what was done.

The Indians had their shamen and medicine men. The Hindus worshipped many gods and believed that illness was the work of demons. Therefore, rituals were performed to rid the sick individual of these demons and witches. The African bushman performed a symbolic dance which was supposed to “cure.” The Chinese used acupuncture, herbs and moxibustion. (This is the burning of powered leaves of the moxa plant on the skin of the patient).

All of the therapies differed widely—from magic and witches to acupuncture. The modes of treatment were varied and often bizarre but they all had “success.” Patients overcame their illnesses in most cases. How can a superstitious ceremony overcome a disease? The answer is that it cannot. First of all, most diseases are self-limited and the patient becomes well in spite of the treatment. But there was always this common de- nominator present in all of the recoveries and that is the vital faculty within each of us which is called upon when needed to re-establish equilibrium within our body and to heal. It is this vital power which we call ‘nature’ that healed the Indian after the witch doctor performed his magical ritual and it was this same force which manifested itself after the Chinese doctor administered herbs. The highest success rate came after those ceremonies or rituals or treatments which did the least harm and interfered least with the body’s innate ability to heal itself.

What Are Drugs?

Pharmacologists consider all chemicals that affect living things to be drugs. Stedman’s Medical Dictionary defines a drug as “A therapeutic agent; any substance, other than food, used in the prevention, diagnosis, alleviation, treatment, or cure of disease in man and animal.”

The truth is that all drugs are poisons and always do much harm, even when taken in small quantities. The body reacts defensively to all foreign substances which are intro- duced. This response is mistakenly attributed to the action of me drug when in fact the

drugs do not act mechanically to produce any response. It is the body which acts upon the drugs in its efforts to dispose of this dangerous substance as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Hygienists know that the living organism is dynamic and full of energy. Its self- reparative and restorative ability remains intact as long as energy is abundant. Over 100 years ago Dr. R.T. Trall demonstrated the difference between lifeless matter and the liv- ing organism. He said that the living organism is active and the lifeless matter is passive.

Drugs are passive inert substances which have no magical powers to impart life and health to a living organism. Drugs combine chemically with the chemical constituents of the body where they do much harm by interfering with normal life processes.

What Do Drugs Do

Drugs Produce Disease

People take so-called headache remedies, stimulants, anesthetics, pain killers, sleep- ing pills and narcotics for the temporary relief they afford. As a direct consequence of drug poisoning, gastric ulcer, anemia, kidney disease or any of many other ailments many develop. The pathologies these poisons occasion are added to the disease for which they are given. This is to say, physician-made diseases are worse than the natural disease.

It has been said that drug-treated patients have to recover twice—first, they have to recover from the original disease and, second, they have to recover from the drug-in- duced disease. The fact is that every drug is a poison and every drug produces disease. All too often patients are killed by the drug and, in an even greater number of cases, where the drug does not kill, it produces permanent harm. In fact, the most common cause of chronic disease is drug treatment for acute disease.

There are no harmless drugs; there are no safe drugs. All of them, even the least tox- ic, result in the production of pathologies, if they are repeatedly administered, even in small doses. It is certainly unwise to continue drug practices, especially in the face of the fact that they produce only ills. For example, what good comes from the adminis- tration of cortisone for arthritis? The symptoms are temporarily suppressed; the patient may be provided a certain measure of relief from pain, but the sufferer’s condition in- evitably becomes worse and recovery is more difficult. The ultimate result is increased suffering for a brief respite from pain. This is true of all suppressive measures. Both physician and patient are deluded into believing that some suffering is being saved, but the later increased suffering outweighs the brief periods of freedom from pain. In fact, the increased suffering is usually of longer duration than the periods of comfort and is far more acute than the periods of “relief.”

There are no drugs now used by the medical profession and there were no drugs used by any of the schools of medicine in the past that did not and do not produce disease.

Side Effects

If a drug, which is a chemical substance, unites with the protein of the cell, it de- stroys the cell. It is precisely to prevent this union and thus to save the life of the cell that the drug is resisted, rejected and expelled. All the action that is mistaken for drug action is cellular or organic action designed to protect and preserve life.

When a drug is picked up by the blood, either from the digestive tract or from the site of the injection, it is carried by this medium throughout the body, so that it comes in contact with tissues everywhere. The so-called side effects of drugs are the actions

of the different tissues with which the drug comes in contact in rejecting, resisting and expelling the drug. So-called drug effects are not drug actions but vital actions.

If a drug may be employed and it suppresses symptoms, it is said to be good. That the drug may produce unwanted effects at the same time it suppresses the symptoms is, of course, unfortunate and the physician hopes that the “side” effects will not be too great or that he can stop the drug if the “side” effects threaten to become formidable.

Hygienists know how to avoid these poisonous effects. They simply avoid all drugs. We cannot be poisoned into health.

Law Of Dual Effect

The Law of Duel Effect states that all substances which are taken into the body, or which come in contact with it from without, occasion a twofold and contrary action— the sec- ondary action being the opposite of the primary action, and the more lasting.

Therefore, the primary action (reaction) from taking a stimulant would be stimu- lating but the secondary and longer lasting effect would be depression. Likewise, the primary reaction from taking a pain-suppressant would be relief from pain but the sec- ondary, longer-lasting effect would be increased pain. If the immediate and temporary effect of a dose of digitalis is to stimulate the heart, the secondary and permanent effect is to depress the heart.

Why would this be so? The body marshalls its available forces to handle the situation at hand which at that moment might be an abnormal substance in the form of a pain-sup- pressant. This toxin which has been so introduced has to be dealt with and eliminated as quickly as possible. During this time, the organism halts reparative and healing process- es which are felt as symptoms, thus temporary relief.

However, as soon as the foreign substance is disposed of, the body reinitiates its healing processes with the return of the old symptoms. However, due to the tremendous expenditure of vital energy and the added toxins from the drugs, greater harm has been done. The heart becomes weaker after its stimulation due to exhaustion and added tox- ins. Likewise affected are all bodily organs.

What Drugs Cannot Do

Obviously, drugs cannot heal disease. There are no healing powers or intelligence out- side of the human body. One should dismiss this notion of “cure” forever from their thoughts. It is only the body which possesses this potential to heal itself and will do so when favorable conditions are provided.

People take drugs for relief of their symptoms but often find that the drugs are in- effective even for this. People who take sleeping pills are more tired than ever. Dieters who take diet pills remain overweight.

The individual who has arthritis still has pain after ingesting enormous quantities of aspirin.

Why Drugs Are Used

Since 2000 B.C. man has sought that magical formula which would “cure” him of all his illnesses. Man sought an easy way out of his problems which he created for himself. “One pill and I will feel great once again!” Unfortunately, there are no magical formulas that will overcome our ills and still allow us to transgress all the laws of physiology.

Drugs are used to suppress symptoms. That is, to relieve pain, relieve insomnia, skin eruptions, constipation, etc. But are symptoms the disease? No, they are just evidences of it. They are a sign from our body telling us that the body has closed shop for cleansing and repairs. If one were to listen to the innate intelligence of his body instead of imme- diately suppressing these warning signs, many chronic diseases would not occur. Drugs

suppress but never solve the problem of ill health (toxicosis). In fact, drugs cause more ill health (toxicosis).

It is commonly thought that every so-called disease is a distinct entity, requiring a specific remedy. Throughout all systems and methods of therapeutics, there runs a ba- sic error that they call the therapeutic actions of their various procedures. The truth is that these so-called “therapeutic actions” or “remedies” are reactions of the body against the “remedies.” The living organism reacts to everything within its environment—to as- similate useful agents and influences; to eject nonusuable and destructive things. The defensive reactions against harmful substances and influences is proportionate to their harmfulness and commensurate with the vital energy possessed by the affected organ- ism. These two factors—the amount and destructive-ness of the agent or influence, and the vital energy of the organism—are the determining factors in every reaction.

In reality the therapeutic effects are among drugs’ evil effects. They are classed as therapeutic effects only because they are the effects the physician wishes to produce when he prescribes the drug. He assumes that something constructive and beneficial is accomplished when a symptom is temporarily suppressed.

When one uses drugs, one endeavors to provide the sick body with means of carrying on its healing efforts. By sending into it or applying to it, exotic and poisonous sub- stances that it cannot use in a state of health, the body is actually further debilitated. In short, the effort to cure disease has been by producing additional disease.

Medical men employ poisons because they believe that poisons are the proper things with which to restore health. They attempt to prevent disease by the employments of poi- sons because they believe that poisons can prevent disease. It never enters their minds that the elements of health are essentials to both preserving and restoring health.

Poisons are used because there is an effort to kill something—germs, parasites, viruses. This war is nominally on disease, but the warfare actually devolves upon the human constitution.

Should the sick be poisoned? One might also ask, should the well be poisoned? Is there any more reason the sick should be poisoned than there is that the well should be poisoned? If poisons are not the proper things with which to preserve health, why should they be thought of as the proper things with which to restore health? If poisons make the well man sick, what do they do for the sick man?

Why Drugs Should Not Be Used

As you have learned from previous lessons, disease is a body-conducted remedial process. It is an effort on the part of the organism to repair and heal itself. You have also learned that disease is not something lurking in the bushes ready to attack the first per- son who passes by it. Rather it is occasioned by our own transgressions of life’s laws.

Drugs cause disease and only disease. They do not prevent or eradicate it. Ingestion of drugs adds further toxins to an already toxic organism. Further, it is very enervating for the body to deal with drugs. The less vital energy the body has, the less equipped it will be to initiate healing.

Further, taking drugs does not solve the problem. One cannot attain health by sup- pressing symptoms. The problems of ill health still remain and the person is usually worse off than before he or she began taking the drugs. We are, in effect, telling our body a lie when we take drugs. We attempt to deceive it into thinking that this or that drug will be the “miracle cure.” But in reality, we are hurting our body more by taking these poisonous substances.

Healing powers are possessed solely by the living organism. It is always in force and is forever functioning in the body in sickness or health. Hygienists cannot “cure”; they have no “cures.” Neither has anyone else.

Outside of the human body, man cannot make blood; he cannot produce a cell; he cannot mend a broken bone; he cannot repair a wound. All that he may do is to remove

all interfering factors, whether internal or external, and supply the normal conditions for life. After that, the organs and processes of life do the work of healing.

People do not become well if the causes of their illnesses are not discontinued and their modes of living are not corrected. Enervating habits cripple their functioning pow- ers so that they remain toxic. They can get well as soon as they cease to build disease.

A toxic state of the body develops and slowly devitalizes the tissues for years, result- ing in delayed healing and degeneration in injured or devitalized parts. When men live in a manner to maintain a continuous toxin saturation, they are in line for the develop- ment of any disease to which diathesis or environment determines them.

It is foolish to suppress symptoms. Let us consider a cough. It is a vigorous, forceful and dramatic expulsion of air from the lungs and is accomplished by sudden contractions of the walls of the chest and of the diaphragm. It is intended to force obstructing and irritating matter (mucus, blood, water, particles of dust, smoke, gas, etc.) from the air passages. In pneumonia, coughing keeps the lungs cleared of exudate so that breathing remains possible. The cough is part of the remedial effort, not an attack upon the body from without. If the cough is checked or suppressed by drug devitalization, passages tend to fill with exudate. Checking the cough definitely, reduces the patient’s chances of recovery.

Analogous to coughing is diarrhea. Like coughing, diarrhea is a dramatic accelera- tion of a normal physiological action. It is a bowel action and is, designed to free the colon, perhaps even the small intestines, of unwanted material. The unwanted substance may be unsuitable, or decaying food or drugs, or it may be a mineral water. In any case, the diarrhea is a remedial effort. To check the diarrhea while there is a need for it is to lock up, as it were, in the food tube the unsuitable material the diarrhea is intended to remove. The diarrhea automatically ends when its purpose is served and no suppression is necessary.

What The Body Does When Drugs Are Taken

The first thing the body does when drugs are taken is to make an attempt at their removal through the bowels, the skin, the kidneys, the liver, the lungs, the mucous membranes, by vomiting or by other means.

Noxious materials within are either rejected or, failing that, shunted aside where they offer the least harm. Resistance and expulsion are self-preservative efforts on the part of the living organism. Sometimes due to lowered vitality, it is very difficult to expel certain toxic substances and may even be too difficult. Then the body adopts another technique for self-preservation—it stores them away in the bones’ fatty tissues or even creates sacs called cysts or tumors for this purpose.

The poisonous quality of drugs that occasion vital defensive actions are termed the “medicinal action” of the drug.

Pharmacologists mistakenly believe that drugs have specific relations to various parts, organs, or structures of the organism, although they have never been able to verify it. Hence their belief in selective affinity, i.e. certain drugs act on one part of the body, and others act on other parts. Thus they classify drugs as cathartics, emetics, purgatives, diaphoretics, etc.

It is the body, the living organism, which chooses the way it can best expel drugs. Some drugs will be thrown out of the body via kidney excretion, which the pharmacol- ogist will call diuretics, another by vomiting, and yet another by expectoration. Some drugs, because of their more poisonous nature, will be ejected by the body through as many channels as possible. Hence, its alleged “multiple actions.”

Healing is a normal physiological or biological process. It results from the orderly operations of the ordinary and regular forces and processes of life, working with agents and substances that bear a normal relation to the living organism. Success of the body’s efforts at self-healing depends absolutely upon removal of the cause of its ills. This is to

say, the body mends itself when causes are removed. No healing can take place without removal of cause.

The force that is in any “medicinal action” is really vital power, that is, the power of the body itself. Understanding this property of living matter, we can clearly see that medicines do not at all act; do not furnish power for action; and do not in any mysterious way impart power to the body for its own action. The action occurring between the body and drugs is exclusively vital action, power being expended, not generated.

The organized body has remarkable powers of self-regulation, adjustment and distri- bution. When unhampered, it distributes its available energy to the various organs and tissues in proportion to their importance and needs.

Easily shown is that disease is a process of repair, renovation or healing; and that “cure” in the proper sense is nothing more nor less than the correction of those basic causes which necessitated, in the first place, the institution of disease. All disease phe- nomena exhibit vital action.

There is this relationship: unhygienic conditions of life give rise to a toxic state of the body. Toxicosis (or toxin saturation) develops beyond a point of vital toleration and evokes special eliminative efforts. These special efforts are the process called disease. Disease tends to free the body of its toxic overload. Disease is, itself, the healing process. Recognizing disease as the “cure,” why employ drugs to stop it? Does that make sense? Is it working against the body’s efforts to heal an exhibition of wisdom or ignorance?

Constructive disease is evidence of vitality. It is obvious, therefore, that therapy is anti-vital—destructive of the vital faculties of the body. Treatment by means of drugs is in reality directed against a beneficial, curative process. The remedy actually subdues vitality and with it physiological activity called “disease.” This is harmful inasmuch as vitality is wasted, the restorative process is arrested, and poisonous substances are intro- duced into the system to lay the basis for further toxemic crises when vitality shall have been summoned to eject the “medicinal” accumulation. Thus the drug-treated body has a double liability: (1) The poisons introduced and (2) the continued retention of noxious materials because of suppressed remedial efforts.

To the extent that the body diverts energy to drug expulsion, to that extent a reduc- tion in vital activities elsewhere in the body is occasioned. This usually results in the reduction of the remedial- process, or illness, not by removing its needs, but by a reduc- tion of the vital power whereby it is conducted. Such a reduction comprises suppression.

It becomes apparent that you cannot indulge in the causes of disease and expect to be made free of its consequences. Physiology does not work that way. We cannot be made exempt from violations of Nature’s laws.

The medical profession no longer advocates bloodletting, leeching, purging, puking, mercury treatments, tobacco and alcohol treatments, or a long list of other injurious and deadly practices of the past.

The medical profession, however, continues to defend drugging, vaccination, blood transfusion and a whole host of injurious and deadly practices. How long will it take them to admit the fact that these practices also require condemnation?

Some Specifics

We know that all drugs are bad without exception. But to cite some specific exam- ples, I will mention a few of the most commonly used drugs.

Acne Nostrums

Acne most often appears on the face and causes much discomfort and embarassment to sufferers because of its unsightly appearance. It is the result of accumulated toxins in the body which are being discharged via the sebaceous glands of the skin. This condition results mainly from wrong diet and if this were to be corrected, the acne would disap- pear for the body would no longer need this outlet. However, many people attempt to suppress this cleansing effort by using acne preparations.

Acne products most often come in the forms of lotions or creams which are applied topically. The claim is that these lotions help heal and prevent acne pimples and absorb excess oil. As Hygienists, we know that nothing outside of the human body has the abil- ity to heal and that, therefore, these claims are quite false. However, much harm can be done. One common ingredient in most acne preparations is benzoyl peroxide. This chemical is used on colored or dyed fabrics to bleach them white. When applied to the skin the body responds to the poison with reactions of itching, redness, burning, swelling or excessive dryness.

Allergy Relief Tablets

Allergy is also due to toxicosis. Allergy relief preparations are highly poisonous sub- stances. The following warning is contained on Dristan Analgesic Tablets: “Warning: may cause drowsiness. May cause excitability especially in children. Do not take this product if you have asthma, glaucoma, difficulty in urination due to enlargement of prostate gland, high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, or thyroid disease.”

Clearly, the body recognizes this as a poison and attempts to rid itself of it as quickly as possible. However, this requires a great deal of energy to deal with the poison and anyone who is so toxic as to display the symptoms of “allergy” would be particularly harmed to have an additional flood of highly poisonous toxins put into their systems.

Analgesics

Clearly, the most common analgesic taken today is aspirin. The first report of the therapeutic properties of the salicylates was by the Rev. Edward Stone in 1763. Today, world production of aspirin has been estimated to be around 100,000 tons per year with an average consumption of about 100 tablets per head per year. A large survey, as report- ed in the Journal of Allergy in Clinical Immunology, listed aspirin among ten drugs most frequently involved in adverse reactions. The first death attributed to aspirin ingestion per se, as distinguished from aspirin poisoning by overdose, was described in Germany in 1902. In 1933, Dr. B.R. Dysart published an article in the Journal of The American Medical Association describing death following ingestion of five grains of acetylsali- cylic acid. Most aspirin tablets contain 400-500 mg. or about 7 grains. Recommended dosage is usually two tablets 4 times a day. This is quite a toxic load to deal with!

By 1970, Dr. R.S. Farr, in his presidential address before the American Academy of Allergy, was citing “the need to reevaluate acetylsalicylic acid” and suggested that, be- cause of the risk to a substantial number of people, aspirin and aspirin-containing com- pounds should become prescription rather than over-the-counter drugs. Hygienists know that they are poisonous and should never be taken. They have no power to heal and can- not be used by our cells for any constructive purposes whatsoever.

In an article in the Journal of Allergy in Clinical Immunology in December 1976, J.R. Vane demonstrated that nonsteroid, anti-inflammatory drugs such as aspirin inhibit prostaglandin biosynthesis.

Interference with the biosynthesis of prostaglandins could have very grave effects on our health since this compound, which is present in all body tissues, plays a very impor- tant part in many physiologic activities. This includes, but is not limited to:

1. Facilitation of parturition by stimulating the contractions of the uterus.
2. Homeostatic regulation of blood pressure.
3. Regulation of exocrine as well as endocrine secretions.
4. Playsanimportantroleinthenegativefeedbackcontrolofimpulsetransmissioninthe sympathetic nervous system.

Also, prostaglandins inhibit secretion of pepsin as well as hydrochloric acid by the gastric mucosa by a direct action on the parietal cells of the gastric glands. (Parietal cells secrete hydrochloric acid.) This is one of the body’s homeostatic devices.

Prostaglandins, then, are a control mechanism for secretion. As ulceration is believed to result from erosion of the mucosa by excessive quantities of gastric juice, the physiologic synthesis of prostaglandins by the stomach may protect the mucosa against ulceration by regulating its secretion.

If aspirin interferes with the biosynthesis of prostaglandins, then ulcers could more readily occur and this accounts for a common side effect of aspirin therapy.

So aspirin not only results in a great energy depletion within our body in its attempt to deal with it, its presence also interferes with many normal physiological functions. People create more harm than they realize when they ingest this commonly prescribed tablet.

Antacids

An antacid is an agent given to neutralize acidity in the stomach. It interferes with the body’s homeostatic attempts to maintain acid-alkaline balance, adds toxins to the body and never promotes health. The cause of acid indigestion must not be indulged. Here again, faulty diet must be corrected. If a person were to fast and then go on an all-raw food program of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds, all bodily functions would return to a healthy state.

Dr. Kiki Sidhwa says, “Milk and antacids, the mainstays of therapy for peptic ulcers, may led to metabolic alterations potentially more serious than the primary disease being treated.” He further says that such treatment might produce many changes in the system, including the development of gout. Explanation of the trouble was that this treatment upset the acid-alkaline balance in the system and led to alkalosis if long continued.

Antacids containing aluminum hydroxide inhibit the absorption of dietary phosphate since it binds this mineral in the lumen of the gut. Along with calcium, phosphorus contributes to mineralization of bones and teeth and is intimately involved in human metabolism. There is an important ratio between calcium and phosphorus which must be maintained. Great harm can result if any interference with this ratio occurs such as the binding of phosphorus when drugs are taken. A certain drug taken for a particular reason always has systemic effect.

Antibiotics

Antibiotics mean anti-life and indeed they are against life. They are administered to kill life in the form of microorganisms. Since disease is incorrectly thought of as an at- tack by bacteria, germs, etc., the antibiotic is given to kill these “invaders.” Instead they poison vital cells, that is, the body itself is killed to some degree. The body’s efforts must then be redirected toward eliminating this new poison.

The cause of disease is not the germ that is present, but the mental and physical habits that have broken down the body. Let the office of the germs be what it may, they cannot cause disease. The theory that germs and parasites have to be destroyed in order to “cure” disease is a delusion.

Respiratory distress has been associated with ampicillin administration. Researchers have also demonstrated that several other widely employed drugs including isoniazid (an antibiotic) have produced clinical patterns of chronic (active hepatitis, resulting in cirrhosis. The scientists have found that drug reactions involving the liver result in liv- er toxicosis from the drug itself. In patients with drug-induced acute hepatitis, the inci- dence of bridging necrosis was increased. (Bridging necrosis is death of the threads of protoplasm which pass from one cell to another in the liver.)

The use of antibiotics has also been proven to result in many blood disorders includ- ing leukemia.

Antidiarrheals

Diarrhea is not in itself a disease but an action of the body against some form of toxic irritation, mainly from unsuitable or unhygienic foodstuffs. Dr. Sidhwa says that antidiarrhea drugs can result in kidney and liver disorders, skin and sight defects and even death.

Why should we poison ourselves and risk the chance of possible kidney or liver dis- ease when all we have to do is simply provide the conditions for health and allow our body to repair itself? In this way we may be sure that we are not doing harm.

Cough and Cold Preparations

It is foolish to take any medication whatsoever when one manifests symptoms of a cold. From the Hygienic point of view, the cold is the “cure.” The cold is the result of systemic poisoning and it is the body’s effort to rid itself of some of its toxic overload. Any preparation taken to suppress these symptoms will only add to the toxins and will create another obstacle for our body to overcome while it is doing its “housecleaning” of toxic debris.

All drugs, including laxatives, sleep aids, stimulants, depressants, diet pills, etc., are aimed at treating symptoms. Hygienists do not treat symptoms but work at removing the cause of toxicosis which occasioned the disease in the first place.

As a student of Life Science you should always keep in mind that the body does not work in separate independent ways but it is a unified whole. The body performs all of its functions as a whole and even though a certain symptom of disease may manifest itself in a particular part of the body it does not mean that the whole system is not involved.

What To Do Instead Of Taking Drugs

The Hygienist does not accept “cures.” What are we trying to “cure?” Attempts to “cure” actually suppress or stop the body’s defensive and remedial processes. As the body is attempting to get well, we are trying to prevent it from getting well. This is the essence of cures.

What we’re concerned about then, in health and disease, is removing the causes of disease, supplying the body with its basic needs so it may build health. Health is the or- ganism’s natural tendency toward the ideal and everything in the moral organism works toward health. We don’t have to make the body healthy; we only have to live healthfully.

An obese person does not become healthy by taking diet pills. He must examine his diet and lifestyle and remove the causes of his obesity in order to attain health. We have to stop people from making themselves sick.

We must examine the person’s way of life: what it is they’re doing that they shouldn’t be doing, the things they’re not doing that they should be doing, and attempt to discover the causes of their trouble.

When we investigate these factors and remove the causes of disease, then we outline a program which will provide the conditions and circumstances necessary for health. The organism will restore itself to normal providing, of course, that it hasn’t been irre- versibly damaged.

It may be helpful to ask yourself the following questions:

1. Am I eating the proper diet? By “proper diet” we mean one which we are biologically meant to eat. That is, fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds—all eaten in their raw state. This is very important. Of equal importance is the amount that we are consuming. Not only the quality of our food is important but also the quantity. Ask yourself, am I overeating or eating when I am not really hungry? Eating food in the absence of hunger or consuming more food than our body can handle will lead to toxemia as sure as if we were subsisting on a diet of refined foods. So keep in mind quantity and quality when examining your lifestyle.
2. Do I consume the purest water available? By this we mean only pure H2O and this is not available from your kitchen sink. Pure distilled water is the only kind that we should drink and then only when we are thirsty. Some people have the mistaken idea that drinking excessive amounts of water will “flush” the kidneys and “clean out” our systems. This is nonsense! Water is inert and has no such cleansing powers. However, when consumed to excess, there can re- sult a great energy drain on the eliminative organs. So, here again, keep the quantity and quality idea in your mind. Distilled water is best in the amounts compatible with your needs.
3. Is the air I breathe fresh and clean? This is a tough one. Living and working in our polluted cities makes it next to im- possible to breathe really pure air. However, there are some things that we can do. If it is possible to move to the country, do so. If not, at least try to stay away from smoke filled working situations (or look into purchasing an electronic air purifier for your office). It helps to live where the house is set at least a little way back from the road and trees be- tween the house and the road will help block and absorb some of the pollution from the cars and purify the air.
4. Do I get sufficient rest and sleep? Sleep requirements vary from person to person but generally if you wake up without the aid of an alarm clock and feel rested and energetic, then you have obtained enough sleep. If not, you had better go to bed a little earlier or take a nap during the day.
5. Do I get enough exercise? Daily exercise is a must to maintain health. Set aside a certain lime every day for exercise. About 30 minutes to one hour a day should be sufficient.
6. Am I exposed to the sunlight at least a few minutes each day? Sunlight is beneficial and the main source for Vitamin D, but be careful and don’t overdo it as excessive sunbathing can be harmful. Remember the quantity and quality.
7. Am I constantly under stress? It is not always possible to avoid stressful situations but it is possible to learn how to deal with stress. Stress and emotions are a physiological occurrence and can result in many types of disorders. Now that you have run through your little questionnaire and have determined the cause of your disease, every effort must be made to remove those causes. When the con- ditions of health are provided in the proper quantity and quality, the body will immedi- ately begin its remedial processes.

What To Do When Acute Symptoms Manifest Themselves

First of all, do not take drugs of any kind and this includes the herbal remedies. The best thing to do when symptoms of a cold or flu, pain, skin eruptions, hay fever, headache, stomach ache, or any disease symptom arises is to rest.

The body needs rest. That is, physiological rest. By this we mean rest of the entire body, of the muscles, organs, glands and digestive organs. How can we provide the body with such a rest? Through a fast. By this we mean no food—only pure water and rest in bed. This will provide the ideal conditions for the body to redirect its energies to the reparative process. It may be advisable to fast at a Hygienic fasting institute where you will be supervised by a competent Hygienic practitioner. After the fast is broken, eat only those foods that we are physiologically suited to eat—raw fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds in compatible combinations. In addition, follow all the other requirements of health and you will find freedom from disease.

For example, the Hygienic care of the pneumonia sufferer is the acme of simplicity. It is not designed to “cure” anything. It does not reduce fever, check coughing, suppress pain, or force further exudate into the lungs. Hygiene does not seek to suppress or palli- ate symptoms. The death rate is reduced to almost nil. Rest in bed in a well-vented room, warmth, all the water thirst demands, no food of any kind until all acute symptoms have subsided, constitute the essentials of proper care. Thus cared for, the person with pneu- monia will recover mote certainly, more speedily and more satisfactorily. Nobody will prove to be allergic to Hygienic care nor have bad reactions, as many have when peni- cillin is administered. By the employment of healthful measures.

You have done your body a favor. You have built health with proper rest, food, etc. You have not destroyed health with pills and potions. The aim of life is to maintain life. This is the goal of every cell in your body. When you take drugs you throw road blocks in the path of the cells in their efforts to live and support your existence. Don’t sabotage your body. Instead, assist life by providing the conditions for health.

Questions & Answers

My doctor says that all cases of arthritis are incurable. He also says that I must take 10 tablets of aspirin every day to alleviate the inflammation and that I may have to eventually increase that dosage. Will this much aspirin be harmful?

Your doctor is correct when he says that he cannot cure arthritis. Hygienists know that only the body has the ability to heal. However, there have been many cases of arthritis which have completely recovered following a fast and a Hygienic lifestyle. Aspirin is a poison and the body will treat it as such. A small amount of aspirin will result in a certain amount of damage to the human organism but such large amounts will do much greater damage. The wisest thing to do would be to consult with a Hygienic practitioner and arrange to go on a fast. After that, adhere strictly to the Hygienic lifestyle and health will be realized.

I have been on the ‘pill’ for a number of years since I do not want to have any more children. Am I doing any harm through this practice?

Your body cannot condone the pill. It contains substances which suppress the normal hormone secretions. To be effective, the product must be taken regularly throughout a woman’s reproductive life, and the method is attended by a multitude of ill effects besides being entirely contrary to the principles of natural, healthful living.

Evidence has built up that the use of the pill carries with it may dangers. There is a liability for strokes or cerebral hemorrhage and other conditions involving

blood clotting. Reports of eye troubles following their use were reported in the United States, Canada, Australia and Great Britain. Numerous other “side effects” have been established.

Yes, this is a very harmful practice and should be discontinued immediately. If you are interested in a natural birth control method which is safe, read the book “Creation of Life” by Terrie Guay.

When my doctor prescribes a drug for me, I presume he knows what he is doing and wouldn’t dispense drugs which were not scientifically tested before they were placed on the market. Am I correct in my assumptions?

Because poison effects always follow drugging, physicians must be regarded as a class of voodooists. Dr. Sidhwa states a case where it was found that a woman was given a drug for arthritis which resulted in degeneration of cells in the retina of the eyes. This eventually resulted in loss of 80 percent of her vision. Reporting on this case, the Washington Post said that “drugs potent enough to injure and kill are often prescribed casually and even carelessly because of excessive reliance upon drug salesmen.”

The so-called scientific training concerning the drug apparently came from the salesman’s touting of the drug.

We should simply keep in mind that all drugs are poisons and there are no safe ones.

It seems that every time I take my medication I get drowsy. Why would this oc- cur?

The nervous system of man is highly complex. It is very sensitive and delicate in its structure and function. This highly-specialized system reacts very quickly and shows immediate and marked changes if substances inimical to its well-being are taken. Drugs can and do influence the structure and functions of the whole nervous system. Drugs interfere with the nervous system, hence functions are depressed and drowsiness occurs.

Since digitalis is derived from a plant, wouldn’t it be alright to take?

There are many poisons in the plant kingdom and digitalis is one of them. Fur- thermore, even though digitalis was originally derived from foxglove, it is now made synthetically. Although digitalis is one of the most commonly-used drugs for treating heart failure, it causes noticeable poisoning in an unbelievably high proportion of patients who take it.

When a drug is given to a man suffering from a weak heart, it weakens the heart still more. The impaired heart must now pump more blood with each beat to help get the drug out of the system. But the heart, in doing so, will exhaust itself more quickly than if intelligently left alone and the patient allowed to rest. The heart needs rest, not stimulation. Exhaustion of all the vital organs is the common result of such stimulation.

This lesson has discussed the harmful practice of drug medication. All such agents are harmful even in small quantities. They are anti-vital and cause disease. They have no power or intelligence to effect healing.

All disease is the result of systemic poisoning and one cannot achieve health by ingesting poisons. The cause of disease must be removed before healing can be realized.

When drugs suppress symptoms they also suppress the body’s healing process.

Only the body can heal and will do so when the proper conditions are provided. These conditions include proper food, fresh air, pure water, sunshine, rest and sleep, exercise and emotional poise.

Article #1: The Poisoning Practice by Virginia Vetrano, B.S., D.C.

Beginning about twenty-five hundred years ago and making but little headway in public patronage until the time of the renaissance, the drug system has now completely blanketed the earth. So great has grown popular reliance upon the drug practice and so thoroughly have the people been indoctrinated in the belief in drugs, that the practice has become a greater threat to mankind than the nuclear bomb. The drug system is filling the land with side effects of drugs, filling hospitals with iatrogenic diseases, the jails with drug addicts, the mental institutions with drug-induced psychoses and the graveyards with the premature dead.

In the great main the drug system is a system of spectacular palliation. Physicians are for the most part engaged in providing the sick with temporary and doubtful relief from their discomforts. Instead of seeking for and removing the causes of suffering, physicians seem to be content to provide questionable and evanescent respite from pain and discomfort.

A patient says to a physician, “I have a headache, what should I do?” The physician is likely to reply, “Here, take this aspirin.”

As an outstanding example of this kind of practice and its results, let me briefly go over a case history that I recently received from a guest of the Health School.

A young girl, age 21, arrived at the Health School with the following story: at the age of thirteen she developed severe abdominal pains and was taken to the hospital and operated on for appendicitis. Later it was discovered that this was not her trouble as she still suffered with the same pains after the operation. Her parents reentered her in the hospital for an exploratory operation, during which the physician found lymphatic tumors in the abdominal cavity. Soon after this operation she developed epilepsy, and had to make frequent trips to the hospital for tests. She had all the diagnostic X rays known and many other diagnostic procedures for epilepsy. There were an array of diagnoses, first hypoglycemia, then hyperglycemia, then high blood pressure, then low blood pressure. One diagnosis contradicted another, and there was no end to the diagnoses, but they never could ascertain the reason for her epilepsy. Her brain waves appeared normal on the electroencephalogram .

Every known drug for epilepsy was given her, but she said that they only made her worse. Her physician insisted that she continue taking the drug despite the increased incidence of her convulsions. In desperation he finally decided to use new experimental drugs, but with the same results—no decrease in her epileptic fits. Is it any wonder that she developed kidney trouble, after this treatment? Soon she couldn’t have normal micturition but required a catheter. For five weeks straight, she was forced to have the catheter in place. During this time, she complained that ‘they injected drugs through the catheter into the bladder in an effort to reach an infection. It was during this period in the hospital that she began losing the ability to walk. After this her sight and hearing became impaired. It was then that her physician told her parents that she wouldn’t live and sent her home to die.

She was indeed a victim of the curing practice. There is no wonder that at the hospital she lost her ability to walk, see and hear, as she said she had to take 200 pills a day, every day. Furthermore, she was force fed, and had seven shots a day. Despite her continual complaint of lack of appetite, they made her eat.

Her parents took their dying child home. Here she became more a master of herself. She was disgusted with having to take so many drugs that were apparently making her worse. She said no one but a blind person could fail to see that she was steadily growing worse under this treatment.

When she arrived home, she had to be carried to bed. Sensing that the drugs were making her worse, and with the permission of her father, she quit 90% of them. She was afraid to quit all of them at once. Disgusted with the encumbering and uncomfortable catheter, she took it out. She noticed immediate improvement in her health. Her eyesight improved, her impaired hearing became normal and almost overnight she found that she could walk again. Within five hours her bladder was functioning satisfactorily.

When it was lime to make her regular trip to the epileptic clinic, she walked in unaided. Her M.D. marveled at her improvement and called in other practitioners to show off the miracle. The girl that couldn’t walk, that was dying just a few weeks before, walked in unaided! Her drugs were indeed miracle workers! He immediately prescribed more of the same. He never learned that she had quit taking most of her drugs. It was after this that she presented herself to the Hygienist.

Can she regain the high level health she had at birth? How much recovery can she make after being subjected to such treatment? It is doubtful that she can regain the high level health of which her pristine organism was capable. Drugs and surgery have made of her a cripple. This girl has adamantine determination, however, and I’m sure that she will recover as much health as is possible.

The Hygienist has little to work with when a patient comes to him machine gunned with X rays, vandalized by the surgeon’s knife and enervated by the drugging practice. Can you imagine a family afraid to try natural and harmless methods after subjecting their daughter to all the most pernicious practices of our times? Her family was against her from the start and she had to plead, beg and cajole them into letting her stay long enough to take a lengthy fast. Because of her medical abuse, I was fearful of taking her as anything may happen on a fast after such treatment, and her parents would have been the first to point an accusing finger.

At the end of 18 days of fasting they told her she would have to come home soon. I immediately broke her fast in order that she would be able to travel. She began having mild convulsions soon after taking juices, and developed a slight fever and symptoms of acute distress. There was nothing to do but place her back on the fast and let nature continue the healing process. Somehow she persuaded her parents to let her stay longer. They were very apprehensive and couldn’t believe that she could live through 18 days of fasting. When she continued on through 58 days of fasting, they were sure she could not even walk down to the phone and talk to them. During the second fast she passed kidney stones. During her second fast and subsequently she had no convulsions and has not reported any since leaving here.

How soon she will reach positive and top level health depends upon how well she carries out her Hygienic living. But as mentioned at the beginning of this article, she will have her limitations because of medical bungling.

It is unfortunate but most everyone coming to the Health School has his limitations in recovery because of his prior use of drugs, X rays and surgery. It is not only the elderly, whose health has been wrecked by drugs and surgery, but younger and younger person’s, organisms are impaired because of their physicians’ poisons and their surgeons’ knives.

Daily we receive clippings in the mail from Canada and the United States describing the evils attributed to drugs, but the drugging continues. Neither patients nor physicians lose their faith in magic potions. It seems that very few people ever lose their faith in the physician with his armamentarium of poisons. Despite all the enlightenment of hazardous effects of drugs in the papers today, physicians and their patrons cling to the belief in their efficacy and harmlessness. The drugging continues.

The title of an article received recently, is “No Drugs During Pregnancy,” then in small letters “unless absolutely necessary.” These were the words of Dr. Benirschlese, research pathologist of animal pregnancies. To prevent pregnant mothers from refusing drugs a loop hole is always left for the physician to deem the taking of a drug absolutely necessary. Intelligent mothers, fearing it may hurt their baby, may balk at taking their

physicians’ prescriptions and ruffle their physicians’ pride. He can then assure them that he is giving the drug only because it is “absolutely necessary” in each instance.

Dr. Benirshchlese said “even such simple drugs as sleeping pills have unknown effects on unborn children.” He continues, “We don’t really know what effect different drugs have on the human fetus but we do know they bring about changes in animals.”

Are we not of the animal kingdom? Are we intangible angels? We are of the animal kingdom and we have the most complex and differentiated organism of any animal on earth. Because of this complexity, many more things can go wrong with human physiology than with the physiology of a lower animal. We can also enjoy greater functioning capacity than the lower animals because of our increased complexity of structure.

A simple machine has fewer things to go wrong than a more complex one. The slightest change in complex machine will immediately upset its workings, whereas a little flaw in a simple machine may not result in any modification of the machine until the damage becomes immense, then it is easily fixed.

Being the most complex living organism, man is more sensitive to inimical agents and influences than are the lower animals. It has been shown that man is more sensitive to radiation than the mouse, so also is he more sensitive to drug poisons.

A significant remark made by Benirschlese was exactly what Dr. Shelton has been saying for years, that a “nine-month gestation period in humans makes research difficult and long-term effects of drug use should be studied until a child is twenty years old.” Minute impairments of vital organs from drugging may not manifest until a child has reached maturity. The increase in microcephaly, liver damage, heart trouble, kidney trouble, diabetes, and cancer in younger and younger people makes us wonder just how many of these young people would not have suffered if their parents had not taken drugs while these children were in utero.

The vigor that was manifested in our pioneers and in the Amerinds is not seen today in our youth and middle aged. This is certainly due in part to our greater dependence upon the medical profession to care for the slightest bruise, cut or headache, and the prescriptions of drug poisons given for these mild afflictions.

Recently a jury awarded a child $500,000 because her mother was given demerol, a drug used to lessen pain during labor, and the child failed to develop mentally. The child was chronologically seven but had the mind of a three-year old. The drug was not supposed to be given to mothers of premature babies. Despite the prematurity of her baby, this woman’s physician gave her the drug.

Another clipping received by mail stated “digitalis drug poisons many patients.” The article states , “digitalis, one of the most commonly-used drugs for treating heart failure, causes some form of poisoning in an unbelievably unusually high proportion of the patients who take it.” John Ruedy of the McGill University said this is happening because of “improper” use of the drug.

I should like to point out that there is no such thing as the proper use of a drug poison. They are poison no matter how given. They never prolong life but always shorten it, and make more uncomfortable whatever life is left in the patient. Drugs greatly lessen the person’s ability to get well Hygienically. They damage and lessen the vitality of every organ and organ system in the body.

When a drug is given to a man suffering with a weak heart, it weakens the heart still more. It is like whipping a tired horse to make him go. He expands more vital energy to get away from the whip, but he wears out quicker. The impaired heart must now pump more blood with each beat to help get the drug out of the system by increasing circulation. But the heart, in doing this, will wear out quicker than if left alone and patient rests. The heart needs rest not stimulation. Exhaustion of all the vital organs is the common result of such stimulation. Premature death is the result of stimulating people into such good “health.”

With 5,000 new drugs being created each year, we should all remain healthy until the age of 140. We actually see more and more of the crippling disease, that people can’t get

well of (even by Hygienic means). All drugging impairs the organism’s ability to function.

Instead of removing the causes of the impairment, people are drugged into insensibility in order that they may continue in their disease-producing ways until there are so many organic or morbid changes in the tissues that full recovery is impossible. The Tribune medical reporter states that this is creating one of the most pressing challenges in medical history; that of how to prevent the new drugs from causing other illnesses or side effects. This has led to the development of a new science, pharmacokinetics.

The very name of their “new” science indicates that they do not yet know the relation between lifeless and living matter—the former being passive and the latter active, always. Kinetics indicates movement and drugs do not move but are moved by the body to various parts of the body.

Pharmacologists freely admit that they don’t know how their drugs act, or how the drugs achieve their therapeutic effect or that they act at all. They don’t even bother to try to prove that drugs act.

If physicians, pharmacokineticists and pharmacologists could begin with a valid premise, their conclusions would be more likely to be correct. They would soon learn that all drugs are as inert in the living organism as in the pill bottle, and that all action attributed to the drug is body action. They would soon realize that these actions, occasioned by the drug, are the actions of the living organism expelling the drug because it is not useful, hence poisonous. As long as they attribute action to inanimate substances, they will continue to confuse themselves about the true nature of the drugging practice, and fail to see the destructiveness of their poisons.

Because of our self-preservative instincts, if a substance is introduced into the organic domain that it can’t use, the cells in immediate contact with the drug, via our magnificent complex nervous system, alert the entire organism to the threat to its integrity. It is not one part of the body that resists a drug but many parts acting as a whole. It is the integral organism which acts to expel the drug before ii damages any one part too greatly.

Digitalis may be given to a man with a feeble heart and there is an immediate pickup in the pumping ability of the heart, not because the drug acts on the heart but because the heart has to pump blood faster to the emunctory organs in order to save the whole from succumbing to the drug. The digitalis didn’t stay in the heart; it didn’t even have to be near the heart, for it to know that something poisonous was in the system and that it had to .step up its activities in order to do its share in the expulsion and rejection of the nonusable toxic substance.

Because the living organism has done all the acting, its energy is depleted in exact proportion to the amount of work it has had to do to eliminate the poison. His functioning power is permanently lowered, and much rest is needed to recover from the depletion. The already weak heart is more feeble than before the digitalis was taken.

Trall frequently clarified the explanation of the fact that it is the living system that acts and not the drug, by the following example: if you introduce a drug into a dead person, there will be no action whereas there should be more action if the drug acted, because there would be less resistance from a dead person’s tissues than a live one. But the dead body cannot vomit it, it cannot develop diarrhea, nor do its kidneys function to expel it. The drug does nothing to a dead body, except chemically combine with the constituents of its tissues.

This is the difference between drugging a live person and a dead one. The live person resists the chemical union, and as long as it is alive it will continue to do so. For the chemical to combine with the constituents of the cell would mean death of the cell, and the formation of a third substance unlike the two which combined to form it. The living organism fights with herculean force to prevent the chemical union, and in doing so sometimes dies in the struggle. The cells had to die first before the chemical could combine with their constituents.

A debilitated old person cannot resist a drug as well as a healthy young person, for the same reason that a dead person can’t act. The debilitated person has less energy to expend in eliminating the drug. Trail points out that if the drug acted, it should act with more force in a weak person because of less resistance from the weak organs, but we see the opposite.

I cannot repeat too often that anything that the living organism cannot make into living tissue or use in any of its metabolic processes is a poison. Drugs cannot fit this qualification, and hence are all poisons. Some are more virulent than others, depending upon their chemical compositions, but they all cripple the organism to a greater or lesser degree, depending upon how much ability a particular organism has to eliminate them.

Cells, tissues and organs are damaged in resisting and expelling drugs. This results in impaired function. Because much of the damage to the organism from drugs is permanent, complete recovery is impossible in those who have been drugged for years.

The damages of drugs are legion and we could fill many volumes with their evil effects, but I shall end this article by stating that if you desire to recover your health drugging is definitely not the answer. Drugs hinder the healing process and occasion diseases of their own.

The causes of disease must be removed. Then, the primordial requisites of life must be supplied in keeping with the living organism’s ability to use them. Then and then only will the living organism be able to return to health. It will make as full recovery as is possible, depending upon how much previous damage has been done by the drugs. The fewer the drugs taken, the speedier and more complete the recovery.

Article #2: Principles of The Hygienic System by R.T. Trall

The Hygienic System, or the treatment of disease by Hygienic agencies, is based on the following propositions:

1. All healing or remedial power is inherent in the living system. The “properties,” of drug medicines, as they are called, are simply morbific(disease causing) effects.
2. There is no curative “virtue,”in medicines, nor in anything outside of the vital organism.
3. Nature has not provided remedies for disease. She has only provided consequences or penalties for taking or doing those things which occasion disease, the disease itself being an effort to remove those causes.
4. Health is found only in obedience to the laws of the vital organism. Disease is the result of disobedience.
5. Health is normal vital action, or action in relation to things usable. Disease is abnormal vital action, or action in relation to things non-usable.
6. There is no “law of cure,” in the universe; the condition of cure is obedience to physiological law.
7. There is one universal rule applicable to the treatment of all disease by Hygienic remedies, and that is to balance functional action. If this is done, no disease, however violent, will prove fatal.
8. Remedial agents do not act on the living system, as is taught in medical books and schools, but are ACTED on by the vital powers.
9. Disease is not, as is commonly supposed, an enemy at war with the vital powers, but a remedial effort—a process of purification and reparation. It is not a THING to be destroyed, subdued, or suppressed, but an ACTION to be REGULATED and DIRECTED.
10. Diseases should not be “cured.” So long as the causes exist, the disease should continue. But the causes of disease should be removed and the patient cured.
11. Truly remedial agents are materials and influences which have NORMAL relations to the vital organs, and not drugs, or poisons, whose relations are ABNORMAL and ANTI-

VITAL.

1. Nature’s materia medica consists of Air, Light, Temperature, Exercise, Rest, Food, Drink, Bathing, Sleep, Clothing, Mental Influences.
2. ThetrueHealingArtconsistsinsupplyingthelivingsystemwithwhateveroftheabove it can USE under circumstances, and not in the administration, of poisons which it must RESIST and EXPEL.
3. Drug remedies are themselves CAUSES of disease. Every dose diminishes the vitality of the patient.
4. DRUGOPATHY endeavors to restore health by administering the poisons which produce disease.
5. The Hygienic System on the contrary, restores the sick to health by the means which preserve health in well persons.
6. Diseases are caused by obstructions, the obstructing materials being poisons or impurities of some kind.
7. The Hygienic System removes these obstructions, and leaves the body sound.
8. Drug medicines add to the causes of obstructions, and change acute into chronic diseases.
9. To attempt to cure diseases by adding to the causes of disease, is irrational and absurd.