Operation ” Response-Able”, part II
Operation ” Response-Able”, part II
Operation “Response-Able” — Part II
By Allen Roberds, DC
Editor’s Note: Allen Roberds, DC a graduate of Texas Chiropractic College, is a clinician and author. Dr. Roberds and his wife Marla are hosts of “Second Opinon,” a Tennessee syndicated radio program. The Roberds aired a response to the Stanford survey on the dangers of chiropractic cervical manipulation reported by the American Heart Association, which culminated in the Associated Press release that garnered sensational headlines across the country. Part I of Dr. Roberds’ article appeared in the June 3, 1994 issue of “DC.”
We advised listeners that what was to follow might seem a little foreign to some raised on doctor worship, but it was not medical bashing, just plain fact; that after almost 100 years of medicine’s unabashed “chiro-bashing,” a little chiropractic truth may sound unfamiliar but is entirely overdue. “So let us all play by the same rules. If medicine had not lied about chiropractic, chiropractic would not have to tell the truth about medicine,” we added.
Then, without malice, we dispassionately told them: Every year 50,000 people die and many more are injured due to 2.4 million unnecessary surgeries, which includes 66,080 unnecessary gallbladder operations; 34,000 unnecessary hemorrhoidectomies; 506,800 unnecessary tonsillectomies; and 173,140 unnecessary hysterectomies.3
Ninety percent of angiograms are considered unnecessary, accounting for 4,500 deaths a year, while the angiogram is considered one of the most inaccurate test in modern medicine; two to four percent of angioplasty patients die during the procedure, or within one year;4 about five percent of bypass patients die as a result of surgery, yet only 1.9 percent die from heart disease itself; and over million a day is spent on unnecessary heart by-pass surgery, resulting in 14,000 to 28,000 deaths per year.5
Up to 160,000 people die and 1.6 million people are hospitalized because of drug reactions, and in 1991 drug companies spent over million every day to persuade consumers to buy their products, accounting for one third of all advertising.
Two-hundred and thirty-thousand people are injured, 135,000 of them seriously,6 and 40,000 people die — one study reports 155,000 deaths7 — due to medical malpractice, which is now the number one cause of all accidental deaths in the U.S., not to mention inoculation deaths and injuries. Each year two million people get infections in the hospital, which they did not have on admittance, and 100,000 of these patients die of that infection, and in 25 percent of the deaths, the allopathors did not even know the infection was present until autopsy.8 Add it up, America.
The Haight-Ashbury Free Medical Clinic reports: 40,000 allopaths are alcoholics; 4,000 are addicted to drugs; one-fifth of these are cocaine addicts, and three-fourths of the coke addicts are abusing as many as seven additional drugs.9
An Associated Press article on the AMA’s Sixth National Conference of Impaired Physicians estimates that 7,000 allopaths, more than half of which are surgeons, suffer from cognitive impairment as a result of age. Another 40,000 are so emotionally disturbed, they should not even be in practice.10 The generally accepted figure, according to the Medical Insurance Exchange in New Jersey, is that there are 100 impaired allopaths per 1,000 or one in 10.11
A 10-year study showed that only 10 percent of drugs are likely to do what they claim, but they are so dangerous they are rarely prescribed, while 10 percent are questionable, 10 percent are doubtful, and 70 percent absolutely fail.12 (Doctors, only modern medicine could thrive with this kind of track record. They know the overriding power of the media to mold public perception. Lavish funding, to the tune of million per day, every day, is allocated to “educate” the public year after year. Medics don’t have to worry about educating their patients because they have someone else doing it for them! (Get it?)
We continued: “Where is the science of which modern medicine is the self-proclaimed defender, that supports the germ theory of disease, or the efficacy of artificial inoculations? Where are the patient outcome measures on drugging sick patients, back surgery, radiation treatment and psychotherapy? If it exists, let us see it.
“We are not against medicine, per se, if they would stick to what they know: emergency intervention and first aid. But we strongly object to the widespread, unscientific, dangerous, and often fatal use of unnecessary drugs and surgery under the guise of health care, when other methods have proven to be safer, more effective, less costly, and virtually harmless to the patient.”
We reminded listeners that “although we applaud medicine’s ability to handle crisis care and we admire the real heroes of medicine in the emergency room, it