Chinese Medicine?

was listening to NPR this morning and they had a story about a scientist in China called Doctor Who (sorry - couldn’t resist) Doctor Hu whose company is offering stem cell treatments for a variety of conditions.

Jena Teague and her husband Terry Williams are among these new visitors. They traveled to China to seek stem-cell treatment for their blind, 7-month-old baby daughter, Laylah.

[…]

the family traveled to the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou, where Beike is based. They are spending $23,000 for Laylah to have infusions of stem cells harvested from umbilical cord.

[…]

The doctors have told Laylah's parents that the baby now sees light through one eye, while the other eye is dilating almost to the point where she can see light.

Of course, we can’t know if the treatment is really working. The Chinese scientists don’t know what method might be behind it, which isn’t encouraging. No clinical trials have been carried out and no research has been published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. The risks are unknown. And doctors in the US are not recommending that patients go to China for this treatment.

Also, other scientists in China have their doubts:

Dr. Naihe Jing is the deputy director of one of China's top stem-cell research labs and a member of the prestigious Chinese Academy of Sciences. He fears Beike could ruin the reputation of China's entire biotech industry.

Still, whether it proves to be a breakthrough or not, one thing struck me – how ludicrous the labels of “western medicine” and “Chinese medicine” are. For example, the idiot Bill Maher on TV recently advised quintuple bypass survivor David Letterman to stop taking the pills his doctor had prescribed him, because this was “western medicine” - something Maher doesn’t accept. So was Maher suggesting Letterman visit China for stem cell treatment?  What is stem cell therapy anyway? It’s practiced in China – a country that also apparently has a biotech industry – so does that mean it’s not western? Perhaps Maher was warning Letterman off humors and bloodletting – western medicine for sure, although rather an unconventional treatment in Europe today.

Or perhaps Maher is just a confused idiot.

The truth is, ancient people, who did not understand how the body works or what really made people ill, just made stuff up about these things. The ancient Chinese made up stuff about meridians and chi. Ancient Indians made up stuff about chakras. Ancient Europeans made up stuff about humors. We now know better, and so have abandoned humors and bloodletting. The only mystery is why people still insist that chi and chakras are real. But whatever you believe is real, the distinction clearly is not between “western” and “eastern” (fill in your preferred country) therapies. The distinction is between therapies that work and those that don’t. Scientists in China are researching real medicine, and trying to find out what works and what doesn’t, just like scientists in the west. Maybe some have oversold their results, but scientific procedures, not ancient myth, will ultimately decide what works and what doesn’t

So can we now please abandon this pretence that doctors in the west practice something called “western medicine”, while the Chinese have access to some secret knowledge that “western science” still hasn’t yet caught up with? There is only medicine that works – or at least, is backed by reliable evidence that it does – and pre-scientific superstitious quackery that doesn’t. The East/West labels mean nothing. And the next time some twit like Maher intones gravely against “western medicine”, just say, “yeah, I don’t fancy bloodletting either” - and advise him to go visit Doctor Hu in Hangzhou. Preferably on a one-way ticket.

March 19 - Update

Steven Novella is even less impressed with this Chinese stem cell therapy than I was.

Comments

[Cynical prof]

In the Chinese language, traditional Chinese medicine, including acupuncture, herbal medicine, and talk of ch'i (qi) is known as... (drum roll, please): "Chinese medicine" (中医 zhōngyī).

[pv]

This makes interesting reading.

Basically prior to 1949 the average lifespan in China was less than 50 years. Today it is still only in the low 70s. Why was it so low prior to 1949? Simply because of the lack of medical care. The idea of the inscrutable, wise old man with his mysterious herbal remedies keeping everyone alive and at the peak of health is and always has been a fantasy; albeit a very useful marketing fantasy with which to exploit idiot, ill-informed, molly-coddled Westerners. In short, the trumpeting of the benefits of Chinese medicine (especially the "ancient" variety") is based on nothing but myth. The facts, which are horrible and depressing, contradict the myths completely.

But let's not allow the facts to spoil a great story, for the benefit of quacks, charlatans and liars!

[pv]

Btw, in 1996, the average lifespan for a Chinese man was 68 years and for a woman 71 years.

[Martin]

Pv: "Why was it so low prior to 1949? Simply because of the lack of medical care."

Yeah. Or maybe "social revolution", "the great leap forward" or "cultural revolution" had something to do with it. "Wedidit" seems abit too simple methinks.

[pv]

"Wedidit" seems abit too simple methinks.

Non ho capito!

Of course social changes had a lot to do with it. But social changes without antibiotics, vaccination programmes, better hygiene and sanitation and so on would only bring limited change. People would still be dying in in intolerable numbers from malaria, tb and so on. Most of the Chinese population lived in what we would regard as abject poverty and had no access to anything, even if it were available - which it wasn't. The idea of the inscrutable, ancient Chinese medicine man with his herbs and magic remedies is largely a Western fantasy completely unsupported by the facts. Chinese people prior to 1949, much like 18th century Europeans died from what are today curable conditions and illnesses - they weren't spared by ancient Chinese herbal remedies. It just ain't so and never was.
Whatever works is medicine. There's no Western "this" and Chinese "that" about it.

[Techskeptic]

I wrote about this very subject a couple of months ago (not the stem cell stuff, but the 'ancient chinese medicine' crap). With life span data and historical correlations if anyone is interested.

Here

[Skeptyk]

"Or perhaps Maher is just a confused idiot."

Likely. Poor Bill's brain just has a lousy "terrain"* When it comes to ideas, Maher's problem is the "aggregate toxicity" of quack notions in his mind. It's not the invading memes, it's the terrain.

Skeptyk

* Maher thinks healthy people can't get infections such as malaria, nor does he "believe in" vaccine science. Relevant quotes include:

"...people get sick because of an aggregate toxicity, because their body has so much poison in it, from the air, the water..."

"I don't believe in vaccination either. That's a... well, that's a... what? That's another theory that I think is flawed, that we go by the Louis Pasteur theory, even though Louis Pasteur renounced it on his own deathbed and said that Beauchamp(s) was right: it's not the invading germs, it's the terrain. It's not the mosquitoes, it's the swamp that they are breeding in."

[badger3k]

"perhaps Maher is just a confused idiot"

Leave off the perhaps and this will be a more accurate sentence. Maher is another example of a man who makes sense sometimes, and is a complete moron at others. His anti-vaccination and anti-science rants are pathetic. I wonder who he will turn to when he gets sick.

[Mark Gibbs]

Can we stop this pretense that "real medicine" is practiced in the West...? Our institutions of medicine are interested in treating sickness and disease, NOT curing them. That's where the $$$ is. The best medicine is the placebo. Period. And our scientifically trained doctors can't explain it. Why should they? Where's the profit in that line of research?

[Martin]

Mark:

I think the idea is that between "The best medicine is the placebo." and "Period.", there's supposed to be some evidence of some sort (pressing the space-bar does not count as evidence unfortunately). Good luck.

[Bronze Dog]

If doctors were only interested in money, they wouldn't emphasize prevention as much as they do. And, of course, everyone loves to claim that modern science doesn't know anything about mundane effects like placebo.

Of course, how can placebo be the best medicine if the very gold standard of medical studies, the double-blind placebo-controlled study, is designed to prove that they get better results than placebo? Placebo is what you expect of inaction plus subjective validation. Treatment includes that plus real, measurable effects.

Oh, and lovely torrent of cynicism and misanthropy. Ever consider that some doctors might be in the business because they want to help people? Did it ever occur to you that decent people might want to take up the medical profession?

Do you seriously think that the eeeee-ville people have magical powers that let them ignore the massive bureaucratic problems that'd come from international million-man conspiracies?

[yakaru]

Mark wrote:
"Can we stop this pretense that "real medicine" is practiced in the West...?"

The article itself said:
"(O)ne thing struck me – how ludicrous the labels of “western medicine” and “Chinese medicine” are....(stem cell therapy is) practiced in China....so does that mean it’s not western?"

Mark says:
"The best medicine is the placebo."

I say (horrified):
Mark, you're not suggesting that alternative medicine is nothing more than a bunch of deceptively marketed placebos are you?

[Big Al]

So penicilin, anaesthesia, vaccination, organ transplantaion, steroids, skin grafts, etc., etc., are all just as good as ultra-concentrated hydrogen hydroxide (a.k.a. homeopathy)?

If only people had had access to ear candling, cupping, Therapeutic Touch and aromatherapy during the Black Death! It's obvious that the death toll would have been drastically reduced.