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Ebola, like all diseases, is an opportunity for some to offer up curious treatments. Here is a brief budget of Ebola-related SCAM (supplements, complementary and alternative medicine) and a few Dug the Dog digressions.

Homeopathy

Reality seems valueless by comparison with the dreams of fevered imaginations; reality is therefore abandoned. ~ Emile Durkheim. Homeopath?

In its classic form, as promulgated by Hahnemann, homeopathy is divorced from the modern understanding of medical and chemical reality. I can cut Hahnemann a little slack since he came up with his fictions at the end of the 18th century. But I would think that even a modest understanding of chemistry and physiology would suggest that homeopathy is 100% pure bunkum. But homeopaths are nothing if not inventive. Since Hahnemann’s time they have come up with a remarkable number of variations on their nonsense. The motto “you are only limited by your imagination” must have had homeopaths in mind and they have fevered imaginations. Who knows what they could invent if they only had a box. There are nosodes, the homeopaths answer to vaccines. Of course, it is an answer that would be wrong on any reality-based exam. Nosodes are the vaccines of the homeopathic world, only without efficacy. I have written about nosodes in the past.

[A nosode] is a homeopathic remedy prepared from a pathological specimen. The specimen is taken from a diseased animal or person and may consist of saliva, pus, urine, blood, or diseased tissue.

and they are usually diluted to between 30 and 300 C.

Gone in a flash was a Natural News article on a DYI homeopathic treatment for Ebola. A reader (Thank you Jim) saved the recipe and I show it below with the caveat not to try this at home because it is a typical worthless wackaloon homeopathic nostrum attempting to prevent or treat disease and dangerous to make to boot:

How to Make Your Own Ebola Remedy What you need: A face mask and gloves Two bottles (50 ml up to 500 ml glass or plastic bottles) with caps Clean water (mineral or tap water) An Ebola sample: some spit or other disease product, such as blood, from a person infected with Ebola, or who is suspected sick with it. Any small quantity will do, even a pinhead. An alcoholic liquid, such as whisky, brandy, rum, etc. Half an hour of your time. Procedure: Fill the bottle with water, leaving about 20% space at the top. Place the Ebola sample in the water in the bottle. Close the top of the bottle with the cap. Hold the bottle and strike it hard against a solid surface, such as a large book, 40 times. Pour out the contents of the bottle. Refill the bottle with water (the fluid remaining on the inside surface of the bottle will serve as the next Ebola sample). Repeat steps 3 to 6 a total of 30 times. Storage: Pour the bottle solution into another bottle—your stock bottle. Add 10% by volume of the alcoholic liquid (whisky, brandy, etc.) as a preservative. Store in a place away from sunlight and electronic equipment. Using this stock bottle, you can supply the Ebola remedy to as many people you want. With one drop from the stock bottle as an Ebola sample you can produce another stock bottle to give to someone else. Instead of the original Ebola sample you used above to make the original stock bottle, you use a drop from the first stock bottle. This process can be carried out ad infinitum, supplying a whole city, etc., if needed. Taking Your Home-Made Ebola Remedy For prevention: Place a teaspoonful of your Ebola remedy from the stock bottle into a cup filled with water. Stir the water five times with a disposable spoon or stick. Take a sip from the cup. During the epidemic, take a sip once or twice a day, stirring five times before taking the sip. Refill the cup as needed after striking the stock bottle against a hard surface five times. If you are sick with Ebola: Place a teaspoonful of the Ebola remedy from your stock bottle into a cup filled with water. Stir the water five times with a disposable spoon or stick. Take a sip every 15 minutes, stirring five times each time until you notice improvement, then stop. On improving, you can ease off and take the remedy every hour or so, again stirring five times before taking the remedy each time.

It is step 4 in the preparation that is the dicey one. I would think face mask and gloves would be a bit cavalier for infection control, but on par with the understanding of infectious diseases by many pseudo-medical providers. I am not too worried about the final product. If I were washing dishes at home I would probably consider it clean after the third or fourth rinse and shake, although with Ebola I might heat it to 400°F in the oven for an hour. You may think the Natural News was scammed, but this is a standard homeopath approach to nosode production. They suggested the same method for the Ebola nostrum, the Korsakovian, that is used to make Oscillococcinum. If you fret about Ebola being spread as a nosode (and likely only to the fool who went after the original Ebola-containing spit) consider this list of nosodes available on the internet. I’ve underlined the more peculiar.

Anthracinum (Anthrax); Aviare Tuberculinum; Bacillinum; Botulinum; Candida; Canine Dapp (Distemper, Parvo, Parainfluenza); Carcinosinum; Chlorinum; Cholera ; Colibacillinum; Derum S”Anguille [sic]; Diphtherinum; Diptherinum; Diptherinum; Diptherotoxinum Dysentery; Eberthinum; E Coli – Bacteria Coli; Enterotoccinum; Epstein Barr Virus; FIP / Feline Infectious Peritonitis; Gonorrhea (also known by Gonotoxinum or Medorrhinum); HIB / Haemophilus Influenza B; Hepatitis A; Hepatitis B; Hepatitis C; HPV / Human Papilloma Virus; Lac Maternum; Leptospirosis / Leptospira Canicola Bacteria; Luesinum; Lyme Tick Bite Balance; Lyssin (also known by Lyssinum or Rabies ); Malaria Off; Medorrhinum (also known as Gonorrheal bacteria or Gohorrhea or Gonotoxinum); Mononucleosis; Morbillinum ( Measles ); Nuclear Radiation ; Oscillococcinum (Anas babarie hepatis et cordis) Paratyphoidinum B; Parotidinum (Mumps); Penicillinum; Pertussinum (Whooping Cough); Plague ; Pneumococcinum; Polio ; Proteus Bulgaris; Proteus Vulgaris; Psorinum; Pyrogenium- sepsis; Radium Bromide; Rubella (German Measles); Rubeola (Measles); Salmonella; Scarlatinum; Secale –Ergot; Serum Anguillar; Staphyloccoccus Aureus; Staphylococcinum; Staphylotoxinum; Streptococcinum; Syphilinum (Luesinum); Tetanotoxinum; Tuberculinum Aviare; Tuberculinum; Tuberculinum Kent; Typhoidinum; Vaccininum / Vaccinotoxinum; Varicella (Chicken Pox) Variolinum (Smallpox); West Nile Virus Complex; X-Ray .

Remember, all of these nostrums supposedly start with an aliquot of an original infected tissue. It is the smallpox that has always given me pause. Just what was the original source material? Do they still have a smallpox sample forgotten in a closet somewhere like the CDC? Are their production facilities rated to handle these pathogens? I would wager no. X-Ray and nuclear radiation always gives me a smile. But they are missing Ebola and HIV. And if you are wondering, as did I, what Derum S”Anguille [sic], it is eel serum. How eel serum, or an X-ray, constitute a nosode eludes me. An HIV nosode is available elsewhere. I also give you:

The Homœopathic Proving of AIDS The nosode prepared from the blood of a man diagnosed as having Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome who subsequently died of Syndrome related diseases.

So do you want to take a preparation made from HIV-infected blood or Ebola-infected blood? If you were not convinced of the total lunacy (treated with homeopathic moonlight?) that is homeopathy, read over the site for the HIV nosode. From The School of Homoeopathy in Devon, England no less. The “Ebola Remedy”: part and parcel of the bizarro world that is homeopathy.

There are even more creative applications of homeopathy. Like acupuncture, homeopathic variations are remarkable in their number. There are:

“paper remedies,” where the substance and dilution are written on pieces of paper and either pinned to the patients’ clothing, put in their pockets, or placed under glasses of water that are then given to the patients, as well as the use of radionics to prepare remedies. Such practices have been strongly criticised by classical homeopaths as unfounded, speculative, and verging upon magic and superstition.

As if classical homeopathy isn’t unfounded, speculative, and verging upon magic and superstition. LOL. Verging? I leapt in years ago. So pot, kettle, black. Radionics, by the way, is using radio waves to diagnose and treat diseases. It is pure, if expensive, bunkum and one machine does have an Ebola setting. You can make homeopathy remedies as with radionics, although it doesn’t make for nice fingernails. And anything can be turned in to a homeopathic nostrum:

In addition, homeopathic remedies can also be made making use of non-material sources, for instance, electricity, musical frequencies, magnetic fields and even moonlight. In fact, the possibilities are infinite.

Music. Really? I wonder if a Death Grips homeopathic nostrum would cure my headache. There is a Nigerian newspaper with the headline “American doctor proffers technology cure for Ebola.” What is this wonder cure? “You will hear just white noise as the homeopathic remedy energy is played in order to stimulate the body to heal itself.” One sound to be played if exposed, the other if ill for 48 hours. It is based on ‘science‘ as described :

It turns out that the energetic signal in homeopathic remedies can be extracted via a device consisting of a simple coil connected to an amplifier and digitizer, and the resulting signal can be stored on a computer as a .wav file or a MP3 file. This technique was developed originally in the 1990s by Jacques Benveniste, a French researcher doing immunology research. He demonstrated this in repeated laboratory experiments.

And be careful:

In any case, do not play for more than 15 doses. Too many doses may stimulate the body too much.

It is difficult to know what to make of the producer of this product; he does not apparently understand parody (nor maybe do I). One commentator points out the similarity to FSMoSophica, a homeopathy-like use of the Flying Spaghetti monster where they:

…can speak the healing information directly onto raw globules, we will do this by mentioning the latin name of the respective mother tincture. I think that I am going to concentrate on the second method, the speaking method for the final manufactoring process.

to which he replies:

Interesting. Depending on the homeopathic training of the one making the sound, this does fit pendulum prescribing and even radionics. Personally, I do trust signals from reputable pharmacies because their procedures are tried and true for two centuries, methodical, and not dependent on subjectivity of the one creating the frequency. Thank you for your post.

They have been creating quality frequencies since 1814? About 50-100 years before radios and phonographs? Impressive. And pendulum prescribing? What is that? Use a pendulum held over the patient and ask a question, it will move clockwise for yes and counterclockwise for no. Usefull in homeopathic diagnosis and treatment.

To find the appropriate remedy I have made up a list of the most commonly used remedies along with the most common potencies. I have two pages of remedies which cover nearly 80% of the needed remedies. I suspect that with people, the list would be much longer. I first ask if there is a homeopathic remedy suitable for that particular case. If yes, I then ask if it is on my list. If yes, the next question is, “Is it on the first page?”. If no, is it on the second page. If yes, I then ask which letter it starts with. Since you can only get a yes or no, this process is a bit laborious. If the second page begins with Kali Ars., I would ask, “does the name of the remedy start with K?”. If it does not, I ask if the name starts with L and so on until I located the exact remedy. I then ask in the same manner for potency and frequency. If the remedy is not on my list, I then go to a full list of remedies from a textbook or other source and try and locate it there.

I was shocked to find this was subjected to a clinical evaluation and published. I was not surprised to find negative results:

These results, wholly negative, add to doubts whether dowsing in this context can yield objective information.

You think? And of course they threw in the usual caveats so that utilizers of wackaloon diagnostics have an out to continue:

It is acknowledged that the experimental situation may adversely affect dowsing ability and this may be reflected in the study results…The sample was small, and the absence of proof of effect does not mean that there is no effect.

I also found the following interesting: Andrew Vickers helped develop the original idea, he of acupuncture works for pain fame. I suspect that anyone who thinks that dowsing for diagnosis is worthy of a clinical trial has a different idea of reality than I.

Not to be outdone by herbalists with 365 deaths, I guess the homeopaths want in on the action.

Silver and Ebola

Don’t own an mp3 player or have an Internet connection? Don’t have a grand or two for a radionics machine? Well, you could try silver nano particles. Dr. Rima Laibow of the Natural Solutions Foundations suggests “No One Needs to Die From Ebola! ” and has sent an:

Open Letter to Heads of Ebola-Impacted States and World Health Leaders on Ebola Prevention and Treatment

suggesting her product of:

10 PPM Nano silver administered to Ebola victims, contacts and potential contacts, Ebola and other contagious diseases can be eliminated as the deadly scourges that they currently are.

Sounds impressive since it is based on Defence Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) data that was declassified in 2009. Ohhhhh. Previously secret information. This must be juicy. Silver, like copper and mercury, has broad anti-microbial actions. I still use antimony to treat Leishmaniasis. I prefer less toxic treatments than metals if available and, in the case of silver, a treatment that actually works. According to Dr. Laibow:

10 PPM was by the most effective dose for killing the Ebola virus.

When begs the question of how you ‘kill’ a virus. Laibow also says that the:

DTRA’s research was carried out specifically in the Ebola Virus as well as other deadly hemorrhagic virus.

This statement is based on a government report that appears to be a Powerpoint presentation on the use of silver nano particles against viruses. As best I can tell from the slides (which I assume were used as back up for a lecture, which we do not have) they found the following. Nano silver particles prevented the binding of Ebola-like particles to Vero cells but do not prevent the internalization of Ebola-like particles at concentration between 10 and 50 ug/ml. The site seems to confuse the size of the particles (10 nm) with the concentration (10 PPM). The study used 10 nm particles and larger. The site offers their silver at 10 PPM, parts per million, which is about 10 ug/ml. But in the DTRA study it was the 10 nm size that was most effective as the dose went from 10 to 25 to 50 ug/ml. You have to read it carefully to note that Dr. Laibow seems to not understand that all tens are not the same.

The site suggests 5cc (1 tsp) as the dose for Ebola, up to 12 doses a day of a product “not intended to prevent, treat or cure any disease.” 10 PPM is about 10 ug/ml. So the patient is taking 50 ug. Most people are about 50 L of water. So the silver if 100% absorbed and evenly distributed (not going to happen) would be 50 ug/50,000 ml or 0.001 ug/ml, a wee bit less than the DTRA study by a factor of 10,000. So there was nothing about killing Ebola in the DTRA study. More importantly, they did not even use Ebola, but Ebola-like particles which are all the protein with none of the genome:

Virus-like particles (VLPs) have been generated in insect and mammalian cell expression systems for a number of viruses including rotaviruses, parvoviruses, human papillomavirus, and HIV by ectopic expression of subsets of their respective viral proteins (20–23). These genome-free VLPs are often morphologically similar to the live virus from which they are derived and are highly immunogenic.

The product was being considered for use in Nigeria, whose Health Minister also can’t read. The saddest, and most amusing in a gallows humor kind of way, is that the silver nanoparticles are consistently referred to as an “Experimental Drug” even by the Wall Street Journal . More evidence to suggest that fact checking is a thing of the past for the few remaining newspapers in the US. Somehow I would be skeptical that a website that says:

Chemtrails are part of an aerial spraying program that appears to be a secret government program or series of programs.

And:

I have been identifying publicly the toxic threats presented by prescription drugs and medical vaccines for decades.

And that shaken babies are due to vaccine injury, is going to have a breakthrough experimental treatment for anything.