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June 7, 2003 (MS Word document)

Version Française Alexander, June 1998 First do no harm 

"Primum non nocere"

Hippocratic Oath e have created this website to tell our son's story and to share with other parents the information we have found about pediatric brain tumors and about childhood vaccinations.



This information is designed to help parents exercise informed consent and make intelligent decisions regarding their child's health, especially when their child has cancer. For us, this information represents what we wished we had found when we feverishly searched for information on pediatric brain tumors in the fall of 1998. While we focus on cancer and chemotherapy, we also discuss childhood vaccinations because there is substantial medical literature to suggest a potential link between vaccines and the rise of various cancers including brain tumors in children. On August 10, 1998 at age two, our son Alexander Horwin was diagnosed with the most common pediatric brain tumor, medulloblastoma. After Alexander endured two brain surgeries my husband and I located the best non-toxic therapy that had proven successful in treating brain cancer. However, on September 21, 1998, the FDA denied Alexander access to this potentially life-saving treatment. The oncologists told us that without their "state-of-the-art" chemotherapy, the cancer would soon return. We knew nothing of the history, efficacy and actual danger of chemotherapy but instinctively knew it was a poor choice for therapy. However, now that the FDA had denied Alexander his best chance of survival using a non-toxic therapy that had saved other children, we had no other treatment options left. Reluctantly we started chemo on October 7, 1998. The protocol was entitled CCG 9921 which consisted of intravenous administration of four chemo drugs: vincristine, cisplatin, cyclophosphamide (also called cytoxan), and VP16 (also called etoposide). Alexander completed his third month of chemotherapy in December 1998 and died on January 31, 1999. He was just two and a half years old. fter our loving, bright, happy and handsome son passed away, we wanted to know why. The doctors were unable to provide us with a single lucid answer regarding any of the following questions. Why did our son have cancer at the age of two? Where did it come from? Why is this particular cancer in children increasing? Why did he die while on chemotherapy and only one quarter of the way into the protocol? Since both my husband and I had worked in the medical field we knew where to look for answers. We spent a year reading everything that we could find on the subject of cancer in children. We expended thousands of hours pouring over medical literature, communicating with doctors and scientists, and speaking to parents of children who were permanently disabled or killed by vaccines, and parents of children who were dead as a result of cancer or its treatment. This research provided a number of insights. For example, the so-called "state-of-the-art" chemo protocol that the oncologists had administered to our son had proven its ineffectiveness in pediatric brain tumors many years before. In fact, in 1994, the exact same chemo drugs Alexander received in 1998 had been administered to children the same age with the same brain tumor (medulloblastoma) as Alexander. This experiment proved so unsuccessful that tumors spread within five months and the oncologists terminated the protocol. It was incredible to us to discover that chemotherapy that had already proven so ineffective that it required termination was being presented to parents as "state of the art" years later. We were never informed about the failure of this therapy. We also discovered that we weren't the only parents being purposefully misinformed. Today, parents are still being misled and children with brain cancer are still getting these same toxic drugs that have proven their ineffectiveness in the past. But even if you are informed that orthodox therapy does not work you still may not have a choice. When we hesitated to bring Alexander in for chemo the oncologists were already gearing up to take him from us by court order. We have written to more than 30 Members of Congress about our findings and have provided written testimony to congressional hearings. (The documents are posted on this site.) By sharing our son's lethal encounter with the medical industry, other parents can take heed, learn and perhaps prevent the same horror from happening to their child. We encourage parents to exercise informed consent before agreeing to any medical intervention for their child. Informed consent means that you know and understand the truth about all of the risks and benefits. This may require you to conduct your own research; read books, medical articles, etc. One excellent resource is available on the Internet: Medline includes over nine million citations of indexed and searchable articles on hundreds of medical topics taken from the world's best peer-reviewed medical journals. Another source of information is the manufacturer's insert that comes packaged with every single drug or vaccine. It's a good idea to read it before the drug/vaccine is administered to your child.