The blogosphere has been blowing up over a medical quack recently and it’s a topic that needs more attention. The medical field and medical treatments is a field that is inherently conservative and skeptical in that change happens slowly and that the standard of evidence is quite high. To gain FDA approval requires proving that it is effective and that it is safe or at least safer than the ailment.

When it comes to the more life threatening conditions, like cancer, then due to the safety risks of the treatment a lot of people are willing to try new and experimental treatments. Fortunately the poison (i.e. chemo) that people have to have pumped through their veins to improve their chance of survival is a hell of a lot safer than just letting the cancer do its thing or trying an ineffective treatment. There’s also the fact that the longer you let the cancer run rampant, the lower the chances of survival, so by trying experimental or bull shit treatments early, it increases the chance of death. Sure, there’s a time for experimental treatments, such as if the conventional, proven treatments have failed and you’re chances of survival are near zero. Otherwise stick to what’s proven.

Then of course there’s treatments that are still in their “investigational” phases after decades of failed trails. At that point it’s not experimental it’s a failed line of bullshit. For someone to be peddling that and especially if they’re charging for it, it’s highly unethical. It’s giving desperate people unjustified hope with a therapy that won’t do them any good.

So enter Dr. Burzynski and the Burzynski Clinic. They offer a cancer “treatment” using antineoplastons, now made from synthesized compounds found naturally in blood and urine. This treatment was first proposed in 1976 and has not only failed to be validated by clinical trials, it’s very efficacy has been falsified. FDA approval for new medicines and therapies is a lengthy process that can easily take 5-10 years, but if it hasn’t been approved or passed clinical trials in over 30 years then it won’t.

What’s worse is Burzynski is trying to extort $200,000 so he can offer false hope to the family of a 4-year-old girl with cancer. He also hired a henchman who threatened and bullied any blogger who covered this story. He’s since fired the henchman, but whether or not they are still bullying people like that, they are still taking advantage of desperate people and offering them bogus treatments.

Fortunately the Texas Board of Medicine is considering revoking his medical license in April.

(Via Blag Hag)