The difference between ‘Heat’ and ‘infection’

I have been planning to write an article entitled: How can acupuncture cure a bacterial infection. The need for this article occurred to me during clinic. Patients (rather irritatingly) often adopt the biomedicine explanation for their symptoms, and they state that they have a ‘bacterial infection’ therefore it is necessary that they take antibiotics. Or they give some other similar scenario, which makes the taking of the biomedicine remedy inevitable.

This is irritating for several reasons. Firstly, the drug they are taking is usually only harming them, and (like most of biomedicine remedies), it has no healing qualities at all. Secondly, the biomedicine understanding of their illness is often just plain wrong. The biomedicine scenarios are usually the product of an incomplete understanding of how the body works. Their knowledge is primitive and has gaping gaps in it. But they assume that their knowledge is complete and then directly adjust the chemistry of the body in a naive attempt to remove the symptom, but they usually end up doing far more harm than good. But this is another story.

To counter this problem, I decided there was a need for me to write this article. How does the Chinese Medicine concept of ‘Heat’ relate to the biomedicine concept of a ‘bacterial infection’?

I am still formulating this article in my mind, but recently in clinic I made an observation in this area.

I had been treating a patient for a few weeks. She had been brought to the point of death on two occasions due to the damage done to her by the remedies that biomedicine was prescribing for her. While I was treating her, she started another course of these ‘remedies’ (antibiotics and corticosteroids), which were applied after she went into another critical crisis phase (brought about by previous drug remedies) and did, on the surface, seem to momentarily remove the symptoms.

What was of interest to me, was the effect on her health that antibiotics, following a course of steroids, had had. In Chinese Medicine terms, it was clear to me that the Yang of her Spleen and Lungs had been greatly diminished, and was now so weak that her Yang was in danger of collapsing (i.e. she would die). This made me realize the following things.

Illnesses are often Heat, in some form, in the body, which acupuncture readily clears naturally. Bio-medicine understands this Heat as a ‘bacterial infection’ (because that is the only scientific vocabulary available to them). When a drug like antibiotics are applied, the Heat symptoms can sometimes clear. But this is not producing this effect by clearing the Heat; it is doing it by diminishing the Yang of the organ concerned. If you diminish the Yang, you will certainly also reduce Heat. To use an analogy, this can be thought of as removing the oxygen to kill a fire. It you take away the oxygen, the fire will certainly go out, but you will have no more oxygen left.

Antibiotics do a similar thing to your body. They diminish Yang, in this case in the Lungs and Spleen (which share the same energy; these two organs are often affected simultaneously). This explains why antibiotics tend to produce loose stools and perhaps a tender abdomen, signs of Spleen Qi Deficiency in Chinese Medicine (ignorantly called ‘irritable bowel syndrome’ by biomedicine–because they have no understanding of the condition). They diminish the Yang of the Lungs and also of the Spleen. The Yang is the functioning of the organ, its ‘fire’ if you like. So to remove the Heat in the Lungs, antibiotics smother the Yang of the Lungs and Spleen, which does, indeed, take away the Heat signs, but in the process, the functioning of the Lungs and Spleen have been weakened. Chinese Medicine acupuncture releases he heat naturally, without causing any negative effects on the body.

In a patient who is already weak, and has already been brought close to death by similar drugs being applied previously, the patient could well be killed by having antibiotics (and many other such damaging drugs) prescribed.

In natural healing, we get used to experiencing such situations. And we have to stand back and let the patient decide to let the biomedicine people administer drugs which are only going to destroy the patient’s health. Biomedicine is promoted by a profound propaganda machine. And it’s arguments are convincing, to people who have not experienced natural healing. This is why there is such a desperate need for these types of articles.

In order to become detached from such situations, I have to remind myself that: ‘Every patient has the right to be ill, and every patient has the right to die, if that’s what they choose to do.’

 

24 March 2008