Posted on 01 October 2012 by Erik Davis.
Practitioner
Iva Lloyd (Markham, Ontario)
Qualifications
Naturopathic Doctor (ND), Registered Polarity Therapist & Educator (RPE), and Reiki Master
Founder of Naturopathic Foundations Health Clinic
Claims That…
Intravenous Vitamin C kills cancer. Cancer can be fed by the food that you eat. Infra-red saunas can eliminate chemicals that promote cancer growth. Homeopathy and hydrotherapy are useful parts of a cancer treatment program.
Erik is a technology professional based in Toronto, focused on the intersection of the internet and the traditional media and telecommunications sectors. A reluctant blogger, he was inspired by the great work Skeptic North has done to combat misinformation and shoddy science reporting in the Canadian media, and in the public at large. Erik has a particular interest in critical reasoning, and in understanding why there’s so little of it in the public discourse. You can follow Erik's occasional 140 character musings @erikjdavis
I took some time to find out what polarity therapy is all about and I came across the American Polarity Therapy Association’s Standards of Practice document.
Enjoy the well organized crazy.
http://www.polaritytherapy.org/images/stories/pdfs/2009_practice_standards.pdf
We severely require new laws that obliged that ANY claim has to be backed up with evidence.
No more false claimes should be possible.
We should also have a standard on who can claim to be a “doctor”.
Ricky,
These laws exist (Ex: The Competition Act). Even so, false claims abound due to inadequate and/or inappropriate enforcement. These practitioners for the most part know that they need evidence to back up their claims. They also know that the chances of them facing any consequences are very, very low. It’s a climate ripe for widespread flouting of consumer protection law – which is precisely the situation we see with alt-med practitioners.
The title Doctor has been allowed to be diluted to the point of losing practical meaning.
If anyone thinks this stuff is ‘harmless’, remember that if people didn’t pay for this stuff, it wouldn’t be on the market.
Re: “intravenous vitamin C kills cancer”, this seems in my reading of ND sites to be particularly happening in Canada around Ontario, perhaps as a CCNM kind of craze. US NDs are not so bold, yet their ‘naturopathic oncologist’ craze is quire a thing to cringe at.
Also, regarding ND Lloyd, if you want the ‘big repository of Canadian naturopathic woo’, then read Lloyd’s “The History of Naturopathic Medicine: A Canadian Perspective” (ISBN 1552787788 978-1552787786 2009).
It’s over at Amazon, where I gave it five stars [and I mean that rating to indicate that the book is quite useful for my purposes; NOT as an evaluation of the book's rationality, science-basis, or medical accuracy]:
“An Excellent Primary Source of Information Regarding North American Naturopathy (February 18, 2011 By Robert J. Cullen)
I’m more than pleased with this book by CAND and Lloyd and what it covers.
Particularly, the detailed discussion of naturopathy’s science-ejected premises was rewarding.
I was surprised at the high-level of detail devoted to the biographies of Canadian NDs.
This is a primary text that truly is an asset in terms of what I research — sectarian ‘medical’ systems.
-r.c.”
Would it not be possible to have the claims treated as advertising and bounce them against Canadian advertising laws? If the doctor advertises vitamin C i.v is a cancer cure, and if it by any chance, is not a cure – would that not count as false advertising?