Vedic Medicine on the March!

[Mr. Scott]

I've seen signs that vedic medicine is on the march in a very big way here in the USA, no doubt because of a huge influx of people from India. I googled up a bit on it and see that vedic medical centers are being established in many areas of heavy Indian populations, and some very large ones are being proposed. I can't tell you how this has come to my attention because of security policies where I work, but I'd like to initiate discussion about it as a possibly dangerous new wave of quack medicine.

Does vedic medicine have a reputation yet amoung skeptics? Anyone have first-hand experience with it?

Here's what google puts on top of the search for Vedic Medicine (http://www.ayurvedamed.com/about/) to jump start the discussion.

[jon]

A couple of things - if you haven't already seen the AMA article on their use of toxic heavy metals as 'medicine' (http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/292/23/2868) :jaw-dropp that's worth a look. The Indian Express also had a good article (http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/full_story.php?content_id=71247&pn=0) on debates in India around ajurveda (and the nice claim that, cause using heavy metals was traditional and natural, it was also safe to give them to patients to swallow...)

No first hand experience, but here in the UK lots of this stuff seems to be spilling over into cosmetics, spas etc...

[Dr Adequate]

Does vedic medicine have a reputation yet amoung skeptics?

Ayurvedic medicine

Oh, those heavy metals?

"Heavy metals are integral to some formulations and have been used for centuries. There is no point of doing trials as they have been used safely and have mention in our ancient texts." --- Tara Dutt, Joint Secretary, AYUSH

Well that's OK then.

[Jeff Corey]

Last summer. I was contacted by a member of an Indian Skeptic group (cited in the back of the SI) who wanted to meet with me when he visited his son in NY. We were invited to dinner at his son's house and we had a very pleasant evening. He had a number of questions for me, because he was writing an article for his organization. The surprize was when he started talking about this wonderful Ayurvedic health food his other son was manufacturing and marketing in Queens, NYC.
When he offered my some Ayurvedic lozenges, I politely refused. I begged off on the interview, too, figuring there was no way I could be politely be skeptical about his beliefs. After reading about the heavy metals, I'm really glad I refused the lozenges.

[Roboramma]

Thanks for the article. I just posted a link to it on a yoga board (http://p196.ezboard.com/fyoga84291frm12.showMessage?topicID=491.topic) where someone was asking to have ayurvedic medicines shipped to them from India.

I couldn't get the skeptic wiki page to open (I haven't been able to access it all week) so I didn't feel right linking that as well. If anyone else here feels like passing that link along to those fellows, that'd be nice.

[JJM]

Thanks for the article. I just posted a link to it on a yoga board (http://p196.ezboard.com/fyoga84291frm12.showMessage?topicID=491.topic) where someone was asking to have ayurvedic medicines shipped to them from India.

I couldn't get the skeptic wiki page to open (I haven't been able to access it all week) so I didn't feel right linking that as well. If anyone else here feels like passing that link along to those fellows, that'd be nice.Wikipedia articles on "alternative medicine" (AM) tend to be dominated by proponents, and the ayurvedic page certainly promotes the nonsense. Usually, the only good use for Wiki on AM is examination of references; but the admin has flagged the ayurveda article for having too few.

BTW, Deepack Chopra used to be a reliable MD. Over twenty years ago, his cheese slipped off his cracker and he turned to ayurveda and joined the maharishi Mahesh Yogi. After a few years, he got even deeper into woo and established himself separately.

[Eos of the Eons]

Mwahahaha. This is a Pakistanian conspiracy to get rid of Indians by getting them to take stuff laced with heavy metals as "medicine". Getting them to spread this junk to Americans is more than they could have ever hoped for!!!

Seriously though, what kind of nutjob sCAM is this? To get folks to eat heavy metals in one sCAM camp, and the other sCAM camp sells junk to rid people of toxins like heavy metals. They make customers for each other?

Double seriously, I'm glad folks are hearing enough about these nutty "medicines" so that they may refuse them the way Jeff Corey did. Thank Ed!!

[Roboramma]

Here's the response of the fellow who I passed the link along to:
thanks for you link, Roboramma
I cannot afford for the moment to make Amritdhara analyzed
in order to verify, I hope it isnt the case,
it is a very old preparation existing already for a hundred years,
I have to take it, it is the only thing I did find,
which have effect on my stomach burning

Edit: Yuck. Someone else posted a link to a site for ayurveda claiming to cure AIDS. I don't even want to post the link here.

[jon]

Seriously though, what kind of nutjob sCAM is this? To get folks to eat heavy metals in one sCAM camp, and the other sCAM camp sells junk to rid people of toxins like heavy metals. They make customers for each other?

Double seriously, I'm glad folks are hearing enough about these nutty "medicines" so that they may refuse them the way Jeff Corey did. Thank Ed!!

That's why it's called complementary medicine - different strands of the BS complement one another, so if one quack makes you ill you can always find another to buy a 'cure' from :) My skin/eyes sometimes react badly to lavender - when I say why I want to avoid this, it's surprising how often people will suggest various 'natural' treatments for the problem, as opposed to the obvious remedy of avoiding the stuff in the first place...

Jeff- my understanding is that the levels of heavy metals in ayurvedic preparations would have been dangerous if you took the recommended dose over a period. Sucking one lozenge would likely have been safe - but then there's no evidence that most of this stuff works, and supplementing the diet with heavy metals is not desirable...

robo- glad the link was useful. That's often the response you get - that this is traditional and/or natural heavy metal intake... I wonder how people feel about the traditional British practice of lead water pipes?

[ktesibios]

Well, here in the USA our traditional practice of using 50/50 tin/lead solder for joining copper water pipes was banned a while back.

Talk of having vedic medicines shipped here from India makes me wonder- isn't Customs empowered to block the importation of foods or drugs which would be deemed unfit for human consumption under our food and drug laws? Medicines contaminated with toxic metals would surely fit that description.

[Eos of the Eons]

Well. Supplements are classified as food. If there are no claims actually on the bottle of stuff, then it is "food". Food is not regulated the way drugs are. Try proving to customs that the "food" is contaminated with heavy metal. You got your heavy metal food detector with you? Not going to happen.

http://www.faqs.org/nutrition/Diab-Em/Dietary-Supplements.html

dietary supplements escape the stringent approval process that food additives and drugs must go through before being marketed to the public, unless the manufacturer of a dietary supplement makes a claim for therapeutic efficacy.