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From: sdyer@bbnccv.UUCP (Steve Dyer)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.africa,net.med
Subject: Re: Re: Is there any benefit in African Medicine
Message-ID: <397@bbnccv.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 8-May-85 00:33:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: bbnccv.397
Posted: Wed May  8 00:33:43 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 9-May-85 03:13:15 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, MA
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Xref: watmath net.nlang.africa:17 net.med:1516

This kind of discussion crops up regularly in net.med, but it's
worth reemphasizing here.  "Western" medicine is a profession
rooted in humanistic values of service and aid to the sick and
dying, but its strongest tool since the 19th century has been
the scientific method--a therapy must produce repeatable beneficial
results in order to be accepted by the medical community.  Like it
or not, a sample size of one is useless in predicting a therapy's
value in Western medicine--there are too many uncontrolled variables,
all which may influence a therapeutic outcome, to give it any
predictive value.

Medicine, because it deals in such a precious commodity as human
life and health, is fundamentally conservative.  It prefers to
treat patients with therapies it knows to be of value, or at least,
as the maxim says, to do no harm.  This means, for example, that
effective folk remedies might take a while to be used; they are
given the same scrutiny as other, less "natural" treatments.
-- 
/Steve Dyer
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