punished for success

Dr. Punyamurtula S. Kishore, Preventive Medicine Physician in ...

Dr. Punyamurtala Kishore

Yesterday we posted a history video about Dr. Ignaz Semmelweiss, who was destroyed by the medical establishment of the mid-1800s for virtually stamping out fatal “child-bed fever” at hospitals under his authority.

Present-day America has its own Semmelweiss. Dr. Punyamurtala Kishore, in Massachusetts, developed a successful system for treating and curing opioid addiction. His reward for that? In 2011 the state shut down all 52 of his clinics and threw him in jail.

https://chalcedon.edu/magazine/dr-punyamurtula-kishore-in-the-eye-of-the-storm

Our managing editor at Chalcedon, Martin Selbrede, covered this bizarre story in deail from its beginning to the present. We have a link to Article No. 15 in the series because it provides links to the earlier articles, in order.

It’s standard practice to treat drug addiction by giving the patient other addictive drugs, like methadone. Dr. Kishore abandoned that, and replaced it with a treatment regime whose goal was not “managing” addiction, but curing it.

Like Semmelweiss, Dr. Kishore had dramatic results to prove his success.

Like Semmelweiss, the establishment–politicians, the “news” media, pharmaceutical companies, and high-ranking physicians–came down on him with everything they had. Semmelweiss died in a mental hospital. Dr. Kishore went to jail. At the age of 65, they had him cleaning streets–which impaired his health.

Unlike Semmelweiss, Dr. Kishore lived through his ordeal and, in the midst of persecution, found advocates and allies. So his struggle continues.

It’s all in Martin’s articles. It may be rather hard to believe–but believe it.

We often hear “It’s settled science!” as the argument to shut down any and all discussion about Man-Made Climate Change. Back in the mid-19th century, it shut down the one doctor whose methods were the only methods that could stop the “child-bed fever” that was killing multitudes of pregnant women in hospitals.

Today Dr. Ignaz Semmelweiss, of Hungary, is memorialized on coins and postage stamps, with more than a few hospitals named for him. But in his own time, Semmelweiss was reviled, denounced as a charlatan, rejected, refused permission to carry on his work, and finally died in a mental hospital.

This was because Semmelweiss insisted that doctors under his authority wash their hands before tending their patients. At some hospitals, the mortality rate for women giving birth was around 18%. Women who gave birth in the streets had a lower mortality rate than that! But where Semmelweiss was able to get doctors to wash their hands, the mortality rate plummeted to 2%. In fact, in some months, no patients died of child-bed fever.

So Semmelweiss had the results; but that was all he had, and the scientific community ignored them. This 15-minute video by The History Guy on youtube tells the whole story: watch it before it’s taken down.

Thanks to my wife for impressing me with the importance of this history–to say nothing of its applicability to all eras of history, including our own.

“Settled science” can be fatal.