Influenza -- fact & fancy

The fact that you're reading this shows the Y2K factor was exaggerated.

All of the predictions of power failures, financial panics and exploding toilets were overblown, with the only major problem being the government's announcement that some of our spy satellites were unable to locate the enemy for a period of time. Of course, this merely put our military on a par with the rest of us, who aren't quite sure who the enemy is in the first place.

Actually, it's a shame that the massive computer failures didn't appear, since I was hoping my credit card records over at Mastercard would be obliterated. Besides, reverting to the Stone Age holds no terror for us in Iowa, since our connection with the outside world is tenuous at best. (Our only visitors here are missionaries and presidential candidates during caucus years).

What did show up was influenza. And while this column is usually devoted to Medicare matters, the media circus surrounding this condition warrants comment.

This season, influenza has been more virulent and widespread than in recent memory. While flu varieties vary, the newest has been worse than average, as are most that originate from the Chinese mainland. But the truth about this outbreak is hidden behind media lies and medical coverup.

Historically, influenza has ranged between a nuisance and a killer. While most years the available variety has been fairly mild, at times epidemics have devastated schools, businesses, and nursing homes, causing absences, secondary infections, and even death.

The worst was the infamous Spanish Flu, that raged across the globe at the end of the First World War. More than six million people died (with virtually the entire world infected) before it burned itself out. Also called the Swine Flu, the ramifications of the outbreak are still with us.

In 1978, the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta announced that another Swine Flu outbreak was on its way. The public was warned that this one could be just as deadly.

The answer, according to the medical establishment, was to suspend dead or attenuated viruses into solution and drive them into an appendage with a large needle, aka, the "flu shot." I found this especially interesting, because until then the only time I had met a half-dead organism suspended in a solution was one of my in-laws in Chicago.

By the way, why is it that the people at the CDC wear the same outfits worn by the people at CBW (Chemical Biological Warfare) in the military?

The outcome of this flu outbreak was a dud. This flu was not much of a killer, finishing in second place behind the U.S. government, which pushed flu vaccine on anyone with an arm to shoot it in. The result was Guillain-Barre syndrome, causing hundreds of deaths and thousands of people suffering from neurological damage.

One of them was a patient of mine, who came into my office with a headache the day after getting his flu shot. By the next day he was hospitalized, paralyzed from the neck down, and remained there for several weeks. While he eventually recovered, to this day he suffers attacks of weakness and neurological deficits.

Now, we have a new flu and new shots. The new variety is called Sydney Type A, and is definitely tougher than any seen in recent years. As it spread across the country the government again pushed more needles at the public than junkies in trench coats.

A doctor was interviewed from a major hospital in Boston giving the usual report. His wards were overflowing with people suffering from influenza. You could tell that he was a real M.D., as he had the obligatory stethoscope wrapped around his neck.

The good news, he said, was that not one of these people had been immunized, indicating that the flu shot works. He also added that "when people get their shots, even if they get the flu, they don't get as sick as those who didn't." I thought this was interesting, in that I had treated two patients that day who had the flu, both having had both flu shots and advanced symptoms. One of them even asked me if it was a coincidence that he got the flu two days after his shot.

Historically, the flu has always provided a good living for a medical profession that has been ineffective in its treatment. In the early 1960s, there was an outbreak of the Hong Kong flu, followed in two years by the Asian flu. These epidemics both devastated communities and emptied schools and businesses. I was in school at the time, and remember the classrooms being up to two-thirds empty. Many classes had no instructors.

My brother and I contracted both of these, and each time missed a couple of days of school. The part I could never figure out was why I missed so little school while many of my classmates missed a couple of weeks. This was the way our illnesses always went. We never missed as much time from school as our classmates.

While I couldn't figure it out then, I realize now that it was chiropractic that made us healthier. At the time, I thought that I must have been getting different illnesses than the other kids. My later theory was that my parents were forcing us back to school to prepare us for a job rowing on a Roman slave galley.

During this outbreak my father would have to make house calls on patients, even making soup in some homes where the entire family was infected. Interestingly, his chiropractic patients recovered quickly (at least compared with medical patients).

When I was at Palmer in 1975, the Port Chalmers flu hit the area, causing several dozen deaths in the Quad City area alone (you'll notice that I keep track of all of my favorite outbreaks). I missed one day of school, but several of my neighbors missed two to three weeks of work. I began to realize that the main difference was the treatment they received -- drugs and hospitalization.

I would like to have avoided the flu altogether, but like most students, I was run down by my schedule. The main difference between chiropractic college and basic training is that recruits don't have to pay the drill instructor. The other difference is the college wisely doesn't issue rifles to the students.

Years of observation have taught me that basic chiropractic theory is true. I haven't seen anything handle influenza better than chiropractic. The shame is that many of our own institutions are trying to marginalize chiropractors into musculoskeletal treatment only.

Watching CNN, I saw patients being treated in hospitals and clinics with the same symptoms that my walk-in patients had. Through the miracle of TV, I saw doctors interviewed about the patients in their wards who were worsening on camera.

To be fair, many of these had contracted complications such as pneumonia, but my patients were not getting complications at the same rate. Television showed patients being wheeled into crowded wards with plastic tubes being jammed into orifices, destined to suffer en mass with other patients while infecting each other with influenza, pneumonia and creeping crud.

My patients were treated and went back to their homes and familiar surroundings, free of cross-infections and side effects, and treated conservatively with adjustments (my clinic is short of plastic tubes).

Not long ago, I watched a program about the Spanish Flu and the millions who had suffered and died. A representative from the CDC then informed us that science had not yet isolated the virus from that outbreak, but was trying to rectify that by sending teams of scientists into the Arctic to dig up bodies of victims that were frozen in the tundra for 80 years.

While it's a good thing to have these guys out of the country, the bad news is that they want to transport frozen cadavers back into the country for experimentation only seen in cheap horror flicks. The last movie I saw like this had zombies attacking New York City.

All of this reminds me of some old newspaper clippings sent to me years ago by a doctor from another state.

During the Spanish Flu epidemic at the end of World War I, people were dying faster than coffins could be made, with the exception of Davenport and the surrounding area (you have to remember that chiropractors were not plentiful at that time).

It was noticed that patients treated by B.J. Palmer and chiropractors in the area were doing better than most others in the area. The morbidity and mortality rates for chiropractic patients was better than for others and the public had started to notice.

During the next few years, this created momentum for one of the first state licensure laws in the nation. Chiropractic was legalized in Iowa largely because of its success against influenza. For many years, chiropractors in this state were referred to as "flu doctors." While this story has been largely forgotten in recent years, it's time to tell it again.

Chiropractic helps patients with a condition that to this day denies use of drugs and medications. Hospitalization and drug treatment has only created side effects and further contamination and suffering.

Recently, there was an announcement from a drug company about a new anti-flu drug and its effectiveness. Supposedly, if you take the drug immediately upon onset of symptoms, it lessens symptoms after four days in many cases. Most of my patients expect to see improvement sooner than that, and are usually better within a week.

The news media is impressed with the drug, however. The medical establishment has been claiming that many people taking it are back to work in a week or so (almost as fast as chiropractic patients) and people are lining up to take this drug (not to mention paying big bucks). Oh, yeah. The side effects are listed on the side of the box.

Let's face it, patients should be in chiropractic offices for the flu. Stuff all the "chiropractic's for back aches" junk you hear from some of these insurance types. Maybe we need a new slogan to get our message through.

Suggestion: "Guess That's Why They Call it the Flu" (sorry, Elton John).

How about: "Influenza -- Chiropractic Gets You Well."

Or, if you insure with NCMIC, you might not want to be so outspoken, perhaps something less objectionable:

"Chiropractic -- We Don't Screw You Up as Much as the Other Guys."