My Malignant Melanoma

I have been asked the question who is "Brandon Bays", and surprise has been expressed that Caron Keating rejected conventional therapy, after someone on here recommended Mrs Bays book on the What Now boards.

Yes, Caron Keating was under the spell of a number of quacks, one of whom was Mrs Bays. Caron apparently beleived the slash/poison/burn extremist school of alternative medicince propaganda, which claims that conventional treatments such as surgery, chemo and radiotherapy are harmful, and cause cancer patients to die.

That this flies in the face of all medical evidence is explained away by paranoid conspiracy theories involving science and medicine being controlled by big business.

And what was the result of this? With more or less unlimited money to spend on alternative treatments, Ms. Keating managed to turn her small grade one breast cancer into multiple grade 3 metastases. Refusing a second mastectomy and chemo, she managed to die of a small, low risk cancer.

Alternative medicine propagandists are very fond of single cases, which they often claim contradict medical evidence from hundreds or thousands of cases. What do they make of this single case? Well, one of our resident altie apologists claimed that if only she had rejected slash/poison/ burn earlier she might still be alive. Source The person making the claim does not have the courage of their convictions, however, and takes every conventional option available. Very sensible, if a little dishonest.

But Ms. Keating was happy to let a naturopathic quack claim that he had diagnosed her cancer. Source. She was being "treated" by quacks from the very start. Naturopathy is the distillation of quackery. Source.

Mrs Bays was just another parasite on poor confused Caron. Her mother knew that she was being exploited by charlatans, but could not stop it. Source.

The Rose Shapiro book ("Suckers") I recommended has this to say about Mrs Bays:

"Brandon Bays says she is inspired by the work of Deepak Chopra, and there are certainly echoes of his pricing structures and recruitment techniques in her project. 'Journey Intensive' two-day seminars are held all over the world, for which she charges each of the reportedly five hundred or more attendees per event £245. After one of these 'you become a 'Journey Grad' which opens you to a wide range of benefits and support and qualifies you to attend the advanced Journey programs' such as the two-day Manifest Abundance Retreat, which costs £670."

Mrs Bays has claimed she cured herself of a tumour the size of a basketball in 6.5 weeks. Of course she offers not a scrap of evidence to back this ludicrous claim, which seemingly does not stop people from uncritically repeating it. We do however have at least one test case for her techniques: Ms Keating. Who died of a low grade 12mm tumour. Hmm.

Labels: Alternative, Brandon Bays, Caron Keating, Medicine, quack

You won't need to have cancer very long before it is suggested to you that a vegetarian or vegan diet will help to prevent recurrence, despite there not being a scrap of evidence to support such a claim.

There is limited evidence to support the idea that red meat is implicated in increased rates of bowel cancer, though cabbage family vegetables taken at the same time might protect you from the effect.

There is no evidence to support the idea that meat in general is implicated in cancer in general.

Not only is there no evidence to support the idea that meat might make cancer recur, any sort of dietary restriction not prescribed by a registered dietician is ill-advised for anyone receiving cancer treatment. Note that I said "Registered Dietician". Nutritionist, nutrician, and any other title is meaningless in this area. Even celebrity "nutritionists" like Gillian Mc Keith bought their qualifications on the internet.

When quack diets are pushed at the general public, we can mostly ignore it. But when seriously ill people are having their health endangered by poor diet advice, something needs to be said.

The real experts advise that cancer patients eat their normal diet, or the diet recommended by the Food Standards agency.Source. They do not recommend any sort of fad diet for the purposes of cancer prevention, or preventing cancer recurring.

The proponents of veganism usually go a step further than vegetarians. Veganism has no rational foundation, but is a sort or religion. It is an insufficient diet for a healthy person unless supplemented with vitamins, but vegans often make a number of unfounded claims for such a diet. There is no evidence to back any health claims made for a vegan diet. Veganism is also often linked to opposition to conventional medicine, and indeed any sort of rationality.

It is interesting to me that it is hardly ever pointed out that virtually nothing is linked to cancer more strongly than alcohol intake. Eighteen different cancers are linked to alcohol use, but none of those pushing fad diets ever seem to suggest moderating alcohol intake.