Science, Non-science and Nonsense

By Dr. SARATH GAMINI De SILVA

I congratulate Dr. Upul Wijayawardena for his honest opinion expressed in The Island of 5th March. The following is a further illustration of how the professionals are playing political games to further their own interests, with no concern for the health and well-being of the nation. Over the past few years, we have seen much untruths, hypocrisy and myths being propagated by professionals, misleading the ignorant public, creating social unrest, and even violence.

The campaign conducted blaming the fertilizer glyphosate as a cause of the epidemic of chronic kidney disease of unknown origin in the farming areas, mainly in the North Central province, was one burning issue then. There was no scientific evidence to prove this, despite the efforts of some professors in the medical faculty to find some. However, the importation of the fertilizer was banned mostly due to political expediency. One is not aware of any other country in the world doing so. When a visiting Sri Lankan expatriate doctor claiming to be a researcher in the field was asked, he could name only a small country still contemplating doing so. He was lost for words to answer probing questions on the matter. His research has since been discredited in the USA. How the ban adversely affected productivity in the agricultural sector in Sri Lanka has never been assessed or discussed. Fortunately, the ban has been revoked now, and glyphosate is used freely for tea and coconut cultivation.

How the issue of sterilization of women in Kurunegala without consent, propagated mainly by monks and medical men with no expertise in women’s health, is still fresh in our memory. It caused so much communal disharmony and even violence. The issue has now been conveniently forgotten with no punitive action taken against either the accused doctor, if he was guilty, or against the people who knowingly created all that mayhem, possibly for political gain.

The more recent episode of promoting scientifically unproven native medicine for Covid-19 caused much harm to the pandemic control programme. A quack was allowed to defraud the public, amassing much wealth. It was disappointing to see a professor of pharmacology in allopathic medicine as well as leading politicians including the Minister of Health, and the Speaker of Parliament openly advocating the questionable decoction. An earlier attempt to promote a similar decoction for use in state hospitals was thwarted by objections raised by a professional association. How the public was allowed to ignore the public health guidance to prevent the spread of the disease in attempts to obtain the medicine is deplorable. It was hilarious how even armed forces personnel in uniform were standing in the queue. The matter is now almost forgotten, after the Minister of Health herself fell seriously ill with the disease, despite having taken the offensive medicine, and the quack making it opting to get vaccinated!

As Dr. Wijayawardena has mentioned, having first given publicity and freely advertising the questionable ‘medicine’, now a committee composed of all the professors of medicine in the country, has been appointed to conduct a ‘trial’ to verify its effectiveness! It is known that the way proper trials as done for allopathic medicine may not be performed on native medicines. I do not intend elaborating on this further, except to say that it is a colossal waste of valuable time and money for the busy medical teachers. As usual the matter may be forgotten in the course of time.

The issue of compulsory cremation of deaths due to Covid continues to be a raging controversy. The Ministry appointed expert committee of nine virologists, as well as the Sri Lanka Medical Association and the College of Community Physicians declared nearly three months ago that there was no scientific evidence whatsoever to say that the disease could spread by contaminating the underground water table if bodies are buried. Yet the authorities thought it fit to rely, perhaps for political reasons, on a solitary report with an opposing view provided by a committee consisting mainly of Judicial Medical Officers and non- medical geologists, both categories with no expertise in the field of viral diseases. Eventually, the government had to bow down to international pressure from human rights advocates to do what should have been done months ago. How much heartburn and unrest was caused to the community need not be stressed here.

Several leading doctors registered to practice allopathic medicine keep advising people on public media about unproven health benefits of various traditional food products and health practices. Some of these food products like the varieties of rice promoted are quite expensive, compared to commonly used ones. The main claim made is that these foods gave immense strength to warriors (“yodhayas”) who won wars in the times of ancient kings! One can remember some doctors promoting papaya extracts as a cure for dengue fever. With their reputation as qualified doctors people tend to believe them. The risk is that the people following such advice often ignore life saving guidelines with disastrous consequences. There is no doubt about the unethical nature of this practice.

The Medical Council of Switzerland recently removed a doctor from the medical register for speaking in public against the well-proven recommendations to control the spread of Covid like face masking, social distancing, vaccination, etc. The doctor claimed that his right to freedom of speech should be respected. However, the Medical Council held the view that a doctor cannot mislead the public, and now that he is no longer a registered medical practitioner, he will have the freedom to say whatever he wishes. On a similar basis, a medical doctor should not be allowed to smoke tobacco in public, thereby falsely reassuring gullible people that tobacco is harmless. Thus the message is that a doctor has no freedom of speech to speak on matters dealing with health not conforming to established knowledge, principles and practice. This should apply to other professionals as well when they deal with their discipline. Unfortunately, we find politicians, even the few professionals among them, are the most undisciplined with no ethics or principles in practicing their craft!

Doctors are registered with the Sri Lanka Medical Council (SLMC) and are under obligation to strictly adhere to the long established ethical principles of the profession. When doctors speak on matters dealing with health, or for that matter on any issue based on science and common sense, people believe them due to the faith they have in their knowledge and wisdom. According to the Hippocratic Oath, doctors are supposed to practice the profession at all times with conscience, dignity, integrity, honesty and compassion. They are not supposed to consider among many other things, political affiliation in their dealings with the people. Beneficence and non maleficence (benefiting and not harming) to those under their care is a basic principle in the practice of medicine. We can only hope that the Sri Lanka Medical Council will emulate its Swiss counterpart in strictly disciplining the doctors registered with them.

Medicine and religion deal with physical and spiritual wellbeing of the people. Practitioners of both are guided by strict codes of ethics. Despite their various shortcomings and misdeeds being highlighted from time to time, the society still respects and believes what they say in view of the vital functions they perform. If they breach the codes of conduct much harm could be done to mankind. It is unfortunate that in several instances mentioned above, the doctors and Buddhist monks have joined together in causing havoc.

Nations are blessed when their leaders act with conscience doing good for the people. Lack of accountability is what seems to drive the politicians and their henchmen to mislead all. Sri Lanka is cursed by an entrenched system that seems to bring out the worst in men, leading to what appears to be collective suicide.