Wikipedia & Medicine - Very Unreliable

Forget Wikipedia for your medical knowledge. Anything worthy of your knowledge the mafia will label quackery; Big-Pharma sends out its paid coolies to write stuff in their own favor. Here, for example, is the experience of Dr. Max Gerson's grandson, who posted on Wikipedia - for the benefit of people - and the result was, a document for the benefit of Big-Pharma:

August 9th,
2010 Orthomolecular.org
By: Andrew W. Saul, Ph.D.

There is nothing quite like a paper trail, and Wikipedia has one. Consequently, you can read for yourself all the material that has been added, and then deleted.

For example: Wikipedia’s page about Max Gerson, M.D., is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Gerson . The doctor is widely known for the nutritional cancer therapy that bears his name. Gerson’s principal biographer is his grandson, Howard Straus. Mr. Straus tells the Orthomolecular Medicine News Service of some interesting experiences he has had with Wikipedia bias:

“Some years ago, on seeing that the pages for Dr. Max Gerson and the Gerson Therapy were only stubs (short place-holders with little information on them), I took it upon myself to flesh out the pages. I thought Wikipedia was fairly neutral on balance, so I put in all the information that I could, and kept it factual with references, citations, and literature links.

“Within a month, the following had happened:

“The information was labeled as “biased” and “unreliable” because I am Dr. Gerson’s grandson and biographer. There appeared a big red flag at the top of the article labeling the articles neutrality “dubious.” The photograph I posted was removed. Provable, referenced facts, with dates and places, all suddenly became “claims,” even quotes from no less than Nobel Laureate Albert Schweitzer, M.D., who famously said: “I see in Dr. Max Gerson one of the most eminent geniuses in medical history.” Dr. Schweitzer and his wife were patients of Dr. Gerson, making this a first-hand account from a rather reliable source.

“All my links, references and citations were removed. They were replaced by links to the American Cancer Society and National Cancer Institute, which offer only criticism of the Gerson Therapy. Even quotations from published scientific papers were removed. Attempts to rectify these actions were immediately overwritten.

“It’s easy enough to show the progression of the pages, since Wikipedia displays former edits on request, dated and documented. One can verify this by clicking on the “History” tab at the top of the Max Gerson page, and looking at 2005 and before. My editing is archived at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/69.109.140.164 and also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Howard_Straus

“A second Wikipedia page, specific to the Gerson Therapy, has been completely removed. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gerson_therapy&redirect=no . To see something of what happened, you can click the “History” tab here as well.”

The OMNS adds just one other intriguing statement about Dr. Gerson’s work that is probably too “unreliable” to be seen on Wikipedia:

“I know of one patient who turned to Gerson Therapy having been told she was suffering from terminal cancer and would not survive another course of chemotherapy. Happily, seven years later, she is alive and well. So it is vital that, rather than dismissing such experiences, we should further investigate the beneficial nature of these treatments.” (H.R.H. Charles, Prince of Wales)

Max Gerson is not the only nutritionally-oriented physician whose work is slanted or censored at Wikipedia. Others include Matthias Rath, M.D., and Robert F. Cathcart III, M.D.


Matthias Rath, M.D.

Dr. Rath coauthored a number of papers with Linus Pauling. (1-8) They discussed high-dose vitamin therapy for cardiovascular disease. To see what is going on at Wikipedia concerning him: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Matthias_Rath

Paul Anthony Taylor, a supporter of Dr. Rath, comments: “Instead of providing free access to the sum of all human knowledge, as is its supposed aim, Wikipedia would appear to be just another way of supporting the scientific, political and social status quo. In a sense, however, the game is already up for Wikipedia. The official exams watchdog in the UK, Ofqual, recently stated that schoolchildren should avoid it as it is not “authoritative or accurate” and in some cases “may be completely untrue” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/6943325/Schoolchildren-told-to-avoid-Wikipedia.html Believe it or not, one of Wikipedia’s contributors is the CIA, and they are not just updating their own entries, either. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/08/16/2007049.htm When it comes to nutritional therapies, you won’t currently find much of it on Wikipedia.”


Robert F. Cathcart, M.D.

The Wikipedia page for this physician has been deleted. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Robert_Cathcart Why? Because Dr. Cathcart “does not meet notability criteria per WP:BIO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:BIO ” and “a quick google search shows up no reliable hits for this subject.”

Indeed? It appears that someone was not looking. Orthopedic surgeon Robert F. Cathcart III is the inventor of the Cathcart Elliptical Orthocentric Endoprosthesis, a replacement hip-ball joint still in widespread use today after 37 years. http://www.orthomed.com/pros.pdf Some physicians report it to be superior to other similar devices. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2661497 That alone qualifies him as notable, and invalidates the deletion of his page at Wikipedia. In addition, Linus Pauling personally singled out Dr. Cathcart for recognition for his nutritional knowledge as early as 1978. (9)

Possibly, just possibly, the real reason Dr. Cathcart is deleted from Wikipedia has much more to do with his outspoken advocacy of very high doses of vitamin C to treat viral illnesses. http://www.doctoryourself.com/cathcart_thirdface.html and either http://www.doctoryourself.com/titration.html or http://www.orthomed.com/titrate.htm

Here is all the deleted material on Dr. Cathcart: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Robert_Cathcart&action=history

Take a look and decide for yourself.

(Full article here: http://orthomolecular.org/resources/omns/v06n18.shtml)