Of course there were exceptions and that shortfall didn’t apply to the Okinawans, Ikarians, Hunzas or other isolated groups. But nobody counted them and their ways, until starting around maybe the 80s. Interest in natural longevity gradually expanded over the years to become the “blue zones” concept, popularized by Daniel Buettner, a National Geographic Explorer and Fellow, and Emmy-Award winning journalist. A blue zone is a territory with an extraordinary high concentration of healthy old people, notably centenarians.

A healthy Ikarian (Blue Zones) Diet

Note that I said healthy: a large population of doddery dotards would mean nothing. Just some trick of the light perhaps! But if they live far longer than most AND keep their health faculties in good working order, that’s the start of a path to discovery, surely?

Up until the twenty first century the perception of aging was that it was inevitable. We had no control over it. Attitude of mind was irrelevant. Sooner or later you began to crumble and descend into a miserable dotage of frailty, cognitive impairment, aches and pains and severe limitation of movement.

Some years ago I wrote a piece titled Do You Want To Be An Old Crock Or A Classic Car? The difference between a rust-bucket old banger that has to be sent to the crushers and a decades-older beautiful smooth-running classic car is simple and obvious: the classic car has been properly looked after. We should treat our bodies in the same way and take care of them; otherwise you will become an old crock. The conclusion is still valid and the piece continues to change reader’s perceptions.

A lot of people I talked to at the time had a blunt-force thinking attitude of “I don’t care. I don’t want to grow old and suffer. I’d rather die.” This was very unfortunate because, like it or not, people were starting to live longer and longer, but not necessarily healthily. By the time you reach 80-some and are suffering from stooped posture, aches and pains, limitation of movement, difficulty remembering, incontinence and other indignities of old age, it’s too late to have a change of heart. You have ruined your prospects of a zestful old age and must pay the price.

[Of course it’s never too late to make wise and health-giving changes and derive at least some benefit]

The point is that people get what they expect to get. If you are sold into the story that old age is an infirmity, you can expect a fairly unpleasant ride through your dotage.

And don’t listen to dismissive doctors. Most of them go on with the same old line, “Aging is inevitable. There’s nothing you can do about it. You just have to put up with it.” It’s errant nonsense. Any doctor who utters those words is criminally bad, or just plain ignorant. You want to work with a doctor who offers detailed advice about diet and nutrition, staying active, keeping inflammation at an absolute minimum and, above all, setting the right positive mental attitude. “You are what you eat” is an old, old trope in medicine but there is also a twin phrase, equally valid: you are what you think you are!

Now we Boomers (and the up-and-coming Gen-X, Millennials and Gen-Z) are well served by a positive and fun-loving approach to life. It’s been my slogan for decades that we Boomers want to go on partying till our last day on earth. That brings up an important health definition: it is to distinguish between lifespan and so-called “healthspan.” Lifespan is how long we remain alive; healthspan means how many of those years are healthy, enjoyable and trouble-free.

Ideally we want the two measures to be very close. Get rid of the idea of your “final years”, meaning the difficult troubled times as you struggle to cope. If you wake up one morning, healthy and zestful, have a great day and then go to sleep, never to wake up, that’s a great ways for it all to end, you’ll agree.

That’s the benchmark to aim for. It’s the exit I preach!

Brain Health

Now, let’s separate out the issue of brain health and talk about that. We are not a brain, there is abundant evidence for that statement but it is completely ignored by the establishment. There are individuals walking around with next to no brain (less than 1%) and yet no-one can tell there is anything amiss; memory is excellent. One case known to me went to college, got a degree and began to practice accountancy.

But our brain is still important. It’s the main biological organ for connectivity with the outside world. So we should rightly look after it and be concerned for its effective functioning. Not surprisingly, brain health is now the number one concern for elders, ahead of cardiovascular health and cancer prevention (AARP 2025 Health Priorities Survey).

Yet decades of obsession with low-fat diets has done much damage. It’s a misguided obsession with the supposed harms of saturated fat, built on false science perpetrated by Ancel Keys in the 1970s (he was being paid by the sugar industry to distract attention from the damage cause by high sugar intake). He simply faked or distorted his findings by omitting countries with a high fat intake and good health and omitting countries with a low fat intake that were overall unhealthy.

Here are 2 graphs, the first that Ancel Keys published (which looks convincing) and the second is with all the countries he studied included, which shows virtually no connection between heart disease and fat intake:

It took nearly fifty years for the facts to emerge and there are still die-hards who won’t give up their pet hypothesis that fats are bad for us. Unfortunately, our brains are around 60% fat. So for decades we have been starving our brains and the result is an epidemic of dementias. Moreover heart disease, which was supposed to be being solved by Ancel Keys’ research, has continued to rise, relentlessly. So he was well wide of the truth – but that was his aim.

The story of cholesterol runs along similar tracks. Cholesterol has been demonized to the extent that people fear it as deadly and take complex drugs, with dangerous side effects, to combat it. The aim is to get your cholesterol levels as low as is possible. Yet our brains hold 20% of the total cholesterol in your body! Fighting against cholesterol is to deprive and damage your brain!

Science gets very muddled when big business dollars get into the mix and distort the truth. Ain’t that so!

To your health,

She always looked so vibrant and healthy, though I did read reports recently of her having to cancel or pull back on public performances, due to health issues.

When the C word was finally used, it became more understandable. Poor old Dolly had such faith in the medical profession (to the point of donating $1million to Moderna’s Fauci scam). But I doubt the doctors did her any good, for all her wealth.

Anyway, I don’t want to discuss Dolly’s health beyond that. Not relevant or none of our business!

But the issue was raised (by her) that the years of looking after her beloved husband Carl Thomas Dean, as a caregiver, took its toll. She admitted to rather letting her own health decline, though neglect, while looking after him. That’s something we can’t afford to do, at any age.

It made me think a good deal on one of my walks. It could be a maxim, that we MUST look after ourselves, well into old age, so we do not become a burden on our spouse or relatives. It’s not fair to take the view “I don’t care about preserving health.” It’s just passing the buck and means someone else will get all the dirty work that you are laying up.

And it doesn’t work to just say, “I’ll go into hospital or a home.” Unless you are VERY rich, that will soon burn through all your capital. Besides, your family may not want that for you and will sacrifice themselves to keep you outside the system and in their loving care.

No, it really comes down to a DUTY, that we must take care of ourselves as fully as possible, for as long as possible.

In a lively video titled “I ain’t dead yet!”, Dolly explained: “Back when my husband Carl was sick, that was a long time, and then he passed, I didn’t take care of myself, so I let a lot of things go that I should have been taking care of.”

Parton’s husband, Carl Dean, died in March 2025. While the couple never disclosed what disease he had, Parton shared that he was “ill for quite a while.”  We don’t know how she didn’t take care of herself, but her few words speak volumes given that she had been taking such extensive care of her husband.

When you care for someone else, it is all too easy to neglect to care for yourself.

63 Million in The USA Alone

There are 63 million caregivers in the USA, a nearly 50% increase since 2015.

Demographics: One in every four adults is a caregiver. Of these, 94% care for adults, and one in three is under age 50. Caregivers are increasingly diverse across race, income, and generation. 29% are sandwich generation caregivers, supporting both children and adults. 

Intensity and Complexity: Over 40% of caregivers now provide high-intensity care. Many perform complex medical tasks like administering injections or managing equipment, yet only 22% receive training. 

Health and Financial Strain: One in five caregivers report poor health; a quarter are taking on debt due to caregiving. Half report negative financial impact due to caregiving, and one in five cannot afford basic needs like food. 

Workplace Impact: Seven in ten family caregivers are employed, but many face disruptions and lack access to supportive benefits.

In fact only 11 million of the 63 million caregivers receive any compensation, through Medicaid, VA, or other state programs. These caregivers are more likely to be younger, lower-income, and from diverse backgrounds. 

Caregiving Comes With A Serious Health Risk

Some 23% of caregivers report that they find it difficult to pay attention to their own health while caring for another, according to a report from the National Alliance for Caregiving and the AARP. 

Carers often neglect routine health visits and screening, which might detect problems before they get started proper. Also, when people are spending much of their days dealing with hospitals or at doctor’s offices with those they care for, they just don’t want to spend any precious free time in a medical setting for themselves.

Moreover, when a caregiver takes their care partner to a doctor’s appointment, hospital or treatment, they are rarely asked how they, the caregiver, are doing, or if they need support.

There is a huge emotional toll, including anxiety, guilt and depression. On top of that there is a limitation of capacity to socialize or do things like attend shows, or literary meetings and gatherings.

Even those who do long-distance caregiving can experience burnout and self-neglect. The average family caregiver spends 27 hours a week on care and many put in 40 hours or more. There is an intensity that comes with caring for someone with a serious illness, which doesn’t leave much room for self-care.

Close to two-thirds of caregivers report emotional stress, and 45% report physical strain. There is the additional burden of loneliness, experienced by nearly a quarter of all caregivers who may be missing opportunities to socialize and connect outside their homes, away from the family members and friends they care for.

Love Becomes Captivity

One of the cruellest aspects of family caregiving is that love can quietly turn into captivity. The caregiver begins by helping someone they love, and months or years later discovers that almost every hour, decision and emotion revolves around somebody else’s needs.

Here’s are some strategies which will act as ways of giving the caregiver at least some of their life back.

1. Stop believing that love requires unlimited availability

This may be the most important one. A caregiver can love someone profoundly without being available every minute of every day. Yet guilt creates the feeling that going shopping, meeting a friend, taking an afternoon off—or simply closing the bedroom door and reading a book—is somehow abandonment.

It isn’t.

The caregiver needs protected periods in which they are off duty. Not “off duty unless something happens.” Properly off duty. Someone else takes responsibility, the phone can be ignored, and for two or three hours they become themselves again.

That psychological separation can be enormously restorative.

2. Build a team—even a tiny one

Caregiving becomes particularly destructive when one person becomes the indispensable person. Everything comes through them: medication, meals, appointments, washing, transport, emotional reassurance, emergencies.

Instead of vaguely telling relatives, “I could use some help,” give people ownership of specific jobs.

One person does Tuesday shopping. Someone else takes the patient to appointments. A neighbor sits with them Thursday afternoon. Another relative makes three freezer meals. Somebody else handles insurance paperwork.

People are often surprisingly willing to help but remarkably bad at inventing ways of doing so.

The caregiver should become the coordinator of care, not necessarily the provider of every piece of care.

3. Create one sacred piece of the day

Even where respite care is impossible, reclaim something small that belongs absolutely to the caregiver.

Perhaps 7:00–7:30 every morning is coffee in the garden. Perhaps there is an evening walk. An hour of painting. Music through headphones. Meditation. Gardening. A long bath. Twenty minutes sitting in sunlight doing absolutely nothing useful.

The activity matters less than the principle:

“This piece of my life still belongs to me.”

That is sovereignty in miniature—and sometimes miniature sovereignty is where recovery begins.

4. Put pleasure on the schedule

Caregivers become terribly efficient. Meals, medications, laundry, doctors, cleaning, appointments, prescriptions. Life turns into one enormous checklist.

Pleasure gets postponed until “things settle down.”

They may never settle down.

So pleasure has to become an appointment too. Lunch with a friend next Wednesday. A movie Saturday afternoon. A massage. A concert next month. Sunday breakfast somewhere beautiful.

There is something psychologically powerful about having a pleasurable event ahead of you. A caregiver needs things on the calendar that are not connected with illness.

5. Refuse unnecessary perfection

This is a huge thief of caregiver energy.

The house doesn’t have to be immaculate. Every meal doesn’t have to be freshly cooked. Every visitor doesn’t need entertaining. Every minor discomfort doesn’t require immediate intervention. And sometimes frozen lasagna is not evidence of moral collapse.

Ask repeatedly:

“Does this actually need doing?”

Then:

“Does it need doing by me?”

Those two questions can liberate hours.

Caregiving should operate on the principle of “good enough”, not domestic sainthood!

6. Protect the relationship from becoming purely clinical

This is especially important when caring for a spouse.

Gradually the relationship can become nurse and patient rather than husband and wife, partners, lovers, siblings or friends. Every conversation becomes: Did you take your tablets? Have you eaten? How is the pain? When did you last go to the bathroom?

Illness takes over the relationship.

Deliberately create moments in which illness is banned from the conversation. Watch an old comedy together. Look through photographs. Gossip outrageously. Play cards. Listen to music from when you were young. Talk about people you both knew.

Try occasionally to meet person to person rather than caregiver to patient.

Both people need that.

7. Maintain a life outside the illness

Caregiving shrinks one’s world. Friends disappear—not necessarily through indifference, but because invitations repeatedly get declined. Hobbies disappear. Travel disappears. Eventually the caregiver can lose contact with the person they were before the illness arrived.

Fight that contraction deliberately.

Keep friendships alive. Keep one hobby going. Keep learning something. Go somewhere new occasionally. Maintain conversations with people who don’t begin by asking, “How is he?” or “How is she?”

And when somebody asks the caregiver how they are, they should be allowed to answer truthfully.

The patient has an illness. The caregiver does not have to become part of the illness.

8. Give yourself permission to enjoy being alive

This may be the deepest one.

Caregivers sometimes experience a peculiar guilt when they enjoy themselves. How can I be laughing when she is suffering? How can I go out to dinner when he cannot? How can I possibly take a holiday?

But, honestly, the suffering of one person is not reduced by requiring another person to suffer alongside them.

In fact, quite the reverse. A caregiver who sleeps, laughs, socializes, exercises, sees daylight, experiences affection and occasionally has a thoroughly wonderful time comes back with more emotional resources to give.

Joy is not a betrayal of the person you care for. Joy is part of what keeps you capable of caring.

That might actually be the central thought of this piece. We speak endlessly about care for the patient, but perhaps we need to enlarge the concept. The caregiver is part of the care system too. If that person becomes exhausted, anxious, resentful, isolated and joyless, the entire system begins to fail.

The goal therefore isn’t merely to help caregivers “cope.”

It’s to make sure that, while looking after somebody else’s life, they don’t accidentally surrender their own.

God bless you, Dolly! You were a blazing light!

To Your Good Health,

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

Data Source:

AARP and National Alliance for Caregiving. Caregiving in the US 2025. Washington, DC: AARP. July 24, 2025. https://doi.org/10.26419/ppi.00373.001

Quite a lot really. It all depends on your model of consciousness. If it really is true that we are a non-material, aware entity, there are certain things that MUST be true, by definition.

For example non-material means no matter, energy, space or time (those are material characteristics). Take just a couple of points and think it through, with logic, not superstition or religious guff… No time means no beginning and no end. No end means you can’t go away. You’re here (or somewhere) FOREVER!

That means you can’t die or vanish. You cannot UN-be!

No space means (in effect) you are all-space. You fill up everything, to the very ends of the universe and beyond. That reminds me of a lovely witty remark I like to quote by English writer G K Chesteron: the Cosmos is just about the smallest hole into which you can cram a human mind. 

[Actually, to be very accurate, this is the actual quote: Chesterton, G. K. (1908). Orthodoxy. London: John Lane. Chapter II, “The Maniac.” “The earth is so very large, and the cosmos is so very small. The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in.”]

You should give yourself points; billions, trillions of points, just for being you. Your mind can reach out to the edges of the universe. Therefore your mind is as BIG as the universe! Forget all that hoo-ha about the meek inheriting the earth. Anyone with intellectual balls enough can inherit the entire Cosmos!

So what? Well, if we don’t go away or vanish at death, what happens? For the feeble reductionist scientists, it’s not a problem. Everything is matter (stuff), there is no life, no living essence. When the chemicals pack up, we’re done. All gone.

Of course they can’t prove that childish dogma, by the very nature of their position. It’s forever unprovable and as Sir Karl Popper would point out, it’s not a falsifiable position, therefore it is not science.

Sir Karl Popper. One of the 20th century’s most influential philosophers of science

But we can prove the opposite. There is life beyond death. The evidence is abundant. So how do the reductionists rationalize that? They don’t. They just claim all evidence is fake or a delusion. It MUST BE FAKE is their position, because there is no life essence, so proofs there is cannot exist.

As I said, very childish.

They should know better really, because science says that we must survive beyond death in some capacity of other. It’s advanced physics. Matter and energy (same thing) cannot be created or destroyed. We leave some impression behind; something of our energies survive; information won’t go away or unexist; there’s “essence of us” out there in reality; we leave a mark. Fact.

But I don’t want to trivialize this. Let the low-grade loonies get on with their denials. What REALLY happens when we die; I mean what happens to our consciousness? One minute we’re alive and maybe talking; next minute we’re down; gone. But are we really no more? 

The phenomenon of death is something that concerns only our physical form. We stop breathing; the heart quits; chemicals max out; and then the body doesn’t do much.

But even that is not simple, as so many cases of recovery of individuals pronounced deader than dead prove. It’s getting harder and harder for doctors to truly identify the moment of actual death. Flat lining (no more heart electrical signals) does not mean recovery isn’t possible. Not breathing or having no oxygen for even quite substantial periods is still recoverable.

People in a supposed “brain dead” coma can and do wake up and are normal!

I covered this topic in some detail last week, concentrating on just the physical facts.

https://alternative-doctor.com/safe-and-effective-you-gotta-be-kidding/

What Happens to The Me?

The real question posed by my title is what happens to the thinking, aware entity at the moment of death? With the body gone, it means that person will no longer be able to communicate to us. But does that mean he or she is no longer there?

If you were to die tomorrow, what would you likely experience?

These are big questions and you may prefer to ignore them: “We’ll never really know, so what’s the point of worrying?” It’s a position. Many hold it.

But reports and clues are littered around everywhere, telling us what to expect.

What it is not: there are writers with opinions, not based on any facts, but just quoting somebody else out there who spins stories. One of the daftest is that you will go into another world, just like this one and not even know you’ve died for a time. There will be paths and walls and windows and furniture that will all look familiar to you.

Emanuel Swedenborg, writing in the eighteenth century, described this daffy spiritual world in which people initially find themselves in familiar surroundings, living in houses and communities remarkably like those they left behind. It apparently never occurred to Swedenborg he was just hallucinating. His idea was just a dream.

Later Spiritualist writers, particularly Andrew Jackson Davis, expanded this into the idea of “Summerland,” where souls inhabit beautiful homes and landscapes that often resemble an idealized earthly existence.

But pause for a moment and think it through. If your favorite armchair appears in heaven, who made it? If a hundred-year-old oak dining table accompanies you, does the carpenter who crafted it arrive there too? What of the trees that became the timber? What about the bricks, wallpaper, carpets, teaspoons, motor cars and pianos? Do material objects possess immortal souls alongside their owners?

The concept quickly becomes philosophically awkward. It seems to require an endless duplication of the physical universe, with every manufactured object somehow translated into eternity. Yet if all these things are merely symbolic or thought-created, then they are no longer really the original objects at all, but expressions of consciousness.

Interestingly, even Swedenborg himself did not quite describe heaven as a warehouse of earthly possessions. Rather, he suggested that the houses and surroundings correspond to a person’s inner spiritual state and, in a sense, arise from consciousness itself rather than from transported matter. 

[https://swedenborg.com/emanuel-swedenborg/explore/spiritual-world/]

For me, that distinction is crucial. If consciousness survives death, it makes far more sense that any environment experienced there would be created by mind, not by hauling sofas and sideboards across the boundary between worlds!

For me this everything-as-it-was story is for wimps and pattycakes. We are better than that, surely?

Same Goes For Angels

In his book Heaven and Hell, Swedenborg says that he was allowed to experience the process of dying and being awakened in the spiritual world so that he could tell people on earth what it was like. He describes how angels sat beside him, unseen by most because angels are in the spiritual world. These angels stayed with him throughout the entire transition, surrounding him with loving thoughts.

I always laugh at portrayals of angels. Just think of the MASSIVE chest muscles it would take to flap those wings! (think turkey breast meat). Yes, it is laughable. All the angels I encountered or know of didn’t need wings, any more than they needed hands and feet.

Yes, there may be supernatural beings present at death, but are they essential? I don’t think so.

So Where Does That Leave Us?

I think the best clues to life after death come from NDE’s, or near death experiences. These are remarkably consistent among people who have drowned or had a heart attack and survived. You’ve probably read accounts: the tunnel, being drawn towards the light, radiant bliss when you get to whatever is there, loving beings waiting for you… Accounts are remarkably consistent and that carries some scientific clout.

If people are just hallucinating, how come these visions are so consistently similar? Millions of people all having the same hallucination? Nah, I don’t think so, though that’s what reductionist scientists try to fob us off with.

Anita Moorjani’s marvelous account of dying in her book Dying To Be Me talks of God in life-after-death being a state, rather than a person. That’s entirely consistent with my own experience and knowing, which I have described at length in my best-selling book New God New World.

I’ll revisit this theme from time to time, because a physician walks a line very close to death. It’s part of the job description that you have to help others step “over the line”. When the person has gone, I know I’ll likely never see them again, though family and friends sometimes get visited by specters at the moment of death.

But at least I know I’ve done a good job, when I help him or her make the transition wisely and lovingly.

Well, LOTS more to write and say about that. I hope this is “food for thought” and more than just a tasty spiritual snack!

To your health,

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

I’m not anti-vaccination, in principle, as you know. I’ve written a dozen times over the years that I’m glad to live in a world where there is a rabies vaccine, thanks to Louis Pasteur. It’s a horrible illness and the vaccine is about 99% effective, if given in time.

BUT THE RABIES VACCINE IS NOT WITHOUT RISKS! I have never claimed that. In fact it’s pretty unpleasant stuff. There are no recorded deaths from the modern vaccine, though it carries a high rate of mild, temporary reactions. Because rabies is virtually 100% fatal once symptoms appear, the benefits of the vaccine drastically outweigh the risks of any complication.

That’s safe AND effective. 

But take Hep A and B. The hepatitis A vaccine is recommended for “high-risk” children and adults, while the hepatitis B vaccine is recommended for all adults under 60 years. All infants in the USA are given Hep B on their first day of life. Yet in a recent study, published in JAMA, researchers estimated that only 40% of U.S. adults had immunity to hepatitis A and only 27% were immune to hepatitis B virus.

They described that as “suboptimal”. I would be tempted to use the word “crap”.

What about, say, measles? The measles vaccine, as you probably know, has been touted as one of the greatest advances in modern medicine that “saved” us all from a deadly fatal disease. Surely that is “safe and effective”? No, that’s nonsense. To begin with, measles had all but vanished as a problem by the same time that the vaccine was introduced. (see chart)

Before measles vaccine was ever invented, the deaths due to measles had dropped from all-time highs of 10,000s per year to 100 per year. Some of this we know had a lot to do with better hygiene, sanitation, electricity, transportation of food, refrigeration, labor laws, and nutrition.

But there is another factor, rarely mentioned, but which I consider likely crucial. Vitamin A dosing.

You will know that I personally choose vit A as the “antibiotic vitamin”, not D as some try to maintain. In the 40s and 50s kids in the Western world were widely dosed with cod-liver oil, which contains lots of vitamins A and D.

Did you know that high-dose vitamin A is the RECOMMENDED treatment for serious measles cases, listed on the CDC website?¹

Secondly, measles was never a scary threat in the way that scaremongers try to make it out today. In 1962 the disease was described by Alexander D. Langmuir, then Chief Epidemiologist at the U.S. Communicable Disease Center (the forerunner of today’s CDC), as being “a self-limiting infection of short duration, moderate severity, and low fatality…”²

Yet today, with all the fear mongering, you would think that measles is about to carry off all our young children!

Measles is, of course, a real disease, and while it can have serious complications, it is largely determined by an individual’s immune status. Before widespread vaccination campaigns, measles was a common childhood illness that conferred lifelong immunity. Now, due to waning vaccine-induced immunity, adults—who are at higher risk for complications—are increasingly affected by outbreaks.

It’s not working! But they disguise this by counting “don’t knows” as unvaxxed, where it’s a fact that over 85% of the population are technically vaxxed. They boast that.

Additionally, while the measles vaccine is heavily promoted as safe, a growing body of evidence reveals dozens of serious adverse events associated with the MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine. 

Some of you know I was probably the first MD in the world (1983) to point out that youngsters tended to develop autism disorders after receiving the MMR (I mean within days, not months or years. After you’ve seen a dozen cases in a month, all with the same story, you don’t need researchers and “investigators” (read shills) looking for clusters and “proving” there is no connection.

You KNOW it is a pattern.

The connection with autism remains controversial and is clouded by arguments as to whether mercury (thimerosal) is the problem, which it appears not to be.

But there are many other complications of this tricky-treacherous vaccine, which is thus neither safe nor effective.

These well-documented risks raise critical questions about the one-size-fits-all vaccination policy being enforced through mandates. The notion that every child must be vaccinated without consideration for individual risk factors ignores the reality that vaccines—like any medical intervention—carry risks that must be weighed against their benefits, not just weighed against loss of profits.

Take another one; good old flu!

There are, in fact, over 200 viruses (and even some bacteria) that cause influenza and influenza-like illness (ILI), all producing the same or similar symptoms (fever, headache, aches and pains, cough and runny noses). Without laboratory tests, doctors cannot tell real flu from ILI. Both last for days and only rarely lead to death or serious illness. At best, vaccines might be effective against only Influenza A and B, which represent only about 10% of all circulating viruses.

Unfortunately, flu shots are just about worthless. Oh sure, they can trot out reams of spun figures to show how crucial it is to get your annual jab. But does it really do any good? And is it really as safe as they claim; that even children and babies should get “harmless” flu shots?

I’ll start by addressing the second question first:

“… the swine-flu vaccination program was one of the CDC’s greatest blunders…In 1976 health officials launched a 100-million dollar program to immunize every American. But the expected epidemic never materialized, and the vaccine led to partial paralysis in 532 people. There were 32 deaths.”³

So much for the continuous chant that vaccines are “safe”. So what about “effective”? 

Based on U.S. surveillance network data from September 2025 to February 2026, estimated vaccine effectiveness (VE) rates against influenza A- and influenza B-related outpatient visits for adults ranged from 22% to 34%, which is absolutely dismal, and 30% to 41% for those ages 65 and older. That’s the group they claim that the vaccine is most needed for and does the most good! 30 – 40% effective? Nah. I don’t think so.

Among children and adolescents ages 6 months to 17 years, VE rates against outpatient visits ranged from 38% to 41%, hardly impressive. “These findings support CDC’s recommendation for annual influenza vaccination,” they concluded.⁴

No they absolutely do NOT! 22-30% protection? That’s not effective in my book.

Did you know that science says that it takes 71 people to be vaccinated against flu, to prevent even one case and 29 healthy adults need to be vaccinated to prevent one of them experiencing an ILI? No, I suppose not, since the medical industry doesn’t WANT you to know!

Add this… Last year.

In adults ages 65 and older, with standard-dose inactivated influenza vaccines, the effectiveness was just 16%. And that’s the age group they claim it does the most good!

Unfortunately, lying and deceit seem to be the normal business protocols in the pharmaceutical industry. You owe it to yourself and your loved ones to stay informed.

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Alternative Doctor

References:

1. https://www.cdc.gov/measles/media/pdfs/2026/05/measles-prevention-and-treatment-overview.pdf
2. Langmuir AD. Medical Importance of Measles. American Journal of Diseases of Children. 1962;103(3):224–226. doi:10.1001/archpedi.1962.02080020236005
3. U.S. News and World Report, Joseph Carey, October 14, 1985, p. 70, “How Medical Sleuths Track Killer Diseases.”
4. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/75/wr/mm7509a2.htm

A particularly telling case was published in 2009 because the victim happened to be wearing a continuous heart-rate monitor, giving the investigators unusually good timing data.

A healthy 48-year-old Norwegian man capsized while kayaking in 3.5°C seawater. He remained conscious for some time as he cooled. Eventually he became unconscious, submerged completely and went into cardiac arrest. His personal heart monitor enabled the physicians to reconstruct the sequence unusually accurately.

Their estimate was: about 31 minutes from cardiac arrest/head submersion until CPR began.

During that interval there was therefore no effective circulation and, to all practical purposes, no breathing or ventilation whatsoever. 

And it gets stranger. He then remained in cardiac arrest while being resuscitated for hours. Cardiopulmonary bypass was established 121 minutes after cardiac arrest, and sustained spontaneous circulation was not restored until 207 minutes — 3 hours 27 minutes — after arrest. 

Yet his neurological examination eventually showed no focal brain damage. Formal neuropsychological testing one year later showed cognitive function at or above population averages, and he returned to his work as an engineer and resumed kayaking.¹

They think that one case which follows their pattern “proves” their story. I say JUST ONE case the contradicts orthodox beliefs proves there is much to learn about the process of physical death.

Then there is an astonishing 83-minute case.

In 2015, Romlin and colleagues reported a 7-year-old girl submerged in icy seawater for an estimated at least 83 minutes.

When recovered she was in cardiac arrest, with ice actually present in her upper airway. Yikes! Her first documented nasopharyngeal temperature was only 13.8°C (normal is 37°C). She was rewarmed and made what the authors explicitly called an “excellent” and “exceptional” recovery, although treatment and rehabilitation were prolonged. 

This case is important because 83 minutes is a documented submersion duration, unable to breathe atmospheric air, not 83 minutes of CPR.

Here’s another…

In 1986, 2½-year-old Michelle Funk was completely submerged in an icy Utah stream for at least 66 minutes. When recovered she was without breath and pulseless. Her core temperature eventually measured about 19°C.

After prolonged CPR and extracorporeal rewarming she appeared to make an extraordinary neurological recovery. The original JAMA report described it as a “good neurologic recovery.”²

And Now The New World Record: At Least 147 Minutes!

This one is extraordinary and was only published in 2025.

An 8-year-old boy in Pennsylvania fell through pond ice and remained submerged for at least 147 minutes; the estimated range was approximately 147–177 minutes. His peripheral temperature on recovery was measured at an extraordinary 7°C (45°F). He had no heartbeat (asystolic). CPR was continued during transport and he was placed on VA-ECMO (an intensive, temporary life-support system that takes over the functions of both the heart and the lungs) and rewarmed. 

The authors explicitly describe this as the longest documented submersion survival in the medical literature.³

But — and this is a large BUT — he did not recover totally without adverse effects.

MRI showed early hypoxic-ischaemic changes. At six months he could stand unsupported, ride a tricycle, eat soft foods and obey simple commands, but he was still relearning basic tasks and recovering from neuromuscular weakness. The paper authors used the expression “meaningful neurological recovery”.

So we can say this: There is no precise instant at which cessation of breathing becomes death. Breathing can cease, circulation can cease and every ordinary outward sign of life can disappear, yet under exceptional conditions the process may still be reversible. Documented cases include apparently complete neurological recovery after more than half an hour without spontaneous respiration or circulation, and exceptional neurological recovery after more than 80 minutes of cold-water submersion. Human beings have survived documented submersion for at least 147 minutes, although the most extreme survivor sustained some neurological injury and had to re-learn basic tasks.

Medicine is incautious by pronouncing that circulation has “permanently” ceased or that the brain has “permanently” lost its capacity to function. It cannot point to cessation of breathing or even the first flat ECG and say, in every circumstance, “There. That was the moment the person ceased to exist.”

Indeed, these cases rather demolish that idea.

Many of these recovery cases have no “memory” of what took place while they were deeply unconscious. But some do.

The largest prospective study is the AWARE Study, led by Sam Parnia, with Peter Fenwick. Among more than 2,000 cardiac arrests, survivors reported a spectrum of experiences. About 9% described experiences meeting accepted criteria for a near-death experience, while about 2% reported explicit awareness of actual events occurring during resuscitation. One patient gave a verifiable account of events, meaning he was aware of what was happening around him, during a period when cerebral function would not normally have been expected to support conscious awareness.⁴

There are also numerous other published case reports.

One review from India described three patients surviving severe illness or trauma. All three reported classic features:

• an out-of-body experience,

• heightened awareness,

• vivid perception,

• and lasting psychological change after recovery. 

Interestingly, the authors noted that some details faded with time, suggesting that these memories may behave differently from ordinary autobiographical memories.⁵

From the medical literature over the past 40 years, certain features recur with surprising consistency:

• a sense of leaving the body,

• unusually clear or “more real than real” consciousness,

• encounters with deceased relatives or beings,

• overwhelming peace or unconditional love,

• panoramic life review,

• reluctance to return,

• profound and lasting changes in personality and values.

Whether these experiences arise entirely from brain physiology or represent consciousness continuing under extraordinary conditions remains an open question. The experiences themselves are well documented; the interpretation remains debated.

No matter: very often what happens is the person have a vivid and typically joyful experience which seems to liberate him or her. After “dying” and then coming back the individual seems develop a powerful sense of personal existence that cannot be shaken by mere death.

Some survivors begin preaching, others running courses, some write a book, on what it really means to be alive.

Meantime let me remind you of the words of that beautiful song “The Rose” (verse 2):

It’s the heart, afraid of breaking
That never learns to dance
It’s the dream, afraid of waking
That never takes the chance

It’s the one who won’t be taking
Who cannot seem to give
And the soul, afraid of dying
That never learns to live

We all get nearer the final exit, every day a step nearer. But it is nothing to fear. Remember, we cannot UN-be. That just can’t happen.

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Alternative Doctor

References:

1. Heart rate monitored hypothermia and drowning in a 48-year-old man. survival without sequelae: a case report. Cases J. 2009 Aug 18;2:6204. doi: 10.4076/1757-1626-2-6204
2. Bolte, Robert G.; Black, Philip G.; Bowers, Robert S.; Thorne, J. Kent; Corneli, Howard M. “The Use of Extracorporeal Rewarming in a Child Submerged for 66 Minutes.” JAMA. 1988;260(3):377–379. doi:10.1001/jama.1988.03410030093036
3. Bartoli, Carlo R.; Wong, Ronald; Mazandi, Vanessa M.; Fairman, Alexander S.; Maffei, Frank A. “Ice Water Drowning Survival After 147-Minute Submersion and 7 °C Hypothermic Circulatory Arrest.” JACC: Case Reports. 2025;30(25):104885. doi:10.1016/j.jaccas.2025.104885
4. Near death experiences, cognitive function and psychological outcomes of surviving cardiac arrest. Resuscitation. Volume 74, Issue 2, August 2007, Pages 215-221
5. Purkayastha M, Mukherjee KK. Three cases of near death experience: Is it physiology, physics or philosophy? Ann Neurosci. 2012 Jul;19(3):104-6. doi: 10.5214/ans.0972.7531.190303. PMID: 25205979; PMCID: PMC4117086

For this newsletter I’m side-stepping eliminating the bad (avoiding what I call “Bandit Foods”), which are inflammatory, and just looking at the positive qualities of a range of foods which help protect against cancer—or which will help fight it, if you have already been unlucky enough to contract cancer.

Don’t forget my “3 Pillars of Healing” in this context:

1. Good nutrition, including avoidance what your body doesn’t tolerate

2. Chemical clean up of your personal environment

3. Psychological detox (this is the one which is usually omitted, often with disastrous consequences)

As for cancer-beating foods, remember the FDA, CDC, ACS and AMA do not admit such a concept. But then, their management of cancer is a disaster in the extreme.

Instead, we can turn to Loma Linda University, in California, for direct information concerning which foods might keep you safe. 

Loma Linda University, if you don’t know, is a Seventh Day Adventists institution. These are the people who live exceptionally long and healthy lives, which they attribute to vegetarianism and alcohol avoidance. Great for some but certainly not for everyone.

Research shows certain plant foods contain powerful compounds — called phytochemicals — that can help fight cancer and reduce the risk of its development. These specific foods may hold a key to prevent the growth of cancer cells in the body, writes Andrew Woodward, an oncology nutritionist at Loma Linda University Cancer Center. 

[https://news.llu.edu/patient-care/7-foods-fight-cancer-heart-disease-and-enhance-health]

Thing is, it’s now well-known that inflammation has been shown to promote cancer cells to grow and spread. It so happens that foods are the worst and commonest sources of inflammation within the body, particularly manufactured foods, vitiated grains and processed seed oils.

But it gets tricky because few “experts” seem to know what I learned 40 years ago: every individual is different and everyone has their own inflammatory or “Bandit Foods.” You can’t generalize and say “these foods are good,” although you can say certain foods are “bad” but some good foods are bad for certain individuals. (my mother and sister, for example, get really sick if they accidentally eat anything from the lily family (onions, garlic, leeks, etc.)

But there is some common ground. Just don’t go supposing that one overall rule applies to everyone; for every “healthy” food you can name, I had dozens or scores of individuals who were made ill by it (Yes, even different spring waters)!

The Linda Loma University website focuses on certain food groups and calls them all functional, although I do not, for reasons just explained. But they are well worth including in your diet, if you fully tolerate them.

So much so that I have put a selection of these foods in my “Liquid Gold” reborn mix! (not that I am suggesting this is the same as eating a proper portion of each of the foods).

These are:

Berries — including acai, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, chokeberry, mangosteen, blackcurrant (packed with vitamin C), bilberries and lots of pomegranate. They taste sweet but technically are low in sugar (low glycemic index).

The darker berries (blueberry and blackberry, for example) contain blue-purple antioxidants called anthocyanins, that reduce inflammation and protect the brain from oxidation. These are king among antioxidants.

Berries also contain ellagic acid, which neutralizes carcinogens and has anti-tumor benefits. Blueberries contain pterostilbene — a powerful antioxidant and can reduce inflammation. 

Cruciferous vegetables — Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, bok choy, cabbage, cauliflower, collard greens and kale are all considered cruciferous vegetables. These vegetables contain indole-3 carbinol (I3C), which reduces hormone-sensitive cancers; sulforaphane, which deactivates carcinogens; and fiber, which is a humble cancer preventive. 

Garlic and onions — The National Cancer Institute suggests garlic and onions may reduce the risk of stomach, colon, esophageal and breast cancer. Garlic is famous, of course, for its measurable anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-inflammatory benefits, as well as cancer-fighting properties. Cancer prevention comes from many sulfur-containing substances, including allicin and diallyl sulfide (DAS), which appear to deactivate carcinogens and prevent DNA mutations. Onions offer many of the same benefits, providing quercetin and sulfur-containing molecules that block some carcinogens and induce apoptosis, a process that kills cancer-trending cells.

Hericium erinaceous (lion’s mane mushroom) is delicious, eaten raw!

Turmeric — Turmeric (active ingredient curcumin) is a golden-yellow colored seasoning used in many Indian dishes, curries and mustards. There have been more than 6,000 studies of Turmeric. Its anti-inflammatory, antibacterial and antioxidant properties help fight cancer. Curcumin appears to reduce tumor reproduction, reduce blood vessel formation, reduce invasion and induce tumor cell death.

It’s not very bioavailable but, hey, just eat LOTS of it!

Spinach and other green leafy vegetables — Spinach is a powerhouse of nutrients whether eating raw, juiced or lightly cooked. Spinach is loaded with: vitamin K, which promotes blood clotting; carotenoids, which supports eye health and antioxidants; fiber; folate, which aids DNA formation and repair; and other phytochemicals. Several studies suggest that phytochemicals glycoglycerolipids and carotenoids fight cancer; especially prostate, breast and stomach types. 

You’ll read “Google experts” whining about oxalates in spinach, as if that was going to kill you! Baby spinach has less oxalate, so the absorption of calcium and iron is greater. Spinach and arugula also contain plant nitrates that produce nitric oxide and nourish the endothelium (inner lining) of blood vessels.

Ginger and other seasonings — Certain compounds found in ginger make it a powerful anti-inflammatory and antioxidant food to reduce oxidative stress that your body has to fight on a daily basis. Ginger is also useful to calm the stomach and reduce nausea. Other seasonings such as basil, oregano, dill, cinnamon, clove and many others to flavor foods may well reduce inflammation. Using these in their dry form maintains their shelf life for about two years, while also preserving them in a concentrated form. Adding seasonings to recipes also reduces the need for excess salt, adding more antioxidants and add flavor.

Woodward also commends mushrooms, as I do. But there are none in my multi-formula. Mushrooms, in addition to adding flavor to foods, have an assortment of immune modulation substances called betaglucans. Other noteworthy benefits include antioxidants, reducing hormone-related tumors and reducing excess inflammation. These benefits can have the most impact when eating mushrooms that are fresh, cooked, powdered or dried.

Many other plant foods have cancer-fighting properties and health-enhancing benefits. “Add variety to a healthy diet with beets, carrots, chili peppers, citrus fruits, seaweed, tomatoes, etc,” Andrew Woodward says. “The more colors on your plate, the better.” I second that.

However, other factors are also important for cancer-prevention, such as exercising, avoiding toxin exposure, not smoking or consuming too much alcohol, sleeping well and controlling stress.

Talk with your healthcare provider if you have questions about cancer. 

For a simple nutrient-dense formula for health and longevity, take my Liquid Gold vitamin and minerals formula. It tastes delicious (fruity with jut a whiff of passion fruit (maracuja) and provides abundant quantities of key nutrients. I completely reworked it recently, from a white-label version to my own unique and brilliant—much needed—all in one!

One shot glass a day is all it takes to be safe from deficiencies (see why it is called Liquid Gold!)

Learn more here.

To Your Good Health,Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

What sense does it make to say you are happy and healthy if you live in a society where you could be imprisoned at any moment, on just a whim or the accusation of being, simply, different? Obviously that touched a raw nerve for the Russians.

But what has always lingered with me was the question of level 9: past lives and karma.

Whether one believes in reincarnation or not is almost beside the point. My purpose was never to persuade anyone of a particular doctrine but to encourage people to think more deeply about why illness occurs and what healing actually means. As healers, we are often so intent on removing disease that we rarely stop to ask whether there is a larger story unfolding in a person’s life.

This raises an uncomfortable question.

If suffering has meaning, and if a person’s life follows a path that includes lessons we cannot fully understand, is it right for doctors to always intervene? Could there ever be circumstances in which illness is not simply an enemy to be defeated but part of a journey that ultimately serves the individual?

Authors Ruediger Dahlke and Thorwald Dethlefsen think so. Together they wrote a marvelous book (1983) with what has to be the most intriguing title ever: The Healing Power of Disease.

Most doctors are understandably reluctant even to entertain such thoughts. We are trained to diagnose, to treat and, whenever possible, to cure. Yet anyone who has practised medicine for many years knows that healing and curing are not always the same thing. Patients sometimes die healed in spirit, while others survive physically but remain profoundly wounded. The longer one practises, the less tidy the relationship between disease and healing appears.

If karma exists, and if some people have accumulated an abundance of what we might call “good karma”, is it not allowable for them to share it with others less fortunate? I have always held that glorious, if slightly arrogant view, that I have abundant “good karma” and have been allowed to pass it on to others as a world-class healer and teacher. 

Then suddenly, perhaps due to the publication of my best-selling book New God New World, I have begun to frame the same question around a different aspect of Being: grace.

Could a person with abundant grace not share it with others around them?

The remarkable Russian saint Seraphim of Sarov believes so and expressed the idea beautifully:

“Acquire the Spirit of Peace, and thousands around you will be saved.”

Notice that he did not say, “Teach thousands.” He did not even say, “Heal thousands.” He spoke of becoming something, not merely doing something.

Perhaps this is the deepest form of healing.

Seraphim of Sarov (from OrthodoxWiki)

Modern psychology, interestingly, points in a similar direction. Researchers have demonstrated that emotions are contagious. Kindness encourages kindness. Hope spreads. Calmness influences those around us. One person’s inner state quietly shapes the emotional climate of an entire family, workplace, or community.

Science describes the phenomenon. Grace may explain its deepest source.

According to that sublime authoress Simone Weil (1909 – 1943), grace, “is the divine intervention that allows for spiritual uplift and liberation.

So am I on to something here? Let me point out that there is an important difference between grace and karma. Karma, in many traditions, concerns justice. We reap what we sow. Grace belongs to an entirely different realm. Grace is not earned. It is received. It is gift rather than reward, generosity rather than accounting.

But it can be shared, surely?

As I reflected on this, I realized that I had known people whose presence changed the atmosphere of a room before they had spoken a single word. We have all met individuals like this. They are not necessarily famous. They may never have written a book or held high office. Yet when they enter a room, people somehow relax. Conversations become kinder. Hope quietly returns. Nothing dramatic has happened, and yet something has undeniably changed.

The older I become, the more conscious I am that I have indeed been greatly blessed. Not because I imagine myself wiser than others, but because life has repeatedly granted me unexpected insights, extraordinary teachers, remarkable patients and learning experiences that have shaped the way I see the world. These have never felt like achievements to boast about. They have always felt like gifts to be grateful for.

Perhaps none of us possesses grace. Perhaps we simply become more or less open to it. Perhaps our task is not to manufacture blessing but to allow blessing to flow through us.

In the words of that wonderful writer Simone Weil, “Grace fills empty spaces, but it can only enter where there is a void to receive it.”

Simone Weil, author of Gravity and Grace (La Pesanteur et la Grâce)

As doctors we often focus, quite rightly, on acquiring knowledge and technical skill. We should. Lives depend upon it. But after decades of practice I have come to believe that patients receive far more than our nostrums, remedies and prescriptions. They experience our presence. They sense whether we are hurried or attentive, anxious or calm, judgmental or accepting. They notice whether we see a diagnosis or a fellow human being.

In that sense, every consultation becomes much more than an exchange of information. It becomes an encounter between two people, each bringing something invisible into the room.

Could that invisible quality itself be therapeutic?

This idea resonates with something I have gradually learned over the years. Presence is not a technique. It cannot be faked. It arises naturally when we ourselves have become more peaceful, more compassionate and more accepting. Patients recognize authenticity with astonishing accuracy.

Perhaps this explains why some healers accomplish far more than their technical abilities alone would predict. Their knowledge matters, of course, but it is accompanied by something less easily measured. Their very presence reassures. Their confidence steadies frightened minds. Their compassion eases suffering that no drug can reach.

Looking back, I wonder whether grace may indeed be an Eleventh Level of Healing?

If that is true, then the greatest calling of a healer is not merely to become more knowledgeable, although knowledge remains essential. It is not merely to become more skillful, although skill saves lives. It is to become the kind of person whose presence itself carries hope.

When patients leave our consulting rooms, they may remember very little of the technical explanation we gave them. They are much more likely to remember how we made them feel. Did they feel heard? Did they feel valued? Did they leave with a little more courage than they brought with them?

Perhaps that, too, is healing.

And perhaps grace, unlike almost everything else in this world, does not diminish when it is shared. Like the flame of a candle lighting another candle, nothing is lost. Instead, there is simply more light.

If so, then every encounter with another human being becomes an opportunity. Not necessarily to solve every problem or remove every pain, but to leave that person carrying a little more hope, a little more joy and a little more sense of their own worth than when they first arrived.

From C. S. Lewis: “Joy is the serious business of Heaven.”

From Pierre Teilhard de Chardin: “Joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.”

And from Mother Teresa: “Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier.”

For me, that is an inspiring thought. It also places a gentle responsibility upon all of us who seek to heal. Our greatest contribution may ultimately be not only what we know, but who we have become.

In the end, perhaps healing is not simply something we do. It is something we become. And if, by God’s grace, our own lives have become a little more peaceful, a little more joyful and a little more loving, then perhaps those who meet us may leave carrying something of that blessing with them. 

That, I believe, is healing by grace.

To your good health,Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

PS Level 10, if you are intrigued, is DEATH. That great humanitarian Bernie Siegel described death for suffering cancer patients as “a form of healing”.

A balance of ultra-processed foods? Refined flour? Added sugars? Artificial flavourings? Seed oils heated to destruction? Fruit and vegetables grown in mineral-depleted soils? Meals eaten in five hurried minutes while staring at a mobile phone? Aw, come on! 

If that’s balance, I’d rather be gloriously unbalanced.

Taking supplements they claim is a waste of time and only leads to “expensive pee”. Well my reply to that has been consistent over the decades: not nearly as expensive as getting sick without supplements! Besides, statins lead to very expensive pee (and no earthly good), anti-depressants lead to expensive pee and little else of good. Oh sure, antidepressants kill ALL emotion, including depression, but is that really what we want? It’s so much easier to get rid of inflammation in the body, which solves all but the most extreme cases of depression (such as that based on life disasters). 

The trouble is with doctors (some doctors) is that nutritional deficiency has to be really gross before they can see it. Beri-beri or Pellagra they can remember from text books. But the common degrees of malnutrition you see everywhere in the streets and homes of London, New York, Paris, or anywhere in the Western world escapes them. Apparently the person is not “unhealthy” until they just about drop dead.

That’s not what we should be pursuing. We want vibrant, toned, supple, healthy bodies that are a joy to occupy and sing our lives with. Good health isn’t “not malfunctioning” but is “the best we can get”… and for longer.

Even if the dopes don’t accept that 98% is healthy but that 88% is unhealthy, there’s another important angle on this that all who tend the sick must know. Cells cannot manufacture what they do not possess. Nature is wonderfully forgiving—but she refuses to perform miracles without building materials. And those materials are nutrients.

As I say constantly in my public lectures: you cannot heal anybody of anything if there is a deficiency of the basic nutritional buildings block. I’m sorry if this offends people, even alternative practitioners, but it’s all a waste of time doing Reiki, reflexology, Chi Gung, micro-current therapy (MCT), massage, homeopathy or anything else if the body hasn’t got the basic necessary materials for health!

I’m not talking about gross malnourishment—famine or starvation. That’s a problem for the Third World and unless you are working in that environment, the malnutrition you will meet is lack of enough of the basic health vitamins, key minerals, enzymes, co-factors and all the other stuff. 

Medicine has become remarkably good at diagnosing catastrophic deficiency. Mention beriberi, pellagra, rickets or scurvy and every medical student remembers the textbook photographs.

What medicine is far less comfortable discussing is suboptimal nutrition.

Millions of people are not starving; they are simply running on less than they need. They look reasonably well. They go to work. They pay their taxes. They raise families.

Yet they wake tired, suffer frequent infections, heal slowly, battle aching joints, lose concentration, experience poor sleep, low mood, thinning hair, brittle nails and endless “minor” complaints that are never quite serious enough to deserve attention.

The laboratory may say “normal.” The patient knows something is missing. Normal is not the same as optimal. That distinction has shaped my entire professional life.

What Do Veterinarians Know Thats Doctors Don’t?

The best people at nutrition, surprisingly, are the veterinary experts. They would not dream of letting an animal go to stud in the pathetic nutritionally compromised state of most humans. 

Veterinarians learned long ago that the right balance of nutrients is essential for vitality and longevity in anything from a cockatoo to a pedigree horse. Why is it that what is good for animals is unimportant for humans? It’s just another case of specialist isolation; knowledge from one field is ignored completely in another. 

If you think I’m overstating it, take a look at a can of pet food. Lynne McTaggart did some 20 years ago. She found that dog food contained the equivalent of 8000 IU of vitamin A, 464 mgm of vitamin E and 812 mgm of vitamin D (Source: What Doctors Don’t Tell You, Vol 13 no 9, Dec 2002). 

That’s way over the recommended daily allowance for humans (for adults, the dietary intake level for alpha-tocopherol is set at 13 mg/day for men and 11 mg/day for women. For children, far less). That’s according to the European Food Safety Authority, the “scientific arm of the European Union: What — dogs deserve better than voters? It doesn’t even make political sense, does it?

[https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/pub/4149]

In the USA, that’s just 15 mgm.

You’ll have to educate yourself about nutrition, there’s really no choice. Fight for your own health. Don’t expect any help from the medical profession or government advisors. Ignorance in doctors can kill you. For example vitamin A is known to protect against cancerous changes in cells (hundreds of studies support this), yet standard medical advice is now to severely limit the intake of vitamin A. Why? Because it can be toxic if you take it at idiot levels. Well aspirin at idiot levels will kill you for sure, but we don’t hear any calls for its removal.

A Rolls-Royce that Crawls?

Don’t think of health as merely the absence of disease. That is an extraordinarily low ambition. Imagine buying a magnificent grand piano and celebrating because only half the keys are broken. Imagine owning a Rolls-Royce that only reaches thirty miles an hour and declaring yourself delighted because technically it still drives.

We should expect far more from the human body. Our goal should be vibrant health. Energy that lasts all day. Not just energy is needed but clear, lively thinking. Strong muscles. Supple joints. Resilient immunity. Excellent sleep.

A body that feels like a joy to inhabit rather than a burden to drag through life. Otherwise you are not truly healthy!

And there is an answer. Take a good nutritional formula and… by good luck, I’ve got one! In fact it’s coming back on stream next week. It’s called Liquid Gold.

This is an awesome health and longevity formula. Let’s just say I did all the thinking and research. You just have to drink it: one ounce of a delicious beverage every day and you’re done!

You’ll be hearing more next week. Look out for the messages and grab some while you can (extra discounts for the re-launch).

Meantime, there are lots of books to advize you and thousands of websites to supply you through your letter box, even without the FDA’s consent! Live healthy, live long! It’s your right!

It starts with knowledge.

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

While folks today are congratulating themselves with their smart skills and up-to-dateness, I had been on it for years or sometimes, as in this case, for DECADES before the rest of the pack.

Influencers often portray themselves as very savvy and switched on… but then forget to mention earlier sources they’d copied from! I’ve lived with it for years and it no longer aggravates me; I’m just amused.

Take “earthing”, the idea of grounding your body electrically, to discharge static build up. You would suppose this idea was “discovered” by Clint Ober or the late Stephen Sinatra, according to your sources, but was actually published by me as long ago as 1988, in a little book called The Allergy Handbook (no longer  in print).

Me and friend, the late Stephen Sinatra MD

So what is it this time?

Well, let me start with a story in the press. It concerns a man in his late 50s, who was training to be a Catholic Deacon.¹

He was repeatedly found in a stupor, over quite a number of years. Coupled with this was unsteadiness. He would sometimes stumble and fall. It looked to onlookers as if he was drunk! In truth he drank a little and occasionally, but nowhere near enough to be inebriated.

What was happening?

On one occasion the wife came home to find her husband on the front steps in a stupor. 

On another night, when he returned from walking their dog, he seemed unsteady and in a “trancelike state,” the wife said. He told her he had fallen because his shoes were too big.

These zombielike spells became more frequent, coming on suddenly and usually in the evening. The wife began wondering if he was developing dementia; very unusual at his age but by no means unheard of. She saw a therapist to learn how to cope.

He went to his doctor, who attributed the problem to dehydration! Later, after he drove the wrong way down a local parkway, his wife insisted he seek additional medical care. A neurologist suspected seizures, but tests didn’t pinpoint a cause.

It was only after stumbling and hit his head on a coffee table that a trip to the emergency room started the process of real discovery.

At the ER, a blood test yielded a startling result: the patient’s ethanol level was 363 milligrams per deciliter, equivalent to a blood alcohol content of .363%, more than four times the legal limit for driving. But he hadn’t been drinking at all! Scheduled to have prostate-reduction surgery in a few days, in preparation, he hadn’t had even a drop of alcohol.

Of course the usual response in this situation is “Ah, a drinker in denial. We know you’ve been boozing. We have the scientific proof. It’s no use you lying!”

But he was telling the truth: this was a case of so-called auto-brewery syndrome or as I christened it decades ago, an “on-board brewery”. In this condition, Candida albicans (a kind of yeast), food yeasts or intestinal microbes break down food sugars and carbs to produce unusually high levels of ethanol in the gut, leaving people in a drunken state.

They essentially brew their own alcohol right in the gut.

I was once asked (around 1988, I seem to recall) to act as expert witness in defence of a man who had this condition quite obviously. I proved it by giving him a loading dose of sugar and taking repeat bloods. The man’s blood alcohol went up and up and up, while sitting in front of me and drinking nothing but water.

Unfortunately, the court wouldn’t listen and followed the police line: he was drunk while in charge of a vehicle, with an illegal blood alcohol level, obviously due to imbibition. His protests he had not been drinking were simply ignored because the charge was simply “illegal blood alcohol level”, without any emphasis on where it came from.

That was the state of the science then, and even now. It’s rare to encounter a doctor or health worker who know about this condition, much less understands the mechanism.

However, today we have a nonprofit, Auto-Brewery Syndrome Advocacy and Research. The Deacon and his wife were connected with Bernd Schnabl, a gastroenterologist at the University of California at San Diego, who was conducting a study of people with signs of this condition. He enrolled.

He met with Prasanna Wickremesinghe, a gastroenterologist at Richmond University Medical Center in New York City, who with colleagues published a case study in 2019 about auto-brewery syndrome.² 

To determine whether this was the problem, “Dr. Wick,” as patients call him, conducted a glucose challenge test, exactly as I had done nearly 40 years ago. Then, Wickremesinghe collected samples from the patient’s digestive tract and found a massive overgrowth of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, or “brewer’s yeast”.

Wickremesinghe prescribed Nystatin, an antifungal medication which I used routinely in my office at the time, and recommended a reduced intake of carbohydrates and alcohol. For several months, the episodes went away.

But the episodes kept recurring. “It’s like flipping a switch,” the patient said. “You’re perfectly normal one minute, and the next minute you’re toast.”

He was put on another antifungal, fluconazole (Diflucan). It seemed to help, but there were still periodic events. It was very worrying. Due to concerns, he was forced to take a leave from his deacon duties, fearing he would zone out while conducting a baptism or wedding. They bought a $1 million liability insurance policy in case his unpredictable behavior left someone injured. He tried acupuncture, coffee enemas and sessions in a sauna. He saw a naturopathic doctor, who prescribed a special probiotic pill for which the Andersons paid $1,500 a month. It didn’t stop the spells.

Fecal Transplant

In this procedure, microbes from the processed feces of screened healthy donors are consumed in oral capsules, which can restore a healthy microbial ecosystem in the recipient’s gut (needs FDA approval, case by case).

Elizabeth Hohmann, an infectious-disease specialist at Mass General Brigham medical center in Boston was contacted. Hohmann had administered hundreds of fecal transplants, mostly to patients with infections of bacteria known as Clostridioides difficile (C. diff). In research studies, she also gave them to people with obesity, liver disease and conditions requiring bone marrow transplants.

However, even she was skeptical of the Deacon’s case. But agreed to talk to Schnabl, the gastroenterologist in San Diego. She learned that when glucose was added to stool samples (out of the body) from this patient and other study participants in a lab bioreactor, ethanol levels in the samples shot up.

No arguing with that. So Hohmann instituted the treatment. It took some time but ultimately the result was a Wow!

I diagnosed Candida for this a lot in the 80s and 90s, because I was looking for it. I did also mention yeasts or Saccharomyces species in my writings of the time. But it has subsequently emerged that other bacteria, including Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae, are capable of fermentation reaction too.

The Deacon had taken at least 18 courses of ciprofloxacin and other antibiotics over the years, mostly for prostate inflammation. That’s the usual cause: messing with the patient’s homeostasis. The results aren’t always so horrible but doctors go on blithely prescribing these drugs, as if there were never any consequences. No follow-ups after a certain minimum time on complex antibiotics!

For this patient, the story ended well. But I know from bitter experience that for most unlucky individuals, they are trapped in a personal hell, because of doctors and “experts” who are too stuck in their ways to consider anything out of the ordinary!

Well, I told ‘em!

Prof.

References: 

1. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2026/07/11/years-hed-be-found-stupor-until-fall-led-surprising-diagnosis/
2. Malik F, Wickremesinghe P, Saverimuttu J. Case report and literature review of auto-brewery syndrome: probably an underdiagnosed medical condition. BMJ Open Gastroenterology. 2019;6(1):e000325. doi: 10.1136/bmjgast-2019-000325. PMID: 31423320. PMCID: PMC6688673

But in my unique position I know of lots of individuals who should have been OK (all the positive lifestyle factors in place) yet were not. It means there is still a lot to be learned.

Now, couple that with recent studies which purportedly showed that getting a shingles vaccination was partially protective against Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Do we care? What is it telling us? Are we impressed even?

Shingles you probably know is an extension of childhood chickenpox, caused by the varicella-zoster virus (aka. Herpes zoster). It becomes re-activated in later life as a burning, itchy sometimes painful, rash, which can usually be seen lying along the pathway of nerves. Not surprising, since the virus hangs out for years in the peripheral nerves.

One very painful outcome is a condition called post-herpetic neuralgia. Treatment for that has at times reached desperate measures, including repeatedly hitting the painful part with mallets when I was at med school! Personally, I always found that homeopathic Ranunculus did the job of clearing it very well.

Obviously then, because it’s unpleasant, shingles became a natural target for a vaccine. Eventually in 2017 we got Shingrix, from Glaxo-Smith-Kline. It is claimed to reduce the incidence of shingles in adults by over 90%.¹

So far, so good. Lots of profits for us and less pain and trouble for the patients!

Understand, these reductions are not massive (2-5% range) but it does indicate something is going on. But what?

Certainly the focus is on brain tissue. The varicella-zoster virus hangs out in the nervous system, as I said. Logically if there is a commotion of inflammation due to a latent virus, brain harm becomes a very real possibility. Blocking that virus from causing inflammation, as with a vaccine, makes sense.

Thus a study published June 16, 2026 in the Annals of Internal Medicine indicates 1 in 17 dementia cases could possibly be prevented by shingles vaccination. Patients in nursing facilities who had received at least one dose of the shingles vaccine within a year of admission had a 5.8% lower risk of developing dementia over the next four years, according to health records of more than 509,000 people, ages 66 and older, who had been admitted to U.S. nursing facilities from 2017 through 2022.²

A study of more than 282,000 older adults in Wales, published in Nature in 2025, found shingles vaccination was associated with a 3.5% reduction in dementia risk.³

Other studies have yielded comparable results. 

In reverse, a study published last year in the Journal of Prevention of Alzheimer’s Disease found that older adults in Italy, hospitalized with severe shingles, had a 13% higher risk of dementia compared to the general population!

Any Old Vaccine?

But here’s the thing. It doesn’t need to be a Herpes zoster vaccine. A startling recent study showed that having the BCG (anti-TB) vaccine also gave some protection against dementia!

It is known that BCG (and probably other vaccines) bolster what is known as “innate” immunity, that is the body’s anti-infection protection measures that do not depend on an antibody response. This very important mechanism is, of course, ignored by Big Pharma and vaccine manufacturers. It doesn’t fit their profit model.

They apply for approval based on tests which show that their vaccine induces antibodies. They don’t have to show it protects against any disease, as indeed is the case with measles, only that it produces antibodies. It’s a joke really. We can’t say how much good antibodies do but we can say YOU DON’T NEED THEM! Individuals with a condition called agammaglobulinemia, who are essentially void of B cells and so cannot produce any antibodies, nevertheless acquire normal antigen-specific memory T-cell responses, proving  that antibodies are not the sole basis of long-term immune memory.⁴

This demonstrates conclusively to me that innate or cellular immunity is far more powerful than “acquired” or antibody-based immunity. Yet doctors continually play down innate immunity.

BCG is known to induce “trained immunity,” a form of long-lasting reprogramming of innate immune responses of the non-antibody type. That’s slightly different from the memory of acquired immunity, as I say.

A pilot study provided evidence that BCG vaccination can alter immune activity not only in the blood, but also in immune cells found in the cerebrospinal fluid, the fluid which surrounds and bathes the brain and spinal cord.

“This study was not designed to show that BCG prevents or treats Alzheimer’s disease,” the lead author pointed out. “It was small, open-label, and designed to look at safety and biological mechanisms. But it gives us a biologically grounded rationale for testing whether immune training with BCG could be useful as an early prevention strategy for Alzheimer’s disease.”⁵

Beyond Plaques and Tau Proteins

The media—and you would think 90% of the medical profession—appear to be fixated on amyloid plaque and tau proteins as the “cause” of Alzheimer’s, which is nonsense.

In fact the abnormalities are likely the body’s own fight-back response and are therefore a good thing.

Alzheimer’s research suggests that the disease is really about immune aging, impaired clearance mechanisms, and chronic neuroinflammatory dysfunction. The role vaccines play in these processes is unclear, but a growing body of literature supports protective associations between vaccines targeting pathogens like influenza, pneumonia, or herpes zoster (shingles) and Alzheimer’s risk.

Yes, to cap it all, it is now emerging that the flu vaccine may give some protection against AD. One wonders where this is going to end!

In one particular study, they chose 65+ years individuals from 2009 to 2019 with a median follow up of 46 months. There were 935,887 matched pairs; 47,889 in the vaccinated group and 79,630 in the unvaccinated group. 5.1% of the vaccinated group developed AD and 8.5% in the unvaccinated group, showing a clear benefit for flu vaccination.

You could argue that was a 40% reduction of risk, which drug companies usually do. But really it is only a reduction of 3.4% overall.

It means we’d have to vaccinate 29 people to save one patient. Not so impressive.

But I’m bringing all this up about vaccines for a reason. A few years ago I raised the question: Is dementia something you “catch”; like a viral illness maybe? 

In 2016 I wrote about a series of fascinating studies highly suggestive of the fact that Herpes simplex #1 (HSV1) virus might be a contagious cause of AD. The work was done by Ruth Itzhaki, professor emeritus of molecular neurobiology at Britain’s University of Manchester (where I qualified in medicine!), and her figures were pretty persuasive. 

In March 2016, Itzhaki and a world-wide group of researchers published an editorial in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, asking the scientific community to consider a proposed link between Alzheimer’s and certain microbes, notably herpes simplex virus Type 1 (HSV-1), Chlamydia pneumoniae and spirochetes.⁶

Big Pharma wanted the research stifled because it was contrary to their amyloid plaque reduction drugs approach and resultant enormous profits.

Prof. Ruth Itzhaki made it to the prestigious Status List of leaders for 2025. I’ve been championing her work for over a decade. 

So although Itzhaki and her lab published their first paper in 1991 finding a clear HSV-1 link to Alzheimer’s and there have been over 100 published studies since then, from her lab and elsewhere, the research has gone nowhere.

Out of the $589 million allocated to Alzheimer’s research by the National Institutes of Health in 2015, exactly zero appeared to be spent on studying the proposed HSV-1 connection.

So they can go on saying “there’s no scientific proof” because there isn’t any; they are making sure of that.

Nearly all of us carry the Herpes simplex virus 1 or HSV-1 (the one that causes cold sores), our peripheral nervous system serves as its dormant nesting ground. From there, HSV-1 can reactivate and occasionally cause mild flare-ups of disease, typically when our immune system is overwhelmed due to stress or other infections. Itzhaki’s lab, however, found that by the time we reach our golden years, the virus often migrates to the brain, where it remains capable of resurrecting itself and wreaking a new sort of havoc when opportunity presents, such as when our immune system wavers in old age.

Itzhaki’s team has discovered the presence of HSV-1 in the telltale amyloid plaques used to diagnose Alzheimer’s, so I think she’s onto something here. 

It’s probably not a case of a straightforward viral presenting symptom but rather that viral and/or bacterial infections are just one ingredient in a soup of risk factors. But for Alzheimer’s, HSV-1 could be especially significant. Itzhaki has found that elderly people who carried both HSV-1 in the brain and the e-4 subtype of the APOE gene (responsible for creating a protein that helps transport cholesterol throughout the body) were 12 times more likely to develop Alzheimer’s than people without either. 

In a 1997 paper in The Lancet, Itzhaki’s group concluded that HSV-1 infection, in conjunction with APOE-e4, could account for about 60 percent of the Alzheimer’s cases they studied. Due to limited funds, however, her group was able to study only a relatively low number of cases.⁷

“If more funding had been available, more information would probably have been obtained, providing even more supportive data,” she says.

So, circling back to the vaccine benefit issue, I ask: is it possible that the vaccine brings on a more general immune response which leads to a reduction or slowing inflammation caused by other viruses, such as HSV-1?

In the case of the shingles vaccine, and if Itzhaki is right, then would it not make sense that giving an anti-Herpes shot could maybe calm or hold back inflammation due to a latent colony of the same family? And that vaccines aimed at other organisms, if they were effective via the cellular memory mechanism, could also, logically, bring about a certain degree of relief!

I think so. I hope so because, for all their clumsiness and stupid man-made additional dangers, vaccines essentially play to nature’s own skills!

Stay sharp!

Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby
The Official Alternative Doctor

References:

1. https://www.cdc.gov/shingles/vaccines/index.html
2. dos Reis S, et al “Reduced risk of dementia with recombinant zoster vaccine in US adults age 65 or older” Alzheimer’s Dement 2026; DOI: 10.1002/alz.71407. Please note this study was financed by GSK and had their people in key positions in the study.
3. Nature 641, 438–446 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-08800-x
4. Plebani A, et al. (1997). T cell activity and cytokine production in X-linked agammaglobulinemia. Clinical and Experimental Immunology. 109(2): 234–238
5. Weinberg MS, et al. “Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) immunotherapy reprograms CNS immunity and alters Alzheimer’s biomarkers: results from two open-label clinical trials” Commun Med 2026; DOI: 10.1038/s43856-026-01691-7
6. Microbes and Alzheimer’s Disease. Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, 51(4), 979–984. https://doi.org/10.3233/JAD-160152
7. The Lancet, 349(9047), 241–244. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(96)10149-5