Dana Ullman, MPH

Anyone who has taken a painkiller certainly knows that there is a big difference between temporary relief and real healing. Even though a person who takes a painkiller may not consciously feel pain, it is widely understood that this relief does not necessarily mean that a "cure" or a "healing" has occurred.

And yet, it is surprising how many people think that various conventional drugs have performed some type of miracle just because they provided short-term relief of pain or discomfort. Little do many people know that when a drug "works", this may be the "bad news". It may be that the drug works by suppressing the disease, thereby creating a much more serious physical and/or mental disease.

Although antibiotics and select other drugs may be an exception to this general observation, getting rid of an infection will not influence the immune factors that led the person to be susceptible to infection in the first place; and in fact, antibiotics are known to disrupt one`s inner ecology, disturb assimilation of nutrients, and even tend to make the person more susceptible to new infection.

Painkillers, on the other hand, may provide great reduction in pain, but this may result in the person continuing to walk on that injured ankle and cause increased injury. The person with arthritis, as another example, may continually take one or more painkilling drugs that provide some relief, but these drugs also create their own tolerance, addiction, or pathology, usually leading to much more serious health problems.

Differentiating Real Healing from Suppression of Disease

[Wellness practitioners] assert that there is a big difference between real healing, palliation of symptoms, and suppression of disease, even though each of these results may initially seem to be the same.

What people don`t usually understand is that there may be a danger in the frequent or recurrent application of treatments that suppress symptoms. The concept of suppressing symptoms is well accepted and understood in psychology. It is commonly observed when a person suppresses his or her emotions, such actions tend to push the emotional turmoil deeper, leading the person to explode at some future time (often at people who are not directly related to the origin of the person`s problem).

While people may be familiar with the problems associated with the suppression of emotions, people are generally not familiar with the possibility that many conventional medical treatments can suppress their physical symptoms, driving the disease deeper into the person. And yet, suppression of disease is so commonplace in today`s medical treatment that it is virtually ignored.

Doctors and drug companies tend to minimize the real problems of suppressing the disease process by referring to the "side effects" of a drug. And yet, pharmacologists commonly note that the determining of a drug`s "effects" and its "side effects" are completely arbitrary. They are both the direct effect of the drug upon the human body.

Ironically, many conventional drugs are touted specifically for their ability to suppress symptoms or even suppress the body`s own immune system. Ultimately, pushing the disease deeper into the person is the result of using pharmacological agents that are explicitly prescribed for their ability to control or inhibit symptoms; these symptoms are the natural defensive functions of the body. Suppression of disease may provide the semblance of benefit (or at least short-term benefit), but it ultimately may make the person much sicker. Such suppression of the disease process may lead to increased chronic disease, immune dysfunction, and mental illness, all of which we are seeing together in epidemic proportions.

Resources:
Larry Malerba, DO. Green Medicine: Challenging the Assumptions of Conventional Health Care. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 2010.

Dennis Chernin, MD, MPH. The Complete Homeopathic Resource for Common Illnesses. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 2006.