Vaccines: What does giving 'Informed Consent' entail?

In medicine, it appears to be generally agreed that 'Informed Consent' is important before any patient gives consent for medical treatment. However, it is clearly not universally agreed as during the last few years, during the Covid-19 Pandemic, the Conventional Medical Establishment has been party to, and supportive of, enforced or mandatory vaccination. And pharmaceutical medicine has a reputation for providing patients with "the good news" whilst remaining silent about "the bad news".

So what does giving 'Informed Consent' actually mean? Simply it is that every patient should be fully aware of both the benefits, and the risks of the proposed treatment. When pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines are involved, the expected/potential benefits are always made clear. However, the risks are not; usually most conventional medical treatment is routinely described as "safe and effective".

What follows was originally posted on X by Jessica Rojas: https://twitter.com/catsscareme2021: and it is reposted here with her permission (she merely requests that you consider following her on her X (or Twitter) account. It focuses on America (although the situation is similar here in Britain and elsewhere), and focuses on the USA vaccine schedule (although similar questions can be asked regarding most conventional medical treatments).

Read it carefully - and note the complexity of the information you need before you can truly give your 'informed consent' to treatment. It is information that is not usually provided to patients prior to treatment.

   "If you are a parent who follows the CDCs VACCINE schedule, here are some facts you need to know and understand to make an informed decision.

1. I understand that the pharmaceutical company who made this vaccine has NO liability.

2. I understand that I pay a $0.75 Federal Excise Tax per vaccine, used to pay vaccine injured families through the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (NVICP) created by the government.

3. I understand that this vaccine contains neurotoxins such as aluminum that far exceeds “safe levels” deemed by the EPA.

4. I understand that this vaccine contains carcinogenic ingredients.

5. I understand that this vaccine was made from aborted fetal cell lines, animal and bug cells.

6. I understand that getting this vaccine does not ensure that I will be protected from the disease.

7. I understand that my child could get the very illness they was vaccinated for.

8. I understand that my child could be a carrier of the illnesses/he was vaccinated for and spread it (“shedding”) for up to six weeks.

9. I understand that my doctor may get monetarily rewarded for having a high percentage of his/her patients who are fully vaccinated.

10. I understand that if my child is injured by a vaccine, my doctor would have to spend an exorbitant amount of hours filling out paper work in order to report it to VAERS (the only way to officially report a vaccine injury).

11. I understand that my doctor has no incentive to fill out paperwork for a vaccine injury.

12. I understand that vaccine injury is under-reported.

13. I understand that vaccine mandates (like SB277) literally hand over new customers to pharmaceutical companies.

14. I understand that pharmaceutical companies have no incentive to make their product better.

15. I understand that pharmaceutical companies spend up to 4x more on advertising than they do on research.

16. I understand that corporate media gets 70% of their advertising revenue from pharmaceutical companies.

17. I understand that corporate media does not want to lose revenue, certainly not 70% of it.

18. I understand that when pharmaceutical companies conduct a study (on their own product) it is in their best interest to have a favorable outcome.

19. I understand that this vaccine schedule has never been tested on children collectively and ACIP assumes it's safe as long as different limbs are used for injection.

20. I understand that this vaccine could cause injury or death, and my child could be one of them.

21. My doctor has informed me on all the risks and side effects and has reviewed the vaccine insert with me.

22. I understand that if my child dies from this vaccine I will be awarded no more than $250,000 and most cases are never heard.

23. I understand that not one vaccine has gone through a saline placebo, double-blind study.

24. I am making an informed choice to vaccinate my child.

So if you have all this information prior to agreeing too, and receiving any medical treatment, you will be able to make a fully informed choice. Otherwise, think again! Good luck!

 

Informed Consent to Pharmaceutical Medical Treatment. What information do patients' require?

Informed consent is important in medicine. It is especially important in Conventional (Pharmaceutical) medicine which has a long history of causing patient harm. (Click here for a list of withdrawn and banned medical drugs prescribed by doctors, especially over the last 70 years). Conventional medicine has always emphasised the importance of informed consent. For example, the UK's National Health Service (NHS) states that: 

            "For consent to be valid, it must be voluntary and informed, and the person consenting must have the capacity to make the decision. The meaning of these terms are:
    * voluntary – the decision to either consent or not to consent to treatment must be made by the person, and must not be influenced by pressure from medical staff, friends or family;
    * informed – the person must be given all of the information about what the treatment involves, including the benefits and risks, whether there are reasonable alternative treatments, and what will happen if treatment does not go ahead;
    * capacity – the person must be capable of giving consent, which means they understand the information given to them and can use it to make an informed decision.”

Yet conventional medicine has a poor record in assuring that the patients have given their "voluntary informed consent" when it comes to the prescription of pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines. Conventional medicine is adept at informing us of the 'benefits' of drugs/vaccines; but they have been less ready to admit to the serious adverse reactions they can cause.

Indeed, in many during the recent Covid-19 pandemic it was clear that conventional medicine was prepared to mandate (force) patients to be vaccinated, without their consent, with vaccines that were (are) by its own admission 'experimental'. Even by the rather 'carefree' standards of pharmaceutical drug testing, were not fully or properly tested.

In December 2023 the USA drug regulator, the FDA, appears to have ditched the concept of voluntary informed consent entirely when it issued a 'final rule' providing an exception from the requirement to obtain informed consent when a clinical investigation poses no more than minimal risk to the human subject, and includes appropriate safeguards to protect the rights, safety and welfare of human subjects. This is, perhaps, thin edge of a very hefty wedge? Or perhaps, for a fundamentally dishonest industry, it is now trying to find reasons to ignore this principle altogether. Remember, at the time conventional medicine told us that Thalidomide, Vioxx, Avandia, Acomplia, Opioid painkillers, Sodium Valproate, and many others, came with "appropriate safeguards to protect the rights, safety and welfare of human subjects"! And they killed patients!

Conventional medicine has always been highly secretive about its treatments. Electro-Convulsive Treatment continues to be used on mental health patients (perhaps less now than before) quite regardless of the lack of evidence for its efficacy. But it is the prescription of pharmaceutical drugs/vaccines, and their adverse effects on patients, that most secrecy exists. Remember, "the person must be given all of the information about what the treatment involves, including the benefits and risks, whether there are reasonable alternative treatments, and what will happen if treatment does not go ahead" (my emphasis). The reverse is usually true.

• Often the patient will not be told about 'side effects' at all.
• Or they are told only of minor 'side effects'.
• Or the serious 'side effects' are minimised, discounted, described as "uncommon" or "rare".
• Or, when the patient suffers a side effect, the doctor assures the patient the drug was not the cause.
• Or a patient suffers serious harm, and conventional medicine completely denies any link.

I wrote about informed consent in May 2012. This blog was in response to a report that described, in some detail, the problem of medical paternalism (I am a medical professional - I know best - you should/must take this drug - it is "safe and effective" - and I don't expect to be questioned). The report said that:

            "Doctors are deliberately withholding information about the dangers of some routine screening and clinical procedures - often because they fear patients would then refuse treatment".

In other words, doctors were refusing to give patients information which might help them make an "informed choice", that is, a choice different to the decision of the doctor! The report suggested that patients should ask the following questions before agreeing to take any prescription drugs:

1. How long has the drug been on the market (if less than 2 years ask for an 'older generation' drug)?
2. Can you confirm I am not taking part in a drug trial?
3. Is the drug suitable for my age/gender/condition?
4. Are you using this drug 'off-label' or for the condition for which it was originally licensed?
5. Are there any special warning or 'black-box' alerts for this drug?
6. Can you explain to me the known side-effects and the likelihood of me suffering them?
7. Has the drug been tested among people similar to my own age/gender?
8. Do you know if the drug has been banned from use in other countries? (Note, many drugs which are banned in one country are still sold and prescribed in others).
9. Have you given this drug to other patients? If so, have they reported any adverse reactions?
10. Is the dose you are recommending within the guidelines of the manufacturer for my age/ gender/ condition?
11. Do you know if the new drug will react with other drugs I am currently taking?
12. If I start to suffer from health problems when I take the drug, I shall stop immediately, and come to see you again. Do you agree this is the best course of action?

However, the report went on to question whether the average doctor would be able to answer many of these questions. In other words, it questions how well informed doctors are about the drugs they prescribe, and how reliant they are on inadequate, and partial information from the pharmaceutical industry, and the medical 'science' that it controls.

And then there is the question about whether medical staff are allowed to provide patients with 'negative' information about conventional medical treatment. The Telegraph has recently published a series of articles entitled "The four-step 'playbook' the NHS uses to break whistleblowers" which discuses how  doctors, who raise patient safety concerns, are confronted with systemic bullying and harassment from their managers and colleagues. 

This raises the important question - can doctors who wish to tell patients the whole truth about medical treatment actually allowed to do so?

The Telegraph articles outline how NHS whistleblowers have had their careers ruined whilc trying to raise concern about patient safety. It outlines how over 50 doctors and nurses have raised concerns about patient death, and poor patient care, and how rather than dealing with the problems raised NHS executives seek to undermine them using 4 specific tactics.

1. Investigating the whistleblowers rather than investigating the issues raised.
2. Bullying and Intimidatory tactics against the whistleblowers.
3. Weaponising General Medical Council referrals to silence whistleblowers.
4. Demotion, Disciplinary Action, and Dismissal.
   

Few medical professionals would want to g through this type of persecution? So the assumption must be that most do not go public with the information? So the information that the NHS does not want patient to hear about does not reach the public. And the patient has to make his/her "voluntary informed choice" without this important information.

Does this sound like an open, honest, transparent medical system to you?

Are you undertaking conventional medical treatment, or taking pharmaceutical drugs or vaccines?

Are you being denied information that would help you make an informed choice?

Even patients who were determined to obtain information about the treatment recommended to them. This link describes one woman's battle for medical information. The response she received to her questions show how careful patients must be to protect themselves from pharmaceutical harm; and the extent to which conventional medical authorities will go to ignore, discount and deny important information required by patients who seek to know the full picture about proposed medical treatment.

So 'voluntary informed consent' is not an easy, perhaps closer to impossible for the sceptical patients to elicit - which is perhaps why so many patients are seriously harmed by drugs which were given to make them well. The patient instead suffers serious iatrogenic harm which is then denied or discounted. 

No government, no mainstream news media, will assist you, as they invariably appear to follow the pharmaceutical line. An internet search might provide important information that doctors will otherwise keep secret. But even this is often difficult to find for ordinary, non-medical people to find.

One piece of advice I received when learning to drive a car, many years ago, was to assume that everyone else on the road was an idiot. It was good advice! It has kept me safe.

Similarly, I would advice any patient to assume that any doctor, if not an idiot, will not be prepared, or will not able, or willing, to tell the truth about the medical treatment you are being offered. So scepticism might just help keep you safe from iatrogenic harm!

Post Script

If you agree that informed choice is important in medicine, please have a look at the 'Free Speech for Health' website, and sign their petition.

Medicine and Informed Consent. Patients take drugs and vaccines because they are kept ignorant of the harm they do to our health

How many people will see their doctor today? How many will start taking drugs and vaccines as a result? Throughout the world the numbers run into many millions. And those many millions will do so because they are ignorant of their dangers. They do not realise that they are putting their health on line in a dangerous game of Russian Roulette.

Why do they not realise? They are not told. Surely, their doctors would not give them something that is harmful to their health? Surely medical science, and drug regulation would ensure that harmful drugs are banned. Surely national health services would not allow patients to be given dangerous drugs and vaccines. If pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines did cause patient harm, our newspapers would tell us about it.

This blog (and my 'Failure of Conventional Medicine' e-book) has featured many examples of this over the last 8 years. But let's look at two current pieces of press censorship, things we should be told about, news about pharmaceutical drugs that patients need to know - but we have just not been told.

The Flu Vaccine
Everyone living in the northern hemisphere are being urged to have the flu vaccination. Yet the flu season has already happened in the southern hemisphere, and a study has concluded the vaccine being used has very low effectiveness. As has happened regularly over the last few years the virus being used does not match the virus which is causing flu this year! The estimate is that it is only about 10% effective. What that means is that the flu vaccine is of limited value, it offers minimal protection.

And, of course, the vaccination still have all the serious side effects that have been so often outlined on this blog. (Do a search, "flu vaccine", on the upper left hand side of this page).

But this information has not been made available to us in the mainstream media. And the conventional medical establishment, who must know about the vaccines ineffectiveness, as well as its dangers, continue to urge that we get vaccinated!

The Dengue Fever Vaccine
The conventional medical establishment insists that all their vaccines are entirely safe. The second situation has arisen in the Philippines and the dengue fever vaccine. This vaccine has been heavily promoted by the drug giant, Sanofi. But the government have recently stopped the national vaccination campaign, although only after thousands of children had been vaccinated - and suffered harm as a direct result.

What is the evidence of harm? Sanofi itself raised the warning, that the vaccine can cause more serious infections in those who had no previous exposure to the virus. Now, the Philippino government  has begun an investigation, with possible legal action to follow. The dangers of this vaccine has been known for some time - but of cause these warning were never publicised!

These are just two current situations concerning the dangers and ineffectiveness of pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines. They happen all the time but the conventional medical establishment pay little or no heed to any of them, continuing to insist that all vaccines are safe and effective. And our compliant media, supported as they are by pharmaceutical advertising, refuse to inform us. Their viability is at stake!

So what happens is that people will be going to see their doctor today, and they will accept the drugs or the vaccines that are offered because they have not heard about the ineffectiveness of the flu vaccine, or the dangers of the dengue fever vaccine. Nor will they have heard that the medical science that proved there was no connection between the MMR vaccine and Autism was fraudulent (see the following blogs).

               MMR Vaccine, Autism, and the silence and culpability of the Political, Medical and Media Establishment

               Autism IS caused by MMR vaccine. Evidence of 'no connection' was fraudulent medical science

               The MMR-Autism Controversy, and the dishonesty of Medical 'Science'

               The Vaccine - Autism Cover-up

               Autism, the MMR Vaccine, and Media Censorship

Anyone reading this information, undeniable as it is, unreported as it has been for the last 3 years, has to be amazed, or upset, or angry. The only possible conclusion is that patients cannot exercise an 'informed choice' about medical treatment because they are just not informed. Why are we not being informed.

The reason is simple. If patients did know about the serious side effects that harm patients, cause illness and disease, they would choose not to accept it. Conventional medicine, based as it is on dangerous pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines, just would not exist. The future of the mighty pharmaceutical industry depends on our ignorance. And they are fully aware of this!

Informed Consent and Homeopathy

Conventional medicine usually fails to provide patients with sufficient information about the effectiveness and safety of their treatments, and so fails to provide patients with a situation in which they can give their 'informed consent' to medical treatment. So what information should Homeopaths give to patients to ensure they are able to give their 'informed consent'. As 'the Black Duck' (a medical fundamentalist, supporter of conventional medicine) said, in response to my previous blog:

          "Perhaps you might like to tell us how homeopaths tackle the tricky issue of informed consent? Do you set out some of the controversial aspects of homeopathy, the current lack of understanding of how homeopathy might work, and so on? Do you allow patients to make their own informed decisions on the back of this information, or do you make that decision for them?

Most new Homeopathy patients fit into one of two categories. Some arrive at an early stage of their illness because they have already decided that they do not want to go through the conventional medicine route of drug-based treatment. Others have used conventional medicine, some for many years, and found that their health has not improved, or has gradually declined. In neither category can the homeopath take for granted that the patient knows enough about their illness, and its treatment by homeopathy, to ensure that they can make an 'informed choice' about it.

What do you know about homeopathy?

This opening gambit is probably a sensible one in any initial homeopathy interview as it will ascertain just where the patient is in terms of his/her knowledge and understanding. And it is always important to start from this point rather to make any assumptions. Increasingly, I am finding that potential patients have already done considerable research into homeopathy, and/or have heard about it from former patients who have been treated successfully. But nevertheless the question remains important. What patients say in response to it will determine what the homeopath needs to say to enable them to made an 'informed choice' about proceeding with homeopathy.

How does homeopathy work?

The Black Duck feels that this is important. Actually, for most patients, it is not important! Indeed, it is probably not important for patients who seek help from any medical discipline. Patients know that they are ill, and that they want to get better. Most conventional doctors would be hard-pressed to explain how their drugs are supposed to work! And it is not my experience that patients want to sit through a long, philosophical lecture on the working mechanism of any particular medical therapy!

So I usually keep the explanation (or answer) to this question quite brief, mentioning the homeopathic principle of 'treating like with like', and briefly describing 'remedy pictures', and 'symptoms of illness', and the importance in Homeopathy of matching the two together. If patients want to ask further questions about this (and most don't) I will try to provide them with answers, based on my understanding.

However, one important point should be made in response to this question. This concerns the nature of the healing process, and how this will be driven by the body, and not by the homeopathic remedy. All the remedy does is to seek to assist the body to do so - it will not do so in its own right. Remedies are not 'wonder cures', all they do is to 'nudge' the body towards its self-healing task.

In addition, every patient should be told that homeopathy works best when it is used as part of a 'holistic' strategy, which stresses the importance of good diet, exercise, and other life-style factors. 

Primarily, most patients want to know about two things. Is homeopathy an effective treatment for their condition or illness? And how safe is it?

Safety

I usually begin with the latter - safety. I tell them that homeopathy is safe, and will not cause 'side-effects', 'adverse reactions', or indeed, cause disease or death. To support this, I will give a brief description of how remedies are made - by serial dilution and succussion. I may then tell them about the 'mass suicide' demonstrations undertaken by 'homeopathy denialists', like 'the Black Duck', in order to show that remedies cannot harm patients in the same way as Big Pharma drugs. I will then affirm that if, together, we arrive at the wrong remedy it will do absolutely no good whatsoever - but likewise it will do no harm!

Effectiveness

It is then quite easy to move on to discuss effectiveness. I have always felt it important to tell patients that in order to be effective, a correct or 'similar' remedy has to be found. If such a remedy is found there will be some measure of improvement in the condition or illness. If it is not there will be no improvement. At this stage I always feel that it is important to manage expectations. There are no guarantees. This is especially important, perhaps, when a patient has arrived after homeopathy has cured or successfully treated a friend or relative (the source of most new referrals).

The Working Partnership

This quickly introduces another vital piece of information the patient needs to know about homeopathy, that the treatment process needs to be a partnership, and that it is not an 'expert-client' relationship. Although the Homeopath may have all the training and knowledge needed to determine a remedy that is 'similar', he/she can only arrive at this if the patient is able to openly, honestly and with insight, explain and describe their symptoms. 

This means that the patient is a vital part of the process. Even the most skilled and experienced homeopath has to depend on the patient for the treatment to be effective. It is a partnership.

Normally I will also tell patients that I am likely to ask some strange, and sometime intimate questions, and that these questions will often appear to have little relationship to the illness or disease being treated (at least, not in conventional terms).

In my experience, homeopathy works best when it is conducted within a professional relationship that is open, honest and transparent. And I know of no reason why the homeopath-patient relationship should be based on anything else!

Qualifications

It is always important for 'non-doctor' homeopaths, like myself, to explain that we are 'homeopaths' and not 'medical doctors' - that, for instance, we do not diagnose disease - that our skills are about matching the patients' symptoms of illness with remedies. I will usually tell patients that if they tell me anything that suggests that a formal diagnosis is necessary, or advisable, I will ask them to see their GP.

Do they wish to continue on the basis of this information?

At this point, I feel it is important for Homeopaths to ask the question - do they wish to continue? Often, this question is asked and answered during an initial telephone, or email enquiry. However, in my experience, few people who have bothered to ask these questions, when given these answers, have then decided to decline treatment. Most are content with the explanations given, and genuinely keen to proceed at this stage.

And in response to 'the Black Ducks' implied criticism, I don't know of any patient who has been forced to accept Homeopathy. Nor am I aware of any decision that I, or any other homeopath, 'make on behalf of patients'. 

Perhaps I can remind him that most patients who choose Homeopathy pay for it privately. This is quite different to the approach most patients find within the NHS: "you are ill, we are only going to offer you conventional drug-based treatment, and we are not going to tell you much about it"!

Providing the remedy.

I will always tell the patient about the remedy I would like them to take (I don't think I have ever told a patient to 'take a remedy' - I have always said 'I would like you to take this remedy'). Normally I will tell the patient what the remedy is, share some of the key symptom that it is known to deal with, and tell the patient why I feel this is important in their case. 

I will also tell the patient that if, after taking a remedy, the symptoms get worse (what we call an aggravation) to contact me in order to discuss the situation, and what to do about it.

Thereafter, the process of homeopathic treatment is concerned with the patient and homeopath working closely together, discussing changing symptoms, modifying the potency of remedies, and moving to other remedies when necessary.

Conclusion.

Providing the patient with this information, honestly and openly, enables them to give their 'informed consent' to Homeopathic treatment. And as we have seen, Informed Consent is also important to the very process of providing patients with homeopathic treatment.  So it is not 'tricky' to do so, as 'the Black Duck' suggests. It is actually quite easy, and essential to the process of healing.

Of course, it is true that providing this information to patients is easier for homeopaths as we have nothing to hide. Our remedies do not cause 'adverse reactions', disease or death. Our treatments do not involve potentially dangerous chemicals, invasive surgical procedures, or dangerous X-Rays or Radiation.

Homeopathy works alongside the body, helping it to achieve what it usually does quite naturally - keeping us healthy. Homeopathy has an easy, straight-forward and honest message that most patients, when they hear it, will understand and readily accept.

Informed Consent - the Dark Heart of Conventional Medicine

"Doctors are deliberately withholding information about the dangers of some routine screening and clinical procedures - often because they fear patients would then refuse treatment".

So begins a Special Report on 'Informed Consent' in the magazine 'What Doctors Don't Tell You' (WDDTY), May 2012. The report discusses the inadequacy of information patients are given about their treatment, and raises the important question:

Are patients giving their true, informed consent to medical treatment?

          "Although it happens every day in surgeries and hospitals, the failure to inform is against the law and a breach of human rights legislation - which gives the patient the absolute right of autonomy over his or her body. It also leaves the doctor open to a legal challenge of negligence, assault and battering, and possibly even manslaughter if the drug or procedure goes wrong"

Given the dangers of Conventional Medical treatments, not least through Big Pharma vaccines and drugs, this is important, if not vital information that every citizen should know. After all, if there is a danger to the patient arising from any medical treatment, patients have the right to know, and to say "NO" if they wish to do so.

 

The report goes over all the reasons doctors give their patients for NOT telling us this information, all of which are entirely illegitimate, insisting that patients have the right to know, and that if they don't know, they cannot make an 'informed choice' about having, or not having the treatment. The information being withheld from us is legion, and the report mentions just a few of these:

    * CT Scans cause cancer through radiation in 1 in 270 people screened by them.
    * 5.7% if patients undergoing surgery for ulcerative colitis will die.
    * Bronchoscopy (when a tube is threaded down the nose) results in a death with every 2,500 procedures.

As the report states, not many patients know this kind of negative information about pharmaceutical drugs, largely because doctors are reluctant to give the information to their patients.

          "Even after the Vioxx drug scandal had become public - eventually, tyne manufacturer agreed to pay out $4.85 billion to the families of around 50,000 people who died while taking the painkiller - doctors were still asking, 'What should we tell our patients?'"

The answer is probably simple! The truth! But as the report describes in detail, medical paternalism is rife within the Conventional Medicine Establishment (it is so very different in homeopathy and other alternative medical therapies). The result is that patients are rarely told about the dangers of the treatment they are prescribed by doctors. The report suggests that patients should ask the following questions before agreeing to take any prescription drugs:

1. How long has the drug been on the market (if less than 2 years ask for an 'older generation' drug)?
2. Can you confirm I am not taking part in a drug trial?
3. Is the drug suitable for my age/gender/condition?
4.  Are you using this drug 'off-label' or for the condition for which it was originally licensed?
5.  Are there any special warning or 'black-box' alerts for this drug?
6.  Can you explain to me the known side-effects and the likelihood of me suffering them?
7.  Has the drug been tested among people similar to my own age/gender?
8.  Do you know if the drug has been banned from use in other countries? (Note, many drugs prescribed in this country have been banned in other countries)
9.  Have you given this drug to other patients? If so, have they reported any adverse reactions?
10.  Is the dose you are recommending within the guidelines of the manufacturer for my age/ gender/ condition?
11.  Do you know if the new drug will react with other drugs I am currently taking?
12.  If I start to suffer from health problems when I take the drug, I shall stop immediately, and come to see you again. Do you agree this is the best course of action?

However, the report goes on to question how many of these questions the average doctor is actually able to answer. In other words, it questions how well informed doctors are about the drugs they prescribe to us, and how reliant they are on inadequate and partial Big Pharma information.

The report goes on to consider, in some detail, what informed consent should consist off, and asks another set of questions, with the guidance - don't give your 'informed consent' to treatment or procedures without the answers to each of the questions. One of these questions is:

           "Are there alternatives of which you are aware that could also be considered?"

The report states that it is highly unlikely that most doctors will recommend the patient to try homeopathy  or any other form of natural medical therapy! The reason for this, of course, is that most doctors will not be qualified to pass any judgement on these questions. Indeed, many of them are known to consider homeopathy to be akin to witchcraft!

* Even 'alternative' advice on diet and nutrition may be a stretch too far for the doctor. Medical students in the US receive around 19 hours of education about nutrition during their five-year medical training".

As the report says, informed consent for the patient infers that the doctor is 'informed' and able to pass on the required information.

          "Informed consent infers that the doctor is informed ... not only is this far from the truth, it is also untrue even for specialists".

So an informed doctor, capable of answering important questions for you, is certainly not something that can, or should be automatically assumed! Certainly, the vast majority of doctors are informed only about conventional (pharmaceutical) medical practice. And even within this single medical discipline, they appear to work mainly on the information provided to them by the pharmaceutical industry, and other commercial medical interests. 

 

Little wonder, then, that many doctors have a limited knowledge about the dangers of pharmaceutical drugs, vaccines, and other treatments and procedures!

However, the problem of getting informed consent is probably even more difficult than the report suggests. 

 

• National medical services, like the NHS in the UK, have become virtual pharmaceutical monopolies, and so equally unlikely to provide patients with the kind of information they require to make an informed decision about medical treatment. 
• Successive governments have failed to challenge the conventional medical establishment, and appear more interested in funding and supporting it than asking serious questions about its efficacy and safety. 
•  And the mainstream media is entirely supine in matters relating to health, parroting the 'good' news of 'medical breakthroughs' that are expected tomorrow - but ignoring the conventional medical disasters of yesterday, today and tomorrow.

So no-one appears to be able or willing to provide patients with the information they require for informed consent. The questions are not being asked, the investigations are not being carried out, that will lead to a greater understanding and awareness of the problems associated with medical health treatments being routinely offered to us today.

I would encourage everyone to read WDDTY on a regular basis. It is a magazine which is full of information about conventional medical treatment, and about alternatives to it. And it really does include material that 'doctors don't tell you', so it can lead to you, at least, becoming more aware of health issues, and therefore capable of making an informed choice.