ALLEGED CANCER CURE

Evening Star, Issue 19839, 12 April 1928, Page 1

ALLEGED CANCER CURE

A CARPENTER'S CLAIM REQUEST FOR INVESTIGATION. A retired carpenter, living at EmS Plains, Queensland, claims to have discovered a cure for external cancer, but he has refused to give the authorities detail* of his treatment. Substantial funds have been subscribed throughout Australia for cancer research, and the campaign against the disease is being modelled on very systematic lines. It was at a meeting at Rockhampton at which a money-raising campaign w at inaugurated (hat the latest cure was mentioned. The man credited with the discovery was Mr A. Coker. It was said that particulars of his achievement had been sent to the Queensland Health Department, but the department was not prepared to do anything unless Mr Coker was willing to furnish the details of the alleged cure. Mr Coker was not prepared to do that.' For twelve years Mr Coker had suffered from cancer, and according to hia statement he had cured himself. Three separate statutory declarations from people whom Mr Coker had cured had been sent to Senator Thompson, who had forwarded them to the Prime Minister. Mr Coker did not ask anything for the cure, but ho asked the Commonwealth to select twenty patients, no matter in what stage of cancer they were suffering, and to nominate a medical man so that he could demonstrate his cure. REFUSAL TO SUPPLY DETAILS. The Minister of Health, Sir Neville Howse, replied to Senator Thompson stating that it was difficult to discuss a matter of that kind without some knowledge as to the nature of the remedy in question, and he suggested that ■Mr Coker should place details before the department as to the kind of treatment with which ho claimed to have had success. At the Rockhampton meeting it was agreed that it was not a fair thing to ask the public to subscribe unless all remedies, or claims to remedies, we'rh to be investigated. Dr Jackson said that he thought the attitude of Sir Neville Howse was full of common sense. It was rather a job to ask a committee to investigate a “cure” without revealing the nature of it, and it would be very rash and very wrong to invite twenty people to submit themselves for treatment for cancer on the assertion of one man that they would be cured. He said that he understood that the man iri question was not scientifically qualified, and was not in a position to have made a careful examination of tumors alleged to have been removed, so that he could not be quite certain whether they were cancers or sunburn. Dr Jackson gave his own experience of supposed cures, and said that he had always been willing to try these things. The discussion was inclined to become somewhat heated, a persistent demand being made by one man that the treatment should he investigated unconditionally. Dr Jackson: Is this gentleman willing to have his alleged cure analysed? A man in the audience criticised the medical men for demanding to see the recipe before they would begin an investigation. Dr Jackson (warmly): There is no' man in the medical profession worthy of the name who would not divulge a cure for cancer if he had one. Further discussion of the matter was not permitted by the chairman of the meeting. In its place a stirring appeal was made on behalf of the cancer research fund. There was no time for quibbling, it was urged, and in any case quibbling was quite out of place on such an occasion.