QUACKS IN MEDICINE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22720, 5 November 1935, Page 12

QUACKS IN MEDICINE

SOME UNIVERSAL REMEDIES From its early history to the present day, quacks have practised medicine and exploited the ignorance of the public, says the Melbourne Age. In 1511, in the reign of Henry VIII, an act was passed for the regulation of medical and surgical practice, and the suppression of quacks. The preamble of this Act declared that “ the science and cunning of physic and surgery is daily within this realm exercised by a great multitude of ignorant persons, of whom the greater part have no manner of insight in the same, nor any other kind of learning.” Seven years later the College of Physicians was established under a charter which gave it power to prosecute quacks and impostors, but despite frequent prosecutions and fines, quacks continued to flourish. Some of them could not read or write, but they distributed handbills proclaiming their ability to cure every disease. During plague visitations the quacks reaped a rich harvest. In London in 1665 the walls of houses and the posts in the streets were plastered with bills advertising quack remedies. There was the “ Sovereign Cordial Against Corruption of the Air,” “ Infallible Prevention Pills Against Plague,” and “ The Only True Plague Water.” There was Dr Theodore de Medde’s “ Universal Elixir” at 2s 6d a bottle for the middle class, and his famous Antipharmacon. at 3d for the poor. The wealthy could obtain at £5 per fluid ounce Avrum Velans, “being the true philosophical preparation of potable gold, distilled by a pure crystalline and innocent spirit.” The methods of quacks in advertising their wares have varied but little through the centuries. There is a familiar ring about the following announcement of an “ Expert Operator ” who sold “Never Failing Pills” at the sign of the Red Ball in Bartholomew Close. “ There never was more Pretenders to cure than there is now, but Friends, have a care how you fall into the hands of such ignorant Pretenders, for if they once get you into their clutches, they will use you as unmerciful, as they are unskilful. Therefore he not ashamed to come in here. Come to Me. My Never Failing Pills are so prepared that the tenderest patient may take them. They are excellent good for seamen to take to sea with them, for they keep their full virtue for seven years.”

And the ethics of advertising by members of the medical profession was a vexed question as far back as the seventeenth century. A “ Doctor of Physick ” in London, who under the initials E.M. advertised his Universal Scorbutick Pills, began his little discourse with a brief historical review of medicine, and how it was formerly held in such high esteem that kings and princes allowed their names to be given to medicines they had discovered, and physicians of the greatest fame delighted in the preparation and trial of their own preparations, and gave their names to them. “ But this last age, revolting from the ingenious labours of Ancient Heroes regarding the art of medicine, let it fall into the hands of tradesmen,” continued E.M. “ Medicine thereby fell much lower in repute. Physicians are at present discouraged from offering the products of their art to the world for fear of scandal and being accounted in the number of these quacks. But the publishing of medicines by the learned, which will prove most advantageous to the people, should be encouraged among skilful and experienced artists, that they may not lock up their rare inventions and fortunate experiments, confining them within the narrow limits of a private practice. If a printed sermon or any piece of learning cried about the streets be no disparagement to the work nor the author, why the pub lishing of a medicine? Again, if per sons of honour and quality expose then cattle and the produce of their land at the market and fair, why not mesof arts, the product of their learned in genious labours?”