Vernon Coleman on Doctors and Hospitals

Taken from Coleman's Laws by Vernon Coleman

Vernon Coleman





`A 13-year-old child weighing 6 stone will probably receive the same dose of medication as a 45-year-old man weighing 20 stone. The same medicines (often in the same doses) are often prescribed for young and old, male and female, fat and thin. This is bizarre, illogical and indefensible.' (page 18)

`In medicine the word `new' when used to describe a drug means two things: the drug is expensive and no one yet knows whether it will cure you or kill you.' (page 19)

`Only the most bigoted member of the medical establishment would dare to describe medicine as a science.' (page 22)

`Most of the clinical research published in medical journals (and used as the basis for medical practice) is (how shall I put it to be tactful) as bent as a paperclip.' (page 26)

`There are 348,461 clinical research papers published every week. Most of them are of no value to anyone except the author (and, perhaps a drug company).' (page 27)

`Never be afraid to ask for a second opinion. It is your life that is at stake - not a new sofa or curtains for the living room.' (page 41)

`Screening examinations and check-ups are more profitable for doctors than for patients.' (Coleman's 4th Law Of Medicine)

`Nearly 200,000 people die each year in America as a result of `medical accidents'. It is clear, therefore, that doctors kill vastly more innocent people than terrorists do. What sort of panic would political leaders be in if terrorists regularly killed 200,000 Americans every year?' (page 51)

`A big chunk of doctors would prescribe arsenic if they got a free pen from the drug company making arsenic tablets.' (page 55)

`Given a choice between an old and experienced doctor who is out of touch with modern developments, and a young doctor who is fresh out of medical school and who knows all the latest jargon, the patient who puts experience ahead of knowledge will benefit.' (page 60)

`Any doctor who tells you that you will need to take pills for life is an unimaginative (and probably ill-informed) buffoon.' (page 61)

`Of all the bad things the drug industry has done (and a list would fill this book and another eleven volumes like it) the worst must surely be the way they have corrupted the entire medical establishment. Not that the blame should be laid on one party. You can't be corrupted unless you want to be.' (page 83)

`If there is a high tech and a low tech way of doing things, doctors will choose the high tech approach even if it is less effective and more dangerous.' (page 86)

`Before the industrial age, hospitals were built like cathedrals in order to lift the soul and ease the mind. Hospitals were decorated with carvings, works of art, flowers and perfumes. Modern hospitals are built with no regard for the spirit, eye or soul. They are bare, more like prisons than temples, designed to concentrate the mind on pain, fear and death. Where there are windows they are positioned in such a way that patients can't see out of them (though even if they could they probably wouldn't be able to see anything more enthralling than the refuse bins or the air conditioning units).' (page 91)

`The number of in-patient acute hospital beds in the UK is approximately one third the number in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.' (page 106)

`Hospitals are filthy, dirty and badly run. Hospitals have too much money but ill-informed uncaring self-serving bureaucrats spend it all on all the wrong things. If the Gestapo ever gets back on its feet and starts recruiting it will have little difficulty in finding suitable candidates among the administrators working in hospitals.' (page 107)

`While people with suspected cancer have to wait months for essential investigations our politically correct system means that money and resources are spent on providing such non-essential luxuries as cosmetic surgery and infertility treatment. (page 137)


Taken from Coleman's Laws by Vernon Coleman The book Coleman's Laws is available from the webshop on this site.


Copyright Vernon Coleman 2007 Home