Paper Doctors
Vernon Coleman
Published by Temple Smith 1977




‘Dr Coleman writes with more sense than bias. Required reading for any Minister of Health’
Daily Express 20.1.1977

‘This short but very readable book has a message that is timely. Vernon Coleman’s point is that much of the medical research into which money and expertise are poured is useless. At the same time, remedial conditions of mind and body which cause the most distress are largely neglected. This is true.’
Daily Telegraph 20.1.77

‘If you believe Dr Vernon Coleman, the main beneficiaries of the hundred million pounds worth of medical research done in this country each year are certainly not the patients. The research benefits mostly the medical place seekers, who use their academic investigation as rungs on the promotional ladder, or drug companies with an eye for the latest market opening. In Dr Coleman’s thesis, medical research is bedevilled by the law of decreasing returns and the doctors themselves bedazzled by the glittering hardware of high technology treatments. The future may hold bionic superman but all a nation’s physic cannot significantly change its basic mortality statistics except sometimes, to make them worse.’
The Guardian 20.1.77

‘Dr Coleman, who gains in statue with successive books, argues in Paper Doctors that medical research as we know it today should be stopped.’
Coventry Evening Telegraph 20.1.77

‘The main conclusion of his book is that it is better to spend money on preventive medicine than on almost any aspect of medical research or ‘high powered hospital medicine. He claims, for example, that many millions of pounds have been spent over the past few years searching for better treatment for coronary disease, yet the two most important drugs used, digitalis and morphine, have been available for centuries. ‘If we had spent our money on persuading healthy people to stop smoking, lose weight, take more exercise and so on, we would have cut down the number of people having heart attacks by half.’
Chemist and Druggist January 1977

‘Few would disagree with Dr Coleman that more should be done about prevention.’
The Lancet 29.1.77

‘It has all the evidence of a keen, energetic and well-meaning individual, anxious to improve the world…it is a book with a message that we do not leave medical research to the researchers and it is good to have people like Dr Vernon Coleman to take critical aim occasionally.’
Medical Digest April 1977

‘Dr Coleman’ well-coordinated book could not be more timely.’
Yorkshire Post 22.1.77

‘I hope this book becomes a bestseller among doctors, nurses…and the wider public who, after all, have to pay for the research.’
Nursing Times 28.4.77


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