The Mother Of Disease Poem by Paul Hartal

People already in prehistoric times, and on different
continents, speculated about the origins of sickness.
Yet they commonly believed that illness was the result
of supernatural causes, of demonic influences,
or of divine punishment.

On the other hand, the over 2 millennia old Chinese text
Of Huangdi Neijing, or the Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon
explains sickness and disease in terms of natural causes.

Thus, the ancient Chinese attributed the origins of disease
mainly to congestion and stagnation.
Chronic and degenerative illneses arise, they said,
from poor circulation, from lack of movement,
as well as from over eating and emotional
and physical stress. These undermine good health.
The Chinese doctors explained that conditions
of internal and external disharmony
interfere with the dynamic balance of yin and yang
and these block the free flow of the vital energy of Qi.

Other ancient doctors,
including the famous Roman physician Galen,
believed that epidemics of cholera and Black Death
were caused by noxious night air, or miasma,
emenating from rotting organic matter.

In the 1840s two physicians,
the American Oliver Wendell Holmes
And the Hungarian Ignaz Semmelweis concluded
that because doctors in the maternity wards of hospitals
did not wash hands before visiting their patients,
they inadvertently caused the death of thousands of women
by infecting them with puerperal fever.
Yet the outraged medical community
ridiculed and persecuted Semmelweis for the discovery
and the poor doctor died in a mental asylum.

In the mid 19th century the English physician John Snow
Speculated that cholera spreads from polluted water.
However, the miasma theory was refuted only in 1876
When Robert Koch proved that anthrax was caused
By the bacterium Bacillus anthracis.

The scientific discoveries of the biologist Louis Pasteur
contradicted the notion of Spontaneous generation.
In the 1870s he proved that anthrax bacteria cause
The disease in cattle. In the 1880s he inoculated, mostly
successfully, hundreds of patients against the viral
Desease of rabies that causes inflammation of the brain.

In 1845 the German pathologist Rudolf Virchow, independently
With the English physician John Hughes Bennett, observed
In patients the abnormal increase of blood cells, which he
Identified as a blood disease and named it leukemia.
In 1855 Virchow was the first to correctly state
that cancerous cells origininate from otherwise normal cells.
He also correctly observed that carcinoma was associated
With white blood cells that caused inflammation.
In the late 20th century researchers realized that many cancers,
among them head and neck, lung, cervical, bladder, pancreatic,
Melanoma, cervical, pancreas and prostate cancer,
are intrinsically associated with long-term inflammation.

In spite of all its changing theories, scientific advances,
and the technological progress in the service of human health,
Medicine remains more an art than a highly reliable science.

The ancient Greek physician Hippocrates of Kos is still
Considered as one of the most outstanding figures
In the history of medicine. His Oath of Medical Ethics
continues to serve as the foundation of modern medical practice.
His dictum: ' Let food be your medicine and medicine your food',
remains as valid as it was 35 centuries ago.

Similar advice of health care comes to us
from other time-tested Sources of knowledge and wisdom,
mainly from the historical traditions of
Indian Ayurvedic Medicine and Traditional Chinese Medicine.
These medical systems incorporate more than
Five thousand years of healing experience through history.
And in accordance with Hippocrates' vision,
a Chinese proverb also echoes the distilled essence
of the well-grounded and timeless medical insight:
Whatsoever is the father of a disease, an ill-diet
is its mother.