VHI, BUPA and Health Insurance v CAM

williamgrogan

I'm sure you are well aware that Health Insurance companies are now beginning to "cover" CAM treatments. Bad and all as this is, promoting it and encouraging people to go to CAM artists is amazing.

This article appeared in the documentation I received with my VHI bill today.

I have underlined the bits that in my opinion are total nonsense.

Reiki claims to be a natural way of energising the body and channelling energy. Dara Flynn tries it out

Stress, muscle pain, stomach ache, depression and disease. Most of us can tick at least one of these boxes - all are symptoms of modern day living. Our natural energies are knocked off balance on an hourly basis. We turn to sugar and energising supplements to achieve the balance, a method that usually backfires.

Reiki (ray-key) is said to re-energise the body, mind, emotions and spirit naturally, by channelling energy back to the areas where we need it most. Brought to the West by Hawayo Takatainthe 1960s, the practice of Reiki was developed by Japanese scholar Dr Mikao Usui in the mid-l 800s and is now the fastest growing method of alternative healing in the world. Mary Twohy is a Reiki master based in Dublin. Mary began practising Reiki in 1997 and in 1998 began educating adults in Reiki. Her courses involve attunement - learning to open up to the life-force energy and channel it. "Anyone can learn Reiki, and anyone can be attuned. The people on my courses also find that learning Reiki has led to changes across their entire lives - their diet, toxin intake, career decisions, relationships etc," says Mary. It is important to choose a Reiki practitioner who is experienced and reputable." The practitioner should be level headed and ideally have worked in the area for a number of years and be familiar with the energy,' says Mary.

Reiki receivers have seen positive effects on all ailments, from general stress to more serious diseases, although it makes no promises and a reputable practitioner will never claim to diagnose health problems. Reiki has no side effects, although a first-time receiver may feel tired after the session.

Reiki has been the subject of much confusion, and is often thrown into the cauldron with myriad practices from faith healing to spirit guide channelling. In fact. Reiki practitioners do not claim to channel spirits or deal in the mysterious. The practise is more about overall healing than anything that stems from the occult.

Most critics of Reiki base their censure on the fact that they do not believe in a universal life force energy in the first place. In fact, mainstream physics has proven that the entire universe is composed of energy and the human energy field can be perceived by scientific instruments. The notion of, "Just as the body knows how to regenerate itself where and when it needs to, it is the body of the receiver of Reiki that directs the energy to where it needs to go" energy is no longer obscure.

Just as the body knows how to regenerate itself where and when it needs to, it is the body of the receiver of Reiki that directs the energy to where it needs to go. Usually beginning at the head, the Reiki master uses a specific series of hand positions on or just above the body. They continue in patterns along the body and chi energy often leads off course to the areas that call for more attention.

Mary begins my session by asking some medical and lifestyle details, for her own information. I remove only my shoes and lie on the table with pillows under my head and knees. Soothing music plays in the background. She begins with my head, opting for gentle, hands-on touch. Over the course of ten minutes or so, she gradually moves her hands out towards my shoulders. From time to time, I am aware of a pulsing or vibration in these areas, although so far: no heat. Later, Mary tells me my mind seemed to be racing so the energy took a colder form, literally to 'cool' the mind down. As she moves her hands Co the shoulder area, I begin to be aware of an intense heat radiating from the hands. The heat is not a normal body heat, but akin to the heat felt an inch or so above a hot radiator.

For the first few minutes my mind was racing. After a quarter of an hour, however, I have allowed myself to drift and find myself in a trance-like state, relaxed and happy. I noticed that the very gentle pressure applied to my chest feels quite heavy. Reiki energies often use the areas that correspond to the chakra centres as a basis, and more energy, she says, was needed around the heart chakra and at the creativity chakra around the pelvis. In the feet she detected an old injury on the Achilles' tendon. The vibrations I felt, she told me, are normal. They were not caused by her hands moving, but by the energy itself.

Afterwards, I felt as if I was covered from head to toe in a warm blanket. I was advised not to get up immediately, but to lie and relax in my new-found bliss. I leave feeling more relaxed than I have ever felt.

Mary advises clients with no major complaints and normal stress levels to undergo a Reiki session about once a month. People suffering pain or ailments may visit more frequently to begin. A session costs €40 for one hour, and €50 for an hour and a half.

Mary Twohy is a Reiki master and teacher at all levels and runs courses from her base in Kanelagh. She may be contacted at: An Droichead 11 Kanelagh Village, Dublin 6. Tel: etc..

williamgrogan

This is a letter I intend sending to the people who produce this magazine for the VHI and the VHI themselves.

If anyone has a constructive suggestion/amendment please feel free to post.


Date: 7/7/04

Dear Ms O’Mahony cc VHI Board

I am a member of the VHI and some days ago received your latest magazine. On page 6 there is what appears to be an article, although an advertisement might be a more accurate description, for Reiki Healing.

I think it is disgraceful that you give legitimacy to this fraud.

If you read the article it is obvious to any thinking person that Reiki is total nonsense. However when you promote the idea that members of the VHI should pay money under false pretences to someone who claims to be able to heal various ailments then you become party to the fraud.

This type of fraud traps the ill, the old, the badly educated and the desperate which is why it a particularly nasty type of confidence trick.

The opening paragraph is a typical scam artist’s position where one is led to believe that we are all ill, stressed, toxic and suffering from the pressures of modern living. This is untrue but fools some people into thinking they need treatment for non existent illnesses.

I will quote some sentences from the article and ask you do they mean anything or do they make sense.

First off, “energy” means the capacity of a physical system to do work. So what can any reference in the article to energy actually mean? What is an Energy Channel? There are no undiscovered “Energy Channels” in the human body or scientists would have found them by now.

“Our natural energies are knocked off balance on an hourly basis”. What’s our natural energies? We only get energy from eating food and drinking. How can this be “knocked off balance on an hourly basis?” By a kick in the stomach?

“Reiki (ray-key) is said to re-energise the body”. But we get our energy from food not from someone waving their hands over you.

What’s a “level headed Reiki practitioner”? What is the opposite?

“Reiki receivers have seen positive effects on all ailments, from general stress to more serious diseases”. Is this not claiming that Reiki can heal illnesses? How could you possibly heal an illness by weaving your hands over someone? What possible mechanism could be at work here? If you wave your hands over someone then there might be a tiny breeze and an infinitesimal change in the local gravity but other than that what is happening between the person’s hands the body beneath them? The answer of course is nothing.

“Reiki has no side effects”, because it does absolutely nothing. This is probably the only sensible sentence in the article. Unless a side effect is the loss of €480 per year.

The phrase “human energy field can be perceived by scientific instruments” is a lie. There is no human energy field and therefore it cannot be detected by instruments, however there are fake pictures that claim to represent this.

The only possible benefit to Reiki is the normal benefits of lying down and relaxing for an hour, something anyone can do at home and does not require the payment of €40.00 to someone to wave their hands about the place as well.

What the VHI is doing via this magazine is encouraging fraud. That is scandalous. The Gardai raided the home of a doctor engaging in a similar fraud this week. Presumably you do not want them raiding your offices?

There are huge dangers in alternative medicine because people with the emerging symptoms of an illness may delay going to their doctor until a cure is no longer possible. This has & is happening.

Clare made the point, in a telephone conversion with me, that each month they run an “investigative” (her word) article on a CAM “treatment”. This article does not contain a single sentence that refutes the fraudulent claims that Reiki can cure illness.

If this is truly an investigative series then allow someone to refute the claims made, perhaps a doctor, scientist or someone from the Irish Skeptics Society, and then at least your readers will have a more balanced view instead of the fawning endorsement of these con artists.

Your organisations should be campaigning against these frauds not encouraging them.