By Dr F Braich DDS PhD
My appeal to you, dear colleagues:
The present Coronavirus pandemic is forcing the international medical community to reevaluate its philosophy and lay the ground for new and more realistic principles to be applied to the post corona era.
For years now I am informing my colleagues of the facts observed over the last 40 years in my practice regarding chronic gum disease and patients’ immune systems.
Statistically gum disease – periodontitis – afflicts over 95% of our modern society. It is chronic in nature with little if any complaints from patients and remains therefore undiagnosed and untreated.
The afflicted periodontal area of the mouth represents the main gateway of germs into our bloodstream – too high and permanent in nature to allow our immune system to function, recover and efficiently fight other opportunistic germ invasions such as this present coronavirus.
The considerable volume of scientific observations out there – adding my own during the last 4 decades – clearly shows then when treated, the periodontal chronic disease (PCD) will remarkably influence positively the recovery of our immune system. Periodontal treatment is the most cost effective therapy of any chronic disease and offers immediate and considerable overall medical benefit. It is the obligation of us all in the medical field to verify the condition of our patients most vulnerable part of the body – the mouth cavity – to all times but particularly when contracted with potential deadly pandemics.
Now in contest of the intact immune system and the coronavirus pandemic, it is clear to all of us I hope, now more than ever before, that if the pharmaceutical medicine cannot provide an immediate magic pill or injection and rise to the occasion of the pandemics, then all what is left between us and the ‘deadly’ virus is our impeccably functioning immune system.
Once the above is stated and clear, the next stage in development of our new medical philosophy will be that the Balneo Medicine can now be called out of semi-dormancy and yes… obscurity and become the true and most valuable partner of our pharma medicine.
I always referred to Balneo Medicine as our Western traditional medicine following the Japanese way of thinking, that their traditional medicine is a recognized partner of the modern pharma establishment and operates in tandem – not in competition with each other for the benefit of the patient. While pharma medicine in cooperation with pharmacology can work frantically to develop the magic vaccine – and each future mega pandemic will need its own specific one… our Balneo Medicine should apply its over 2 millennia old Greco-Roman accumulated knowledge to rehabilitate our immune system.
The only guarantee against extinction was always and will always remain – our immune system: universal, infinitely adaptable to all new forms of future germs and totally reliable if properly preserved and rehabilitated.
Detoxification – chronic disease treatments – as gum disease, diabetes, cardiovascular, etc. destressing and lifestyle changes are all means to repair our overstressed immune system and are all in reach and the domain of Balneo Medicine.
The coronavirus pandemic is the hysterical call to revival and recognition of the Balneo Medicine.
There is no successful fight against pandemics but the immune system and there will never be a better chance to recover the modern immune system than through the Balneo Medicine.
I call to all of you, most respected medical colleagues, to push together now more than ever before for the recognition of Balneo Medicine as a true and valuable specialty of international medicine. Only then we can truly offer our patients the invaluable combined healing potential of Pharma – and Balneo Medicine in one single and profoundly logical healing concept.
The wise, educated scientist knows already that the Chinese coronavirus pandemic is only the modest beginning of what ‘globalization’ will bring in the future. To survive and not to bring our economy to the ‘stone age’ either, we must utilize all resources, all knowledge and all mental power we can master and understand once and for all that NO magic pill will ever be found to compensate for our lack of urgency, our late complacency and misplaced unilateral trust in mastering the future, which finally brought us to the present sorry state of affairs.
Quintessentially, Balneology and Balneo Medicine should be the helper and custodian of our immune system – which in return will insure our survival in the mega pandemics to come and directly and literally save us from total economic ruin.
I sincerely hope we all learned the coronavirus lesson and its future consequences… will stay safe and hope to do much better next time around.
Dr. F Braich
Director, ABMA
Palm Beach, Florida, USA
Copyright ABMA March 2020
