The great American fraud : Articles on the nostrum evil and quacks, in two series, reprinted from Collier's weekly / by Samuel Hopkins Adams.

Samuel Hopkins Adams

Date:: [1906]

Credit: The great American fraud : Articles on the nostrum evil and quacks, in two series, reprinted from Collier's weekly / by Samuel Hopkins Adams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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$remedies which can not jjossibly cure consumption, but, on the contrary, tend by their poisonous and debilitating drugs to undermine the victim's stamina. Peruna. liquozone, Duffy's Malt Whiskey, Pierce's Golden ^Medical Dis- covery and the other blanket cures include tuberculosis in their lists, claiming great numbers of well-authenticated cures. From the imposing- book pul)lislied by the R. V. Pierce Company, of Buffalo, I took a number of testimonials for investigation; not a large number, for I found the con- sumption testimonial rather scarce. From fifteen letters I got results in nine cases. Seven of the letters were returned to me marked 'unclaimed, of Avhich one was marked Xame not in the dictory. another Xo such postoffice in the state' and a third Deceased,' The eighth man wrote that the Golden ]Medical Discovery had cured his cough and blood-spitting, add- ing: 'It is the best lung medisan I ever used for lung trubble. The last man said he took twenty-five bottles and was cured! Two out of nine seems to me a sus|)ieious]y small percentage of traceable recoveries. Much stres> has Ix'cn laid l)y the Proprietary Association of America through its n -m^. ^ Upon %eceipt of Five Dollars {$5MG\ i........ ^ ;| '://;: ^ p^ WHOLESALE CURING ON THE BLANKET PLAN. A blanket cure from the laboratory of Dr. T. A. Slocum. press committee on the suit brought by R. V. Pierce against the Ladies' Home Journal, the implication being (although the suit has not yet been tried) that a reckless libeler of a noble and worthy business has been suitably punished. In the full appreciation of Dr. Pierce's attitude in the matter of libel, I wish to state that in so far as its chiim of curing con- simiption is concerned his Golden ^Medical Discovery is an unqualified fraud. One might suppose that the quacks would stop short of trying to deceive the medical profession in this matter, yet the constmiption cure may be found disporting itself in the pages of the medical journals. For instance, I find this advertisement in several professional magazines: *'M,cArthur's Syrup of Hypophosphites has proved itself, time and time again, to be positively beneficial in this condition (tuberculosis) in the hands of prominent ol>sorvei'>, clinicians and. what is more, pvacticiiig i)hysicians, hundreds of ^\•llom have written their aduiiring encuiniuiiis in$