TheJakartaPost
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Issues: `Divine cigarettes used to treat cancer'
Many in the medical field might raise an eyebrow upon hearing that cigarette smoke can be good for one's health, given the numerous findings relating tobacco use to an increase in the risk of cancer
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em>Many in the medical field might raise an eyebrow upon hearing that cigarette smoke can be good for one's health, given the numerous findings relating tobacco use to an increase in the risk of cancer.
Yet an Indonesian nanochemistry scientist is treating thousands of cancer patients in her clinic with modified cigarettes.
Seventy-one-year-old Greta Zahar, who holds a PhD in nanochemistry from the Bandung-based University of Padjadjaran, has been researching and developing specially treated cigarettes and cigarette filters, which she dubs the Divine Cigarette and Divine Filter, for more than a decade.
She developed a detoxification process called balur (smear) treatment, which uses smoke from Divine Cigarettes as a conduit to capture and extract poisonous metal such as mercury from the body - a process she believes can be beneficial in treating cancer and several other diseases.
Her clinic, Griya Balur, in East Jakarta, has treated more than 30,000 patients, mostly stage three-to-four cancer sufferers, since 1998, she said. Not all patients can be helped and not all complete the full treatment.
However, there are several outstanding cases in which patients in the late stages of cancer have significantly recovered after going on the treatment.
Her findings and treatment method were noted by Malang-based molecular biologist Sutiman B. Sumitro and GP Saraswati Subagjo. (By Prodita Sabarini, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta)
Your comments:
I bet cigarette companies will be very happy to extend their fortunes at the expense of millions of Indonesians who have died due to smoking. This pathetic quack scientist only serves to interest of those "murderers" with a business plan.
Mukesh Raj
Wellington
OK. You have convinced me. This is a truly wonderful product. Inspired by the magnificent genius of the inventors of the divine cigarette I am designing an attachment to a machine-gun barrel for the army to protect soldiers against being shot.
You see, it is not the impact and penetration of bullets that kills but the lead content.
The attachment will coat each bullet with a special layer of dragon's milk that will not only protect against the lead but also enhance the body's natural defense mechanism against traumatic injury.
One burst of celestial bullets and soldiers will never worry about being shot at again.
Rafiq Mahmood
Bogor, West Java
What, might I ask, was the point of this story? To pillory and encourage the humiliation of one of Jakarta's citizens who believes in alternatives to Western medicine? Surely as a nation, you have more faith in your own people than that!
Western medicine today is dominated by pharmaceutical companies, to further their interests and profits.
The WHO, quoted here, is effectively a subsidiary of the pharmaceutical industry (they call it a "partnership"). What they say should always be scrutinized.
Vello
The United Kingdom
