Why We Get Sick

   THE GERM THEORY 

Back in the mid 1800’s Louis Pasteur and Paul Ehrlich jointly gave to the civilized world the disease theory doctrines of microbiology and immunology. This theory became known as the “Germ theory of Disease” and was adopted as the basis for modern medicine.  This theory basically holds that there are fixed, external germs or microbes which invade the body and cause a variety of separate, defineable diseases. In order to get well, you need to identify and then kill whatever germ made you sick. The tools generally used are drugs, surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, and vaccines for prevention. The damage this theory has done to humanity is incalculable!  
     In reality, the germ theory is not accurate, because according to the true germ theory, if we were exposed to a germ, we would get sick. Yet, in reality, ten people can be exposed to the flu and only four get sick. Fifteen people  can be exposed to chickenpox, and only five get sick. Twenty people can be exposed to tuburculosis, and only eight get sick. There was a different view that did not gain popularity at the time, but is more scientifically accurate.  

THE ENVIRONMENTAL THEORY (also known as the Terrain theory)
 Antoine Béchamp, M.D., one of the world’s foremost bacteriologists and Pasteur’s contemporary, was making great scientific discoveries and some of the greatest minds of his day accepted his theories and findings as established facts.  In his life, Béchamp attained so many achievements that it took eight pages of a scientific journal to list them. 
    What makes the germ theory so dangerous is that it seems so obviously true.  Béchamp said “There is no doctrine so false that it does not contain some particle of truth. It is thus with microbian doctrines.” Béchamp discovered Microzyma  (now known as micro-organisms) minute or small ferment bodies–the basic structure of cell life; and that germs definitely are the result, not the cause of disease. Germs cleanse the human system and free it from accumulations of pathogenic and mucoid matter.  Bacteria only feed off of dead cells, and have no action on live cells. They are not the cause of disease, but the result thereof.  Bechamp’s work might have revolutionized medicine, but he had strong opposition. 

    As science progressed, more was discovered as to the irrelevance of the germ theory. Later in his career,  Pasteur recognized that germs and bacteria are not the exact and primary cause of disease. He even abandoned his earlier beliefs on the Germ Theory and became convinced that the disease came first, the germ second. He stated, “The presence in the body of a pathogenic agent is not necessarily synonymous with infectious disease.”   Unfortunately, the trend in modern-day medicine was already in place could not be reversed. 

PRESENT SITUATION

Modern medicine, being based on the germ theory, fails to consider the body as a whole. In attacking the “germ”, it weakens the body, particularly the immune system. Whether it is the flu, tuberculosis, pneumonia, or cancer, our body is not made stronger but weaker through common orthodox treatment or procedures.  

   Contrasted to this, fighting illness or disease on the basis of the Environmental Theory, the body is strengthened and supported while dealing with the ailment.  For instance, if it is the flu, wholistic medicine would use herbs and procedures that fight infection, but do not hurt the body, thus enabling the body to fight the infection as well. Even with cancer or other diseases, the wholistic approach will strengthen the body so that it can defend itself.