Complementary Medicine: Risks to Infants and Children

Complementary Alternative Medicine (CAM) that targets infants and children can place them at grave risk. Our plan is to review some of the major cases of CAM used by parents, and by unlicensed and even licensed health professionals. Complications from CAM are rarely the focus of regulatory bodies, or even the courts. Even regulated health professionals, who have profited by misrepresenting science-based evidence for treatment or prevention of disease, have been rarely sanctioned by their respective Boards or Colleges. This must change. In addition, there is a dire need for regulators, including the governments, who allow quack products and devices to be marketed in their respective countries, to prosecute them. Existing regulations must be coupled with more effective enforcement. Some of these cases have had a direct connection to me personally, while others are examples of just plain dangerous quackery.