Faith in research: prakash inject_ing the drug into a mouse toassess its effects, which hasmade other yaids shun him

in seven days. I am sure he can curecancer."

The world of medical sciencewants to make sure that he can. TheCCRAS, an autonomous body underthe Union health ministry, after muchde l i be ra t i on and pe rsuas ion bvPrakash sanctioned him a Rs 7 lakfiproject last month to studythe effectof his metal-based formulations inpat ients of acute promyelocyt icleukaemia.

The patients selected for the one_year study will have a confirmed dias_nosis backed by blood and bone mai_row tests. Monitoring and analysis ofthe data will be done-by the Ali fndi;Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMSiwhic.h wil l depute a cancer spicialisitor the study. The trial wil l be doneunder Prakash's supervision. He wil lalso provide the details of the trialdrug and a CCMS official will studyits manufacturinq process.

For Prakash this is a step towardsgaining recognition from cancer spe_c,ialists at home and abroad. It wasthe dramatic recovery of five_year_old Iqbal Bhan from

-blood .in.".

that prompted the international medi_c.al community to sit up and take no_tice. lqbal.had been given only a fewweeks to live by Dr Simon Meller ofth.e Royal Marsden Hospital, London,when his father Arun Bhan iook himto Prakash in India. That was aboutten years ago, and for the last fouryears blood tests have shown no traceof leukaemia.. Following this sensational case.

the London-based Leukaemia Re_year5h. .Fund (LRF) sent a team,headed by Meller, to India in l99l toinvestigate the treatment and medi_cinegiven byPrakash. The team, whileconcluding that the drug's curativevalue could not be proved-, cautionedthat it contained arsenic, a poison-ous heavy metal.

Two years later in an article in themedical journal Leukaemia andlymphoma Meller and Dr CoraonPiller, former director of the LRF, ex_pressed apprehensions about poison_ing ny arsenic, mercury and otherheavy.metals used in piakash's po_tion_s (Story on page 36).

Prakash brushes away such fearsstatingthat "the metals are processedto render them non-toxic before be_ing administered to patients'..

Wh i l e a l l opa th ; i n I nd ia and

Back from the deadRAJAN BABU, 32, a senior lecturer at the palakkad Engineering College,wqs-diagnosed in February r 995 as having u.ui" pro*yeroc5rtic reukaemia(svltY.3 tvpe) at the caiicut Mediiai iolt"g".'Aft"ir"""iir .o"i!", orgf elnothgra.pyand aJlopathic medicines he #as referred to ih" ct rii'ti",Medical College, Velloie- Bone Marrow iianiptant

"""iA;;1 b";;;;because he had no matching dr;;;;;;;;i'ir"i's siulings.

The alternative suggestEd at cMC *aJ trigtt dosE-chemotherapy,wh ich.. h e took duri n g iine-August 95. "rt wai-i,irtuairy ; i;;i;;;]r&i_ment," he savs.

Even after this the doctors gave him only a 30 per cent chance ols'rvival. In october g5 he went t-o cMC again ior another course of hishdos-e chemotherapy using a aitterent coiluin.tior tl J."nr]'H; il;i,Vetlore ror more trian 60 d;v' ;a th" t';;iffii;;;#ii,l11ril,'.ili"r,i"liver, lungs and several oth_e. o.gans. Th;i;;;i .;;i ;i'lh"-;ll;;ili.treatment was around Rs 7.b lakh] he says.. Babu recovered enough to rejoin dutyin March 1996. But in Septem_berhe sullered a retapselnd tne aoctoi's ii V;il;;";;il;;iil;ffi];be done. The doctors told his *if. G;;th;, i ao"to, at the TB centre inrs wue \reerna, a ooctor at tne l'ts centre in

Palakkad, that he would not survive for morethan two months.

But then the father of twoyoungchildren, who had been given onlytwo months to rive, is happy that t iis stil iii"e. He is no* *-noi,niiu"anyone else and teaches-for two hours "rr"ry

Auy u, uny "tt "i;;;;il."My-students cannot make out rfii ila;;iiuiaemia patient,,,he savs.He- feets a "smar numbness in tris legi;, whi.h- ;J;;;"lt"rr"Jiigestedcould be due to the heavy metars Ee *i" i"riirg.'bJ;hi,i #i-oit could also be because oJ the hiih do;;

"t "rnott .rupi. H" i" ,,.i,'iriilnto attribute the "discomfort" tdprakastr's meaicln"'r: .Th;;;;;;:

has not increased after I restarted on the taLteil'rre says. ',And it is slowlygoing." His faith in prakash is total. :

V.M. RAJASEKHAR

THE WEEK I NOV, I6 , I997