THE TREATMENT OF ASTHMA (October 3, 1970)

Sir: At a recent conference held by the Asthma Foundation of New South Wales, Sydney (August, 1970), the introduction of a new asthma drug, “Salbutamol”, was discussed. It was stated in The Sydney Morning Herald that this drug appeared much more effective and much safer than equivalent preparations. It was suggested that
”Salbutamol” had minimal side effects on the human heart, and that a disadvantage of other bronchodilating drugs used in Australia was that they stimulated, and perhaps over stimulated, the heart.

Apparent satisfaction was expressed by some of the participants of the conference with the present trend of asthma research and with the results of past work in this field. It is extremely difficult to reconcile this complaisant attitude with a public admission of the limitation and harmful consequences of orthodox palliative drug therapy, and once more I must voice my dissent with this unjustifiable approval of the stereotyped concept on the nature and cause of asthma conditions manifested in the exclusive concentration on the perfection of drug therapy; as a means of solving the “asthma problem”.

The merit of any research work can only be assessed by the practical benefits achieved through subsequently evolved therapy. The end result of all past and present asthma research is the same - the development and use of newer, more “promising” drugs (cortisone, “Intal”, etc., etc.), and now yet another, “Salbutamol”, is to be added to the list of palliative drugs used in the treatment of asthma.

I cannot agree with my learned colleagues' opinion that Australia is a world leader in asthma research, with the admitted fact that the incidence of asthma in Australia is the second highest per capita in the world, and is still rising in spite of the efforts of medical science to prefect the orthodox management of asthma by palliative drug therapy.

Impressive, scholastic phrases and scientific terminology cannot conceal the fact that no new findings of practical therapeutic value have been developed from the one-sided direction of present-day asthma research, and I suggest that it is high time for a more fundamental and rational approach to the treatment of asthma by natural physical methods, which have already proved to be of inestimable value in my daily practice.

7 Bourke Street, A. James.

Wollongong, N.S.W. 2500.