Albert Abrams
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Albert Abrams (1863–1924) was a quack and a fraud, posing as a doctor in San Francisco, whose tool for gaining profit from the gullible was a variety of "electricity therapy" he called ERA, or Electronic Reactions of Abrams. This practice is most commonly referred to as Radionics.
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[edit] Early days
Abrams was born in San Francisco around 1863, giving dates a couple of years either way on occasions. He fraudulently[1] claimed to have qualified in medicine from the University of Heidelberg at the age of variously 18 to 20.
In 1910 Abrams published a book on a medical technique he called Spondylotherapy. In his view this was his version of Chiropractic and Osteopathy which were criticised by orthodox medicine at the time. Courses in Spondylotherapy and ERA cost $200.00 and the equipment was leased at about $200.00 with a monthly $5.00 charge thereafter. The lessee had to sign a contract stating the device would never be opened. [1]
[edit] Hubris
Abrams promoted an idea that electrons were the basic element of all life. He called this ERA, for Electronic Reactions of Abrams, and introduced a number of different machines. One of these was the Dynomizer, which he claimed could diagnose any known disease from a single drop of blood or alternatively the subject's handwriting.
[edit] The devices
The Dynomizer looked something like a radio, The blood did not have to be fresh; Abrams performed diagnoses on dried blood samples sent to him on pieces of paper in envelopes through the mail. Apparently Abrams even claimed he could conduct medical practice over the telephone with his machines, and that he could determine personality characteristics.
The Dynomizer was big business by 1918, then Abrams decided to take the next step: treating the diagnosed diseases. Abrams came up with a new and even more impressive gadget, the "Oscilloclast", apparently also known as the "Radioclast". It came with tables of frequencies that it was to be set to, to "attack" specific diseases. Clients were told cures required repeated treatments.
The Dynomizer operator tended to give alarming diagnoses, involving combinations of such maladies as cancer, diabetes and syphilis. Abrams often included a disease called "bovine syphilis," unknown to other medical practitioners. He claimed the Oscilloclast was capable of defeating most of these diseases, most of the time.
Students attended Abrams' San Francisco clinic for training courses listed at $200 USD a head, a significant sum at the time, and then leased the devices to take back home. Abrams developed a range of different devices. The rules specified that the boxes could not be opened excusing this as fear of disrupting their delicate adjustment.
By 1921, there were claimed to be 3,500 practitioners using ERA technology. Conventional medical practitioners were extremely suspicious.
[edit] Nemesis
In 1923, an elderly man who was diagnosed in the Mayo Clinic with inoperable stomach cancer went to an ERA practitioner, who declared him "completely cured" after treatments. The man died a month later, and a public uproar followed.
[edit] Investigation
The dispute between Abrams and his followers and the American Medical Association (AMA) was intensified. Defenders included American radical author Upton Sinclair and the famously credulous Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes.
Resolution of the dispute through the intervention of a scientifically respected third party was pursued. Scientific American magazine decided to investigate Dr. Abrams' claims. Scientific American was interested in the matter as readers were writing letters to the editor saying that Abrams' revolutionary machines were one of the greatest inventions of the century and so needed to be discussed in the pages of the magazine.
Scientific American assembled a team of investigators who worked with a senior Abrams associate pseudonymised as "Doctor X." The investigators developed a series of tests and the magazine asked readers to suggest their own tests. The investigators gave Doctor X six vials containing unknown pathogens and asked him to identify them. It seems likely that Doctor X honestly believed in his Abrams machines, since he would not have agreed to cooperate if he hadn't, and in fact he allowed the Scientific American investigators to observe his procedure.
Doctor X got the contents of all six vials completely wrong. He examined the vials and pointed out that they had labels in red ink, whose vibrations confounded the instruments. The investigators gave him the vials again with less offensive labels, and he got the contents wrong again.
The results were published in Scientific American[2] and led to a predictable "flame war" in the letters pages between advocates and critics. The investigators continued their work. Abrams offered to "cooperate" with the investigators, but always failed to do so on various pretexts. Abrams never actually participated in the investigation, and in ERA publications asserted he was a victim of unjust persecution.
[edit] Debunking
Then an AMA member sent a blood sample to an Abrams practitioner, and got back a diagnosis that the patient had malaria, diabetes, cancer and syphilis. The blood sample was in fact from a Rock rooster.
Similar samples were sent to other Abrams practitioners, and a few found themselves facing fraud charges in court. In a case in Jonesboro, Arkansas, Abrams was called to be a witness. Abrams instead died of pneumonia at age 62 in January 1924.
With Abrams gone, the AMA publicly opened up one of his machines. Its internals consisted of nothing more than wires connected to lights and buzzers. "Dr" Abrams had been demonstrated to be a fraud.
The fad was over, but others moved into the vacuum and built devices claimed to be based on similar principles.
[edit] References
- ^ History of Stanford medical school and predeccessors : Chapter 26. Wilson
- ^ Austin C. Lescarboura, "Our Abrams Investigation - VI." A Study of the Late Dr. Albert Abrams of San Francisco and His Work. Scientific American 1924 March; 130 (3):159.
Austin C. Lescarboura, "Our Abrams Verdict. The Electronic Reactions of Abrams and Electronic Medicine in General Found Utterly Worthless. Scientific American 1924 Sep; 131 (3):158-159
[edit] See also
- Health fraud
- Royal Raymond Rife
- Reinhold Voll
- Helmut Schimmel
- Oberon device
- Radionics
