This is What Chemotherapy Does

The result of Christopher Hitchens' chemotherapy is a stark reminder of the risk in blindly submitting to modern medicine's treatments.

by Heidi Stevenson

12 August 2010

Simply look at the picture to your right and compare it with the recent one below to see what chemotherapy does. Christopher Hitchens used his mind to decide that he could not find a way to reason the existence of a god. He then refused to use that same mind to think rationally about the value of modern medicine. Knowing that his cancer is not considered curable by modern medicine's chemotherapy, he still allowed himself to be subjected to it. The result is stark.

Hitchens announced on 30 June this year that he would shortly start chemotherapy treatment for esophageal cancer. He wrote:

I have been advised by my physician that I must undergo a course of chemotherapy on my esophagus. This advice seems persuasive to me. I regret having had to cancel so many engagements at such short notice.⁽¹⁾

It is now just two months later, and this is what the treatment has wrought—and for whose benefit? What does he gain from it?

Esophageal cancer is usually detected late, and Hitchens' was typical in that respect; it had spread to lymph nodes. The likelihood of successful treatment with modern medicine is fadingly slim. The Merck Manual states that "the doctor's main objective is to control symptoms, especially pain and the inability to swallow, which can be very frightening to the person and loved ones."⁽²⁾

Hitchens is frank about his condition. "How am I? I am dying."

The question that I must ask is, Why not look into alternatives? When you know that modern medicine has no solutions and that its treatments for your condition can only make you suffer, likely dying from its ministrations, what's the advantage in going to it? Why trust a doctor who tells you to have a treatment that can only make you miserable?

Whatever one's feelings about Hitchens and his atheism, he has proven himself a creative thinker. That makes it particularly sad that he was unable to think for himself when faced with his own mortality. Instead, he simply followed the dictates of the established medical paradigm and submitted himself and his body to it. The result can be seen above. It's stark—and unutterably sad.

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