Urban Legends

From Rife Wiki

Google "Rife" and you will find a few pages with negative urban legends about Rife therapy sprinkled with negative terms to enforce the point. On this page, we want to look at who is creating these urban legends, what they are saying, and what the view of Rife researchers are to these stories.

Contents 1 Who Are These Skeptics 2 Responding to the Critics 3 Rife Machine Operator Sued 3.1 Response to this story from the Rife Research community 3.1.1 Advanced colon and liver cancer 3.1.2 Guilty by Association 3.1.3 Can Resonance Destroy Bacteria? 3.1.4 Conclusions 4 Cheating Death 5 References

Who Are These Skeptics

While it is natural to have a healthy skepticism about any form of medical treatment (either allopathic or natural medicine), such skepticism should normally lead to an informed analysis of both sides of the story.

There are, however, a group of people who call themselves "Skeptics", who deliberately paint a very negative picture of Rife therapy based on poor or falsely reported facts filled with terms like "Quack", "dangerous", and many other such loaded terms, without providing any scientific evidence to back up such statements.

In particular, alternative medicine related pages on Wikipedia are completely controlled by such "Skeptics", as can be seen by the highly biased editing of the Royal Rife^[1] page on Wikipedia. Other websites, like www.quackwatch.org for example, present themselves as some kind of public service, yet in reality are associated with people of questionable background and have admitted in court to be sponsored by the pharmaceutical industry, FDA and AMA.^{[2] [3] [4]}

Responding to the Critics

Up until now, the Rife community has done very little to answer and debunk the negative urban legends these people have written to discourage people from investigating Rife therapy.

A typical example is the Royal Rife page on Wikipedia, which is full of half truths and negative comments about Rife therapy. Although Wikipedia claims to be unbiased^[5], this is not true of the page relating to Royal Rife, as all attempts by Rife experts to correct such biased reporting are immediately deleted^[6], usually supported by poor rationales. Unlike the Rife Wiki, the skeptics are in full control of alternative health pages on Wikipedia, etc.

On this page, we want to look at these urban legends and discuss what is true and false from the point of view of those actually involved in Rife research--as opposed to the opinion of those who have a vested interest in suppressing knowledge about Rife technology.

The urban legends are listed here by the term used as a title in the respective urban legend. Instead of repeating the actual urban legend here in full, our reports will simply concentrate on putting the story right.

Rife Machine Operator Sued

This urban legend relates to a case dating back to 1997.

In a court case of the time, a lady called Shelvie Rettmann, of Prior Lake, Minnesota, is claimed to have made representations that she can cure cancer.

She is claimed to have treated two patients (mother and daughter), who were diagnosed with "advanced colon and liver cancer" and "breast cancer" respectively, and suggested that these patients avoid chemotherapy and instead use her therapy.

During the therapy, Rettmann used radionics to analyze and treat the patient along with a Rife generator, a special diet, dietary supplements, a regimen of baths, and foot zoning.

Despite positive reports from Rettman, the mother later died of cancer and the daughter later determined she did not have breast cancer.

Rettmann allegedly conducted seminars about her products in Ellsworth. Consumers who used her services were allegedly told that she had successfully treated as many as 1,000 patients.

She had been selling the Rife device for about $3,500 and the radionics machine for $1,700. She also sold the nutritional supplements she recommended.

In September 1998, Minnesota Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III announced that his office had obtained a judgment against Rettmann. The Scott County District Court found that Rettmann had violated state laws prohibiting deceptive trade practices and consumer fraud by selling medical devices without FDA approval and telling consumers she could cure cancer with a "Rife generator" machine, a "radionics" device, "foot-zoning" treatments, and various vitamins and supplements. During a hearing, the FDA provided support and expert testimony confirming that the devices Rettmann sold were illegal.

The judge concluded: (a) Rettmann had sold over $7,000 worth of bogus medical devices, treatments and products to an Anoka, Minnesota, man with pancreatic and liver cancer; (b) Rettmann promised she could cure the consumer's cancer faster if he stopped taking chemotherapy treatments; (c) relying on Rettmann's promise, the man stopped chemotherapy after a single session and died four months later; and (d) Rettmann also violated Minnesota consumer laws by saying she was licensed to practice "foot zoning" (essentially foot massage) and she could cure cancer through "foot zoning" treatments. Minnesota does not license the practice of "foot zoning." The judge prohibited Rettmann from providing health care services or products, ordered refunds upon request to injured consumers, and imposed civil penalties of $50,000 plus the state's attorney fees and costs.

Rettmann filed for bankruptcy in July 1998. However, the court ruled that the State was still entitled to obtain a judgment.

Response to this story from the Rife Research community

First of all, the court case is real and someone called Shelvie Rettmann did exist, although she has since passed away.

According to the History of Rife Communities, the Rife research community has been active since at least 1996, with many active researchers have been involved for years previous to that. If Shelvie Rettmann had been involved in Rife therapy and treating over 1000 patients, the Rife community would have known about her at the time. Despite repeated discussions about this case, it has not been possible to find anyone involved with Rife research who actually knew Shelvie Rettman. As information about Rife technology was difficult to find at that time, the very fact that nobody in Rife research of the time knew about her shows that she could not have fully understood what Rife technology consisted of.

Although the terms "Rife frequency" and "Rife generator" are mentioned, no particular unit is mentioned by name. Reports in the media of the time referred to it as a "Rifer Frequency Generator radionics machine". However, according to our research, no actual Rife machine has ever been sold under that name. Again, the name suggests that she used a radionics, not a Rife machine.

Inquiries have been made to the court in question and they have been unable to name the device used either. Either way, the methods described refer to radionics devices, not Rife in any form. The fact that they say "Rettmann allegedly advised both to have treatments with a Rife Frequency Generator" means they have no proof that any kind of Rife device was involved at all. Back in 1997, modern "Rife" devices were in their infancy and not comparable with the high quality equipment available today. It has since been determined that devices made in that day were not operating according to the principles of Royal Rife, as those principles were not understood until much later.

Further research has shown that Shelvie was actually using a radionics device, not Rife therapy at all as we know it today. See also Rife and R.I.F.E. machines defined.

Advanced colon and liver cancer

Anybody who is involved in treating "advanced colon and liver cancer" knows that this is a serious disease and nobody can promise any kind of cure. One of the most serious accusations made is that Rettmann had advised against using chemotherapy. We must therefore ask how effective is chemotherapy against these forms of cancer, and would chemotherapy have saved the patient if it was used.

In the peer reviewed study "The Contribution of Cytotoxic Chemotherapy to 5-year Survival in Adult Malignancies"^[7], chemotherapy contributes to the 5 year survival rate of colon cancer in just 1% of such cases (in 13936 cases, just 146 people survived for 5 years). Although liver cancer was not discussed in that paper, having advanced liver cancer in addition to colon cancer is not going to improve the patient's chances of survival. As the quoted 1% effectiveness is well below generally accepted levels (30%) for the placebo effect, administering chemotherapy or not would not have had any real effect on the survival of the patient.

Guilty by Association

This skeptics report tries hard to associate Rife therapy with radionics -- two very different methods which have nothing in common. The report further tries to associate Rife with Albert Abrams, MD. It is known that Rife was aware of the work of Albert Abrams. However the Rife devices he developed were very different from those made by Abrams. It is like comparing a bicycle to a motor car. Both can be used for transporting people and have wheels, yet their inherent design is very different.

Can Resonance Destroy Bacteria?

According to the skeptics, "The American Cancer Society has pointed out that although sound waves can produce vibrations that break glass, radio waves at the power level emitted a Rife generator do not have sufficient energy to destroy bacteria".

Our experiments have shown that Rife frequencies can be very effective in selectively destroying pathogens. The report from the American Cancer society shows they have made no such investigations of their own into this.

Conclusions

The skeptic's article is valuable in showing us what NOT to do. Regardless of the individuals involved, no one should be taking money for health care without a license; no one should promise a "cure" with or without a license; initial diagnosis, no matter who does it, should include lab test findings; and if a "cure" is achieved it should also be verified by a conventional laboratory test.

The bottom line is that according to our research, Rettmann was using Radionics, not Rife therapy. Furthermore, this case has nothing to do with modern day Rife equipment or the equipment originally developed by Royal Raymond Rife.

Cheating Death

In this urban legend, Geoff Baker of Electromed in Australia is accused of selling a Rife pad device to David Carpenter for the treatment of "inoperable cancer of the prostate gland". David purchased the device after reading an article in the Australian edition of Nexus magazine^[8] during 1996. The patient later died of this disease 8 months later than the prognoses given to him by his allopathic doctors, who had already given up on him and sent him home to die, over a year before he actually died.^[9]

This story is easy to debunk. If you look at the actual advert published in Nexus magazine, you will see that the device was actually sold by "Electro Therapy Systems, Australia" which was not run or owned by either Geoff Baker or Electromed. Geoff Baker was not even working for Electromed at the time. The skeptics obviously knew this, as the advert was even briefly shown on a video clip about this story^[10] yet they never reported in their stories that Electromed was not involved in or aware of the sale of this PET device for cancer at all. According to research, as soon as Electromed learned that one of their devices had been sold for cancer, despite strict instruction the units were only to be sold for arthritis based on their own double-blind study^[11], the device was bought back and a full refund issued.

The urban legend then goes on to make blatant unreferenced and unscientific statements that Rife therapy is somehow "worthless".

As in all such urban legends, a number of negative statements are made -- yet no reference was made to any scientific studies upon which those statements were presumably based. It is one thing to say a technology is unproven, but all that means is that it cannot be said whether or not it works. One cannot infer from a lack of scientific studies that a technology has no value. In fact, there are an ever-increasing number of scientific studies that prove this technology has significant value in the devitalizing of pathogens, and can even be useful in the treatment of cancer.^[12]

References