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Comment by secretsatan | Hacker News Reader

Stopped reading at `Systemic use of natural and alternative healing modalities could vastly reduce covid mortality`

Ok, but please don't post unsubstantive comments to Hacker News.

Physical exercise, breathwork, healthy diets and diverse immune exposure all seem rather "holistic" and yet seem rather likely to reduce covid mortality -- perhaps much more so than, say, Remdesvir

When people refer to natural or alternative medicine, they're not usually talking about common sense lifestyle changes universally endorsed by the medical establishment. That's just regular medicine.

You'd think so, but no. My father had amazing cancer care but the idea of prescribing him yoga or actually any kind of light physical fitness program was considered "integrative" medicine and basically outside of the mainstream. This is changing. But "regular medicine" is, at present, very much not a holistic healing practice.

> Physical exercise, breathwork, healthy diets and diverse immune exposure

I've gone to "mainstream healing" doctors and they always recommend exercise, have a good diet, etc. When people say "alternative healing" that's not usually what they mean.

Why? You might disagree but the article is interesting?

Can you also assert that there’s nothing “natural” you can do that would systematically help with COVID prevention? Quitting smoking, running, healthy inmune system with dieting and so on?

That's not particularly alternative, it's interventions completely accepted by the medical system.

Quitting smoking is not what natural means here. Natural & Alternative is a catch all term for holistic medicine.

That's not what he means and you know it.

I’m honestly not sure what he means. I may disagree with most, but I’m just surprised about people stopping reading when they hear something they disagree with.

It’s not even the central point of the article.

It's stopping reading at a sentence dripping with pseudo intellectualism. When writers try too hard to sound intelligent and erudite it's off-putting, and a "bullshit" indicator.

I agree that it puts me off as well but it's also feels a bit like a no true Scotsman fallacy. If we're always on the lookout for "bad words" then we will eventually set up impossible standards for how we speak.

Yeah this is a major problem in the political landscape overall. Like for example refusing to read anything by conservatives just because you happen to disagree with them on abortion issues. You're going to be a) missing out on a lot of insights and b) even worse, create a divide where you can't even understand the other side anymore just because you outright refuse to hear them out.

I tripped on that sentence myself but continued reading since it seemed like a minor point to the actual story and I wasn't disappointed.

Feels like you're throwing out the baby with the bathwater a bit there.

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