PARENTS WIN RIGHT TO STOP CHILD'S CHEMO

The parents of a five-year-old cancer patient yesterday won a landmark bid to withdraw her from a proposed chemotherapy regime. The Royal Children's Hospital in Brisbane had made an application to the Supreme Court of Queensland which would have compelled Aaron and Deborah Boomsma to comply with the treatment on their daughter, Laura, who had been diagnosed with a rare Wilms tumour in her right kidney in November 2001. She underwent pre-operative chemotherapy in December and surgery in January to remove the tumour. Doctors began post-operative chemotherapy but the Boomsmas objected and said they wanted to seek alternative treatment overseas. The hospital took them to court.

The Campaign for Truth in Medicine was contacted by the Boomsmas and a dossier of evidence on the harmful effects of chemotherapy was compiled for the Boomsma legal defence team. Mr Boomsma stated, "I had attended a Phillip Day cancer seminar very soon after Laura's diagnosis and at that meeting, I learned that there were considerable dangers to human health with some of these treatments. Yet the information we were given by the hospital at the commencement of Laura's chemotherapy was very, very limited in its information, especially on its side-effects. As far as hospital treatment goes, there was just one option given to us. It was chemotherapy or chemotherapy. But that can kill cells in your body, both good and bad."

Original affidavits presented to the courts on behalf of the hospital also made scant mention of the side-effects of Vincristin and Actinomycin-D, the cancer drugs being prescribed to Laura. Admitted side-effects of Vincristin include hair loss, constipation, loss of feeling, hearing or taste, muscle wasting, nausea or vomiting, inflamed gums or mouth ulcers.
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It is believed to be the first time parents have been successful in avoiding a hospital's enforcement of chemotherapy treatment.

The Boomsmas are flying to the UK, where Laura will begin alternative treatment at the Dove Clinic. It will include high-dosage intravenous Vitamin C combined with methods for stimulating white blood cells and destroying cancer cells. Australian and UK doctors hailed the case as landmark and accused Australian oncologists of refusing to recognise international moves supported by scientific evidence to combine chemotherapy with alternative therapies.
CTM correspondent