Mario
Fontes is a member of the State of Arizona Acupuncture Board of
Examiners
and clinic
director of Natural Medicine & Detox in Phoenix, which offers a
board-approved chemical dependency program. Fontes is, as his profession and
position might indicate, somewhat famous for his defense of
acupuncture,
including
auricular acupuncture.
Now,
acupuncture is theatrical placebo,
but Fontes believes otherwise, and will quickly dismiss his critics as
pathological naysayers:
“Anytime
there’s something that’s not mainstream, eventually, it becomes integrated, and
there’s always going to be the people opposed to that.” And also: why
should critics even care? “The people who want our help, we’re here for. The
people who don’t, that’s OK.” As for efficacy, Fontes claims – falsely, as it turns out, in addition to
irrelevantly – that acupuncture has been
practiced for millenia; he also, like many defenders of acupuncture, like to point to troubles in
conventional medicine, such as antibiotics resistance, which are of course irrelevant to the question of whether his
favored woo actually works – indeed, the State of Arizona Acupuncture Board of
Examiners have taken it upon themselves to combat the opioid crisis by
approving chemical dependency programs for auricular acupuncture (i.e. Fontes’s
own venture), predictably focusing on emphasizing that
‘opioids are bad’ and systematically neglecting the question of whether
auricular acupuncture works, which it doesn’t . Then Fontes challenges the
establishment: “It’s the predominant belief
that the true path to health is drugs, radiation and surgery,” says Fontes,
answering that “I just don’t believe that,” since who would have the
audacity to challenge a sincerely held belief? (And yes, he argues both
that acupuncture is mainstream and a minority of skeptics should be dismissed,
and that he is a brave maverick doctor taking on the establishment; we suppose you’re
not supposed to notice the tension.)
Now,
Fontes’s interest in alternative medicine isn’t limited to acupuncture. Indeed,
his interest in alternative medicine “began with homeopathy, and later he expanded into
acupuncture.” Oh,
yes. Fontes is a “clinical instructor” at the American Medical
College of Homeopathy and the Phoenix Institute of Herbal Medicine and Acupuncture,
where he will tell customers about how the “energetics”
of acupuncture can be applied to the “energetics” of homeopathy and how
homeopathy is safer even than herbal medicine,
which is probably correct since homeopathic remedies are just water
and herbal remedies may contain powerful chemicals in unknown dosages and
combinations (they’re ‘natural’,
after all). His center also offers – among a slew of other nonsense treatments
– colon hydrotherapy,
detox foot baths,
“nutritional IVs”,
and chelation therapy.
Diagnosis: Yes, more of the same, and we wish we could say
‘just stay away’, but the Arizona Acupuncture Board of Examiners might actually
have some sway over policy decisions and resource allocations, so things might
end badly no matter what.
Hat-tip: Sciencebased Medicine
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