August 25, 2010
I am reposting the following article which came from Asia Health Care Blog , written by Damjan Denoble. It’s an all-round warning to beware when one is operating in a culture that is willing to compromise and punish truth and integrity, which has a history of killing the messenger instead of tackling the ugly facts in the message itself. Here is the verbatim article:
“A year or so ago we did a post on a Chinese hospital that was offering stem cell “cures” for disease like Alzheimers and various paralytic diseases. The Chinese hospital we referred to in that piece – Beijing TianTian Puhua Hospital, in Beijing (they have a great website explaining exactly how they plan to scam you) – had one of their English speaking secretaries send us a “cease and desist” type message through our contact form. It was badly misspelled and about a paragraph long. Apparently our coverage of their fake stem cell practice touched a nerve.
“Well, all I can say is, boy it’s good to be in the US of A, where I can safely say, “Go F yourself TianTian Puhua Hospital in Beijing for taking suffering people’s money and feeding them false hope.”
“Fang Xuanchang is a respected Chinese science and technology journalist who was recently beaten by two men he suspects were thugs hired by an angry doctor he exposed in a story. The incident suggests a new enemy to journalists in a nation filled with government press crackdowns: vindictive story subjects who hire mobsters to seek revenge. Photograph by: John M. Glionna, Los Angeles Times/MCT
“Then, today, I picked up on this touching article from the Vancouver Sun about Fang Xuanchang, a Chinese investigative reporter who specializes in reporting on quack doctors and false hope operations. Mr. Fang got his head beaten in by lead piping by thugs as he was walking home one evening, all because he was uncovering doctors committing crimes against unwitting patients.
“Could have been me, I guess.
“The lessons for readers are 1) to always, always, always get more than one recommendation for a doctor when you’re in China, 2) if you’re going to have surgery in China, and you have the time to plan it out but don’t have time to hop on a plane and go back home, have a Western doctor at one of the International SOS clinics or a private, English-speaking staff hospital recommend a doctor for you to see, and 3) figure out what hospital you would want to be taken to in case of an emergency, and have it written down on something that will be on your person at all times.
“Oh, also, don’t go around busting quack doctors if you don’t have to.”
Crossing Cultures 