Day: May 17, 2010

Billy Joel’s Daughter Overdoses on Homeopathic Pills

Chris 2 Comments 694 views

Which means there were no ill effects whatsoever.

Alexa Ray Joel, 23, was rushed to the hospital after taking several pills. Law enforcement sources said they were sleeping pills, but a source close to Joel said it was Traumeel, a medication used to treat minor aches and pains associated with repetitive sports injuries.

“Nothing would happen because there’s nothing in it,” said Dr. Lewis Nelson, a toxicologist at NYU Medical Center. “There’s no active ingredient. There’s nothing in these pills.”

Traumeel contains 12 biological ingredients, including several plants that are known to be toxic, and two mineral substances, according to Traumeel.com.

But homeopathic medicines are so diluted, they often end up not even containing the original ingredients.

“So basically you’d be taking more of nothing,” Nelson said, adding that he still recommends following the instructions on the bottle.

James Randi overdoses on sleeping pills before his TED Talk:

Catholic Hospital Rebukes Nun For Saving Woman’s Life

Chris 5 Comments 639 views

From MSNBC:

PHOENIX – A nun and administrator at a Catholic hospital in Phoenix has been reassigned and rebuked by the local bishop for agreeing that a severely ill woman needed an abortion to survive.

Sister Margaret McBride was on an ethics committee that included doctors that consulted with a young woman who was 11 weeks pregnant late last year, The Arizona Republic newspaper reported on its website Saturday. The woman was suffering from a life-threatening condition that likely would have caused her death if she hadn’t had the abortion at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center.

Hospital officials defended McBride’s actions but confirmed that she has been reassigned from her job as vice president of mission integration at the hospital. They said in a statement that saving the mother required that the fetus be aborted.