COVID-19: The Great Accelerator

Within just a few short months, the mysterious and deadly novel COVID-19 virus managed to attract the attention of every human population on Earth. Not since the last great pandemic in 1918 has the attention of humanity been gathered with such urgency. As humans around the world are adjusting to living with uncertainty as the new normal and a slower pace of life, we are also finding a keener awareness and receptivity to important messages and issues: environmental protection, social justice, family bonding, and disease immunity, to name just a few.

Many have called COVID-19 the Great Accelerator in helping humanity create better ways of living. UN Environment Program Executive Director Inger Andersen declared, “Nature is sending us a message with COVID-19. We have pushed nature into a corner, we have encroached on ecosystems. We need to take care of nature.”

Sonia Shah, author of the 2017 book Pandemic, notes that human activities are increasingly intruding on wild habitats and “building roads between wild animals and human bodies…making it much likelier that a previously harmless microbe will cause a devastating outbreak.” Our short-sighted environmental choices can be directly linked to infectious disease outbreaks. 

For example, the West Nile virus outbreak of 1999 was preceded by two decades of steady habitat loss for a diversity of avian species like woodpeckers and rails, which are unreliable carriers of West Nile. Instead, local bird populations swelled with the more environmentally hardy robins and crows, which are choice carriers of the virus. Fewer rails and woodpeckers, plus more crows and robins, equals more West Nile. 

Likewise, the loss of forest habitats means bats are roosting closer to our homes, where we are more likely to come into contact with pathogen-infected guano, while the numbers of chipmunks and opossums — top tick predators preventing the spread of Lyme disease — have shrunk drastically over the past half century. According to Shah, “150 species are going extinct every day. And the species that are remaining have to squeeze into these tiny fragments of wildlife habitat that we leave for them.” 

Shah approvingly notes that the CDC (Centers for Disease Control), which currently sits at the center of so much controversy and confusion surrounding COVID-19, has launched the One Health approach, a global movement recognizing the interconnectedness between people, plants, animals and their shared environments. The CDC website notes that One Health is not new, but has become more important in recent years because of the many factors rapidly changing in our environments, including COVID-19. 

If it feels like humanity has reached a threshold, perhaps it’s because we have. We can’t go back — we can only go forward — but this precipitous moment of change allows us to redirect our vision for humanity’s future and write it into our history. The pandemic has especially highlighted the vulnerability of our healthcare system, which offers little for the prevention, treatment or cure of this novel coronavirus (and how many other viruses yet to come?) The exclusive focus on a hastily-produced vaccine — with questionable effectiveness, unknown side effects and potential annual boosters — as the sole solution to this global crisis has sown confusion and doubt about the integrity of the information and the institutions issuing these directives.

This is especially alarming for those of us who are successfully using alternative healthcare methods to treat and prevent COVID-19, including homeopathy, energy therapies, hyperbaric oxygen treatment, hydrogen peroxide, nutritional supplements, sound healing and much more. These potent and completely safe, life-enhancing, and sometimes life-saving treatments have absolutely zero side effects, yet in many cases have been labeled COVID-19 “disinformation,” censored and removed on various internet platforms because they conflict with the CDC and UN World Health Organization vaccine-only narrative. 

Are we to believe that there is only one solution to any problem, especially one as large and complex as a global pandemic involving billions of people? What is the likelihood that any COVID vaccine could be administered sufficiently before the virus has already morphed into a new pandemic-strength strain, requiring re-vaccination of the entire global population again? And again. And again. This scenario disempowers all of humanity collectively and only makes sense for a privileged few who will profit. I refuse to accept this human destiny. 

Instead, the presence of COVID-19 among us is our cue to begin telling our new medicine story now. You are the cure. A universal healing framework exists, and your body is already plugged into it. You can get treated today just by asking for it. The biggest obstacle to receiving this treatment will be suspending your own disbelief. A lengthy examination of one such modality, Eminus Mirus (EM for short), begins on page 40 this issue. And if ever there was an apt new modality in the days of COVID-19, EM is it. With instruction offered online and all treatments provided remotely, EM is well suited for a global pandemic.

A smoldering quest to authenticate my passionate belief that we are self-contained healing units has fueled the past thirty-five years of publishing Spirit of Change. This vantage point has provided me with a front row seat, both as a journalist and participant, in exploring alternative healthcare of every kind. Just as we are able to feed ourselves, groom ourselves, procreate and even kill ourselves through completely natural means, why would we not be able to heal ourselves the same way? It is only logical that humans would be inherently self-equipped to fully succeed at everything needed for life on Earth. Just because we haven’t yet discovered en masse how the healing part works, doesn’t mean we won’t. 

Just over 100 years ago it was inconceivable that we would one day drive everywhere in automobiles. Projections are that by 2030 the majority of vehicles on the road will be driverless and fully automated. Now apply that degree of transformation to a future vision of healthcare. Why not consider the possibility that a large portion of our healthcare can be accomplished remotely, and is accessible anywhere, to anyone, at a fraction of current healthcare costs? We can learn to access it ourselves, share it with others, or allow others to access and apply it for us. 

While this vision is radically outside-the-box of what we currently experience and believe about healthcare, nothing less will do for such a global transformation in medicine. Who hasn’t imagined miraculous healing powers our bodies might possess? Now is the time to rewrite our medicine story as humanity begins to define its new post-COVID norms. “Whatever you believe you can do, begin it,” the maxim states.

And then start building. Transformation of this magnitude does not happen overnight, nor does a completely new system of healing emerge fully developed. In EM, launched in 2013 and profiled this issue, new treatments are regularly added to the compendium, while others are combined or simplified to continually streamline and refine the process. “It’s hard to build a dynamic medicine system with room to grow, and tend to the landscaping at the same time,” laments EM founder Ethan Borg. 

While sending healing energy treatments with EM might seem a little cumbersome to learn and use at first, it was incredibly empowering for me to have spent the summer EMing away plentiful bug bites with the Self-Diagnosing Itchy Bug Bite Treatment instead of suffering with weeks of scratching and drawing blood. In addition, I have found that other complementary treatments I use are more effective while I am using EM, prompting their more frequent use. I attribute this to an overall increase in yin/yang balance in my body that is the foundation of EM; however this cannot replace the great relief experienced through hands-on healing and other unique forms of alternative medicine. 

No matter what form of medicine you use, the bottom line is that you effect the cure, not the tool you use. Just as a carpenter uses a hammer to build a house, the carpenter is the builder, not the hammer. It’s your body that either heals or doesn’t heal, whether through EM or surgery or hypnosis or herbs, it’s still your body that effects the cure. I envision the day when parents will teach their children how to heal themselves as naturally as they pass on basic food prep and toilet training skills. 

It’s more important than ever that we publicly share information about new medicine and healing without fear of censorship. The ominous trend towards shutting down these conversations online is no different than the narrow-minded persecution Galileo faced 500 years ago when revealing that our solar system was Sun-based, not Earth-centered. The United Nations, for example, recently enlisted 10,000 digital volunteers to rid the internet of what they consider false information about COVID-19 via the Verified initiative, and to disseminate only what they say is “U.N.-verified, science-based content.”

This makes it all the more important for us to become aware of who we are electing for our local, state and federal representatives during this upcoming election cycle. Take time to read up on candidates and their health freedom views. They will be the ones who decide if restrictions are to be placed on disseminating alternative health information, or even whether certain holistic practitioners can be allowed to practice in your town. We need alternative practitioners more than ever before, so it’s vital to codify these health freedoms into law. 

As this issue of Spirit of Change goes to press, Massachusetts Senate bill S.2634 is under review by the Joint Committee on Ways and Means.  This bill, An Act providing for consumer access to and the right to practice complementary and alternative health care services, would protect unlicensed holistic health practitioners from being charged with practicing medicine without a license and would assure consumer access to their services. This proposed legislation has come a long way in the past year and a half — from its initial drafting through sponsorship by numerous Senators and Representatives and favorable passage by the Joint Committee on Public Health.

The good news is that the bill enjoys strong support and the legislative session has been extended due to the pandemic. The bad news is that coronavirus pandemic has stalled the progress of the bill as countless COVID-19 bills are considered by the legislature. Please ensure that this bill — so vital to both holistic health practitioners and consumers — moves out of the Ways and Means committee and onto the floor for a general vote. Urge the Chair of the Committee, Senator Michael J. Rodrigues, to pass the bill out of committee as soon as possible. Make your voice heard by calling him today at (617) 722-1114 or emailing him at Michael.Rodrigues@masenate.gov.

Carol Bedrosian is the publisher of Spirit of Change Magazine and an EM Level 4 student.