Derek Sorensen

From Quackwatch:

Nevada bill aims to legalize quackery.

http://www.quackwatch.org/07PoliticalActivities/nevada_sb69.pdf

Nevada State Senator Michael A. Schneider has introduced S.B. 69, an 85-page bill that would:

**Declare Nevada a “freedom of health” state.

**Affirm that patients are “entitled to access to and the use of the products and services of any provider of health care chosen by the patient, including, without limitation, a complementary integrative medical physician or any other provider of health care.”

**Replace the current homeopathic board with a Board of Complementary Integrative Medical Examiners that has the same powers but can authorize people to become licensed or certified as a “complementary integrative medical physician,” “advanced practitioner of complementary integrative medicine,” “complementary integrative medical assistant” or “complementary integrative medical nutritionist.”

**Require insurance providers to recognize the “ABC Coding system” (a nonstandard coding system for “alternative” and “complementary” services) as a valid means of communicating. http://www.abccodes.com/

The practices that would be permitted under the bill’s umbrella would include biofermentics, bio-oxidative therapy, electrodiagnosis, herbal therapy, homeopathy, naturopathy, neural therapy, neuromuscular integration, orthomolecular therapy, nonembryonic stem cell therapy, peptides, and “any intravenous infusion, intramuscular injection, subcutaneous injection and intradermal injection of nutrients, including, without limitation, vitamins, amino acids, minerals, enzymes, compounded pharmaceutical preparations, homeopathic medications, organ preparations, ozone, hydrogen peroxide and chelating agents.” S.B. 69 may be the worst piece of health-related legislation in U.S. history. Senator Schneider introduced a similar bill in 2007. Susan E. Gallagher, a professor at the University of Massachusetts, has posted a guide to Schneider’s promotion of “medical tourism in Nevada. ” http://faculty.uml.edu/sgallagher/SchneiderBills2007.htm