@ItWasSaucerShaped
something important to note: when working with pure oxygen, combustion is NOT rare. at all combustion is more or less exactly what you should expect without all of the necessary safeguards against it because pure oxygen is so reactive the idea of a bunch of quacks fucking around with pure oxygen in the presence of children is absolutely terrifying. you don't even need a spark to set it off (it can react with some pretty common household chemicals, including colognes, shampoos or even just grease). i watched a napkin with some french fry oil get used as a demonstration of how dangerous oxygen can be - it more or less immediately combusted when a chamber it was in had oxygen introduced to it this is a form of quackery that could easily kick off a huge wildfire or at least burn down a neighborhood if it became more widespread
@pencilpauli9442
And right wing libertarian types wonder why regulations are a thing. The tragedy was totally avoidable and my blood is boiling. No I don't need time in a hyperbaric chamber. I need time in a world that rejects all quackery. FWIW my nephew is autistic and what he doesn't need is a cure. He needs love and understanding, which thankfully he gets from his family and the centre he loves to attend.
@wanderingspark
As a person with ADHD, this story makes want to both scream with rage and cry. A disabled child is dead because his parents would rather pursue a risky quack treatment than accept his disability. I'm also horrified to see that this facility claims hyperbaric oxygen treats acute compartment syndrome. Acute compartment syndrome generally requires emergency surgery to prevent tissue death. At a bare minimum, these facilities should be required to put the FDA dietary supplement disclaimer on their websites. "These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease."
@gana511
I remember meeting a women whose father converted to Scientology so he could work for a celebrity who was a scientologist. She has bipolar disorder and was on medication for it as a teenager at the time. Her father then had her locked in her room and forced to go without her medication cold turkey. She has a complete psychotic breakdown and ended up homeless. She got her life together, mostly, but she told me she's never been the same and she refuses to speak to her father. She's well unto her 40s or 50s now (I think) and its shocking to me that people still want to go for this awful "religion".
@Soilfood365
"improvements in eye contact" as a measure of any clinical effects is such BS. I don't know if I would be classed as autistic, but as a child I always avoided eye contact, as it made me (/makes me) uncomfortable. My step-grandmother decided I was an inveterate liar because I (then about 7) never looked her in the eye, so I started staring intently at the bridge of people's noses while I spoke. Was I any different than I had been? Yes, I was more uncomfortable and felt like a liar, but it was better than being called one, and I can guarantee that at least some children would take the same route to stop being put in a scary and uncomfortable machine to "fix" them.
@CDN_Bookmouse
Hi, autistic person here. I have lived in two general areas in my life: a very low-lying Great Lakes area, and about 700 m higher in Alberta. I breathe easier here due to the lower humidity, but when relatives from Ontario visit they struggle with the higher elevation. Can confirm, I am still autistic. The greatest difficulty continues to be not the autism but the neurotypicals around me and the attempt to live in a world that is often hostile to people like me. Sorry scientologists, but real-world experience still suggests that I WAS BORN THIS WAY.
@gagemauldin1411
I saw this story on local news when it happened. The reporters did a terrible job on communicating that the child probably shouldn’t have been in the chamber in the first place and that it’s basically snake oil for treating most conditions. They acted like it was a normal procedure gone awry and I fear how others in my locality processed that information.
@micol7490
it's really sad to think that some people consider being neurodivergent as the worst possible fate... I'll never understand it, it's so completely aberrant...
@PlasticForkEater
Personal rant here: It’s hard to talk to my older relatives about things like this. They will sigh and call it a tragedy, but they fully believe that parents should have this type of power over their children.
@stiofanmacamhalghaidhau765
This story was deeply distressing for me when it came out, particularly as HBOT was one of the several potentially deadly 'therapies' including CD/MMS, GcMAF, Chelation (for autistic kids, of course... isn't it always?) I and others were attempting to get shut down (and providers arrested) 10+ years ago. Most of that effort failed, with a few happy exceptions. Today, we STILL face authorities whose response is pretty much "well, its the parent's choice ... no evidence it can't help ... one bad egg ... who knows, maybe it'll help some ... doesn't strictly fall under our purview" etc etc. Even a decade ago we were citing instances of significant life-altering injury and death. And today here in Ireland - a place that's been actually pretty good for clampdowns on woo - there is a 'private club' run by 'volunteers' providing HBOT 'cures' for all-the-things who don't charge but take 'donations' or 'membership fees' and because it side-steps several regulatory authorities... nothing is being done about it.
@yuvalne
just want to mention, hyperbaric chambers have recently been found to also have interesting psychological effects as well! there's some initial results showing combining it with regular psychotherapy for veterans with PTSD might be more effective than just the psychotherapy, and a friend of mine is now undergoing trial in my country's leading hospital to see if combining a hyperbaric chamber to his otherwise conventional therapy course can help with his so far resistant to treatment dissociative disorder. you will notice though that in these cases a. the treatment is done by experts under a lot of supervision and b. they mostly just supplament other treatment routes to make them more effective. edit: oh and of course, it can't cure autism because autism is not something you cure. the """"best"""" case scenario is you train your child to hide their needs with methods so cruel dog trainers won't use them. don't try to cure autism y'all.
@jamiegallier2106
Thanks for covering this Rebecca. As soon as I heard the vague news report- I just knew it was some pseudoscience bs. That poor child! The owner was apparently texting and making snarky comments about how the child didn’t even try to put the flames out when his legs were first on fire- that she’d sure would had tried to and not just looked at it. Like, wtaf?!
@Romanticoutlaw
....spider bite? As in, being bitten by a spider? An injury which heals on its own over time so long as the spider wasn't particularly venomous? Gee, does it treat papercuts too?
@stephenschroeder6567
During my Coast Guard days, I was working in the environmental protection side of the organization. In all that, we received constant training for all aspects of the field. In one such training we got to witness what happens when an oxygen enriched environment containing organic materials was subjected to an ignition source. It was beyond shocking and horrible. I will never forget what I saw and heard. Of course, the purpose of said demonstration was to make us aware of the danger as graphically and dramatically as possible. The evacuation of our digestive system into our clothing was just a side bonus. To think a five-year-old, with an entire lifetime ahead of him, was placed into and suffered such a thing for no reason other than people are stupid and greedy is beyond an outrage and I hope all involved are personally visited by Karma herself and appropriate consequences are dispensed. Rebecca, sometimes I do a hard face palm at the nonsense and shady shenanigans you speak about, but this one, well I am almost sorry I watched this and learned of what happened to that boy. A child places their faith and trust in their parents and other adults and when that trust is so overwhelmingly broken as in this case, then I actually hope there is a Hell, with all its circles, and that those responsible for this end up in the sewers beneath Hell for all time.
@outpostcheerfuloyster
"I had to decompress after a diving session, and now I'm no longer fascinated with trains."
@osiris0413
As a psychiatrist, I can neither confirm nor deny that I am out to get Scientologists
@tinycatfriend
the fact children are ending up dead simply to avoid the vyvanse i take every morning is just pure horror
@frederickthornelives
IYKYK - the improvement of 'eye contact' is such scientology thing. ( I suffered a scientologist step father)
@pmsteamrailroading
This is essentially what killed the crew of the Apollo one. A 100% oxygen environment (at sea level pressure) add a spark, instant tragedy.
@ed1726