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It is believed that the Incas used anesthesia. Evidence supports the theory that shamans chewed cocoa leaves and drilled holes into the heads of patients (letting evil spirits escape), spitting into the wounds they made. The mixture of cocaine, saliva, and resin numbed the site enough to allow hours of drilling.
Amphetamine poisoning can cause intravascular coagulation, circulatory collapse, rhabdomyolysis, ischemic colitis, acute psychosis, hyperthermia, respiratory distress syndrome, and pericarditis.
Cancer has been around as long as humankind, but only in the second half of the twentieth century did the number of cancer cases explode.
The average human gut is home to perhaps 500 to 1,000 different species of bacteria.
More than 30% of American adults, and about 12% of children utilize health care approaches that were developed outside of conventional medicine.