Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2017/11/17/help-kate-hark-a-vagrant.html
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Am I missing something or is there no information on what experimental treatments? Because if this includes quack lunacy then - with deep sympathy to Kate and her family who are understandably desperate- I’m out.
Could we have a little more reporting here?
Are people giving money to scientific research establishments to enroll Kate in test programs?
The sad truth is there are far too many pseudo-scientists, faith healers, crystal wavers, reiki loons and others preying on people such as Kate Putting money into the ‘woo’ economy causes them to breed.
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Follow the link and like… read. Here’s an excerpt
Like so much of cancer treatments, you do not know until the 11th hour what to expect. So, although we don’t yet have all the information regarding specific details around potential trials and treatments, we need to act fast. Things will move quickly once she is accepted into the programs, and international patients at renowned hospitals like Sloan Kettering in NYC are required to provide the funds up front. We want Becky to have every single option available to her; and even if Becky does not get accepted into these trials, she will still need money to live and rebuild her life. Because of the physically taxing nature of cancer treatments, she hasn’t been able to support herself financially in over 2 years.
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Ah - suspect my ublock overpowered the YouCaring site. Thanks.
Yeah it’s hidden under a fairly unassuming ‘read more’ link on the page, I missed it too the first time.
ublock stopped it from loading, I had clicked on it, thanks for condescending.
IT would be a lot cheaper to raise money for her to relocate to $EUROPEAN_COUNTRY where she’d get proper cancer care for free.
To be clear: I think it’s great that people want to help, but ya know for every D-list celeb who has enough web presence to beg funds there are a few thousand folks dying of some treatable condition who don’t have the means to fund-raise.
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Experimental cancer treatment is still not covered in most European nations either. The health insurance providers cover all tested and known methods, but this treatment may not even be available if it’s experimental. Insurances frown upon being guinea pigs.
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My initial thoughts as well because experimental treatments general don’t cost. If it’s a trial or something new in process treatment is usually covered by research funds and it’s seriously unethical to charge for them.
but Beaton is pretty on the ball with the callin out bullshit and I think it’s unlikely she would wrap herself up in a scam. And there are incidental costs to receiving it that even the best insurance/socialised healthcare won’t cover. Travel. Accommodations. The hospital room etc.
You generally Have to be a citizen of those places to get that quality free health care. They don’t cover those additional costs I mentioned. And the Beatons are canadian. Canada has excellent socialised healthcare already.
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Still, there are ways to get insurance funding, as far as I know.
I am seriously and very appaled and shocked that someone has to raise this money through fundraising. (And I can’t contribute. 
)
Fuck. This. Shit.
FRT, I lost people to cancer. I have others near and dear to me who are in medical treatment, some for cancer, right now. Two of them are getting experimental antibody treatment. Fully covered.
And I’ve got one person who is just loosing the fight. She’s dying. Nothing can save her.
Cancer is an arsehole.
It seems really messed up to me that somebody would have to pay for an experimental treatment. They’re contributing to a company’s R&D and betting their lives on an unproven treatment to do so, and paying for the privilege.
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Desperate, frightened people often fall victim, even intelligent ones and, with no disrespect whatsoever, she may not know diddly about cancer research or have anything like the tools needed to separate fraud from plausible.
Those who sell fake “healing” are among the slickest of con artists and can play the guilt violin like a master “Do you not think even a tiny chance of success is worth it if you love person X? How will you feel if you ignore this opportunity and she dies?”
I wish her and her family naught but good but I would not donate to such a last-chance, minimal likelihood of success vs high likelihood of being scammed appeal.
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Exactly what my feeling was. I managed not to read the whole of the donation site post (I block all scripts automatically) .
Several people kindly pointed out she is talking about a highly reputable US hospital program and such similar schemes.
But faced with the reailty of Larkin’s Aubade (https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48422/aubade-56d229a6e2f07), the most rational people quail and are prepared to indulge insanities and frauds they never normally would. We don’t judge them, but we do have a duty not to enable those who prey on them.
It’s a bit like give money to homeless shelters, not homeless people. Personalised grief and sympathy are far more infectious than organisational concern. THere’s a post to work on BoingBoing… but where are the clicks?
Generally speaking you don’t there are ethical and legal blocks for charging for that kind of thing. Because it’s covered by the research funding. Much of which is in the form of government grants. Research that charges for funding, or “experimental” treatment that does so generally won’t pass ethics boards. So your at risk of losing funding, getting shut down etc. And it’s considered a big marker for bs treatments and fraud. Alt med and predatory quacks will often use research status to sheild themselves from fraud accusations and allow themselves to charge for treatment they wouldn’t be able to Bill as medical or make health claims about otherwise.
But there are various types of experimental treatments. I’m not super up on the details. But there seems to be a stage in development where things are approved. But for very very limited circumstances. And they’ll be used for experimental treatment of thing essentially off label. In those cases treatment may be charged for. But insurance (even socialised healthcare) often won’t cover the costs.
But more commonly it’s shit like travel, hotel rooms, paying for the hospital stay, for multiple family members. You typically can’t get experimental treatment locally. You have to get yourself, And anyone you need to the one place that’s working on it. So it costs. From the amount they’re raising it seems like that. Expenses around the treatment and palliative care that uncovered because of the nature of the treatment.
That was essentially the shit fit about that British infant a while back. The news. Especially in the US. And the right to lifers were pitching it as a government disallowing treatment. But from what I understand no-one said they couldnt seek that treatment. But the couple were trying to get the nhs to foot the bill for insanely expensive costs to transport a comatose, brain dead infant across the Atlantic.
Yeah and I seem to remember Kate Beaton pointing that out. Criticizing the people who take advantage of that. In the specific context on her sisters cancer. She strikes me as the sort of person who’s on watch for that or has had a run in with it. So while I could see the family falling into that trap. I have reason to doubt Beaton herself would promote the funding effort if they were doing something like the burzynski clinic.
Just to be clear: I wasn’t condescending, I literally had the exact same problem.
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Soz. I misunderstood. Please forgive my rudeness.
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