‘If It Sounds Like a Quack…’ Review: A Sensationalized, Pseudo-Scientific Saga

A dentist turned medicinal laser enthusiast, a natural-supplement alchemist, a Mormon “health retreat” founder, a Polish leech aficionado, devout prayer healers, and a man convinced that he is part alien — these curious but real characters help comprise the cast of Matthew Hongoltz-Hetling’s newest book, “If It Sounds Like a Quack…: A Journey to the Fringes of American Medicine.”

While the personalities mentioned in Hongoltz-Hetling’s non-fiction work may sound outrageous, they set the stage for an examination of a preposterous yet very real danger to American healthcare — quack medicine. Oscillating between poking fun at these eccentrics’ unorthodox techniques and lauding their beliefs, Hongoltz-Hetling also unleashes a torrent of criticism against government agencies, medical research, and institutional science efforts that blur the book’s motive beyond recognition. Ultimately, “If It Sounds Like a Quack…” clumsily skirts the line between comedy and effective social commentary, as the often rambling narrative fails to present real solutions to the core crisis that Hongoltz-Hetling identifies.

The very organization of the piece lends itself to comedic delivery with streamlined stories and fast-paced snippets. Separating the dubious actors’ narratives into chunks like the acts of a stage play, and introducing chapters with Shakespearean quotations, Hongoltz-Hetling assumes the role of playwright in his grand pseudo-scientific melodrama. By chronicling the healers’ lives both before and after finding a calling to alternative medicine, Hongoltz-Hetling allows readers to sympathize with the pre-quack life experiences that drove these people to devote themselves to their respective medical cures.

For Alicja Kolyszko, leech-facilitated bloodletting is the long-sought panacea. For Jim Humble, a chemical solution consisting mainly of industrial-strength bleach serves as the ultimate antidote. For Larry Lytle, a glorified laser-pointer acts as the ideal medical device. For each of these alternative-medicine advocates, the desire to spread their unorthodox treatments becomes an all-consuming passion. Readers are introduced to characters on a spectrum ranging from charmingly eccentric to downright deranged, and in doing so, Hongoltz-Hetling sets up his heroes for battle against their biggest fears — science, federal regulation, and worst of all, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

A portion of his subjects’ annoyance with the FDA seems to have rubbed off on Hongoltz-Hetling himself, as he describes the “wretchedly boring and impersonal FDA culture,” repeatedly quoting from their “567-page ‘Investigations Operations Manual’.” The book also repeatedly generalizes the work of scientists and statisticians as “the supremacy of Numbers Junkies, who have spent the last 170 years promoting data-driven approaches to medicine.” Unfortunately, Hongoltz-Hetling’s characterization of the FDA appears to prioritize this joke for a quick laugh over effectively advocating for clinically-proven science.

That is not to say that criticism of the American medical system is inappropriate in a book that documents the various ways in which frauds are allowed to illegally treat desperately ill patients. In fact, cogent arguments that identify these governmental ineptitudes in preventing the proliferation of quack medicine would have been essential in making this book a worthwhile addition to the discussion surrounding American medicine. However, Hongoltz-Hetling’s use of an excessively ironic tone only serves to detract from the serious issues that this book presents.

Hongoltz-Hetling’s irreverent mockery takes the spotlight in his grand finale, a curtain call where he documents the roles each leading quack played in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic under the Trump administration. Hongoltz-Hetling repeatedly refuses to identify Donald Trump by name. In one biting line he writes, “On January 22, 2020, the former game show host turned American president took a break from an economic summit in Switzerland to sit down with Joe Kernan, a journalist with CNBC.” Using statistical evidence and data, Hongoltz-Hetling links botched press releases and negligent tweets to an uptick in reckless self-treatments and quack medicine as well as COVID cases. However, these substantive arguments are cheapened the moment Hongoltz-Hetling stoops to name calling rather than relying on his curated evidence.

Appearing insensitive to the horrific exploitation of critically-ill patients and families, much of the book takes a jarringly light-hearted tone. One of the most upsetting moments of the narrative describes the death of Kara Neumann, the young daughter of two spiritual healers who succumbed to diabetic ketoacidosis as a direct result of her family’s refusal of all modern medicine. Ultimately, “If It Sounds Like a Quack…” fails to fully emphasize her death among other innocent lives lost or irrevocably destroyed as the true cost of predatory fringe medicine.

Between health retreats, leech blackmarket schemes, and anti-hospital churches, this book depicts the alternative medicine personas that act as the foundation for America’s pseudoscientific infrastructure. Yet the human impact of quack medicine reaches beyond the sensational and laughable façade that this book unfortunately portrays to readers. In the end, these victims suffer the true cost of pseudoscience. Their lives and their stories cannot be reduced to mere punchlines.

—Staff writer Katy E. Nairn can be reached at katy.nairn@thecrimson.com.