Member
of Parliament Backs Method
by James Hughes-Onslow,
The Daily Express, Tues 18th June 1996
A Hacking cough echoed throughout the service in St. Margaret's
Church, Westminster. I apologised for my son's ashtmatic wheezing
to MP Johnathon Aitken, who was sitting in the pew in front. An
asthma sufferer himself, Mr. Aitken took a sympathetic view. He
recommended me to Christopher Drake of London's Hale Clinic, where
he learned the breathing exercises which enabled him to give up
his inhaler. My son and myself (also an asthmatic) will be checking
in there this week.
The former Treasury Minister has, it seems, persuaded a number
of asthma sufferers to try the Buteyko Method.
"I read about Jonathon Aitken's asthma about a year ago,"
says Inrgid Beale, who used to run a decorating business in Suffolk
until asthma forced her to give it up. "I was on Becotide and
Ventolin inhalers and steroids. Despite all this medication, or
perhaps because of it, I still had sleepless nights." But after
attending Dr. Drakes clinic in London, Mrs. Beale's life has been
transformed. "I can walk and swim and do things I couldn't
do before. When I take a breath it's so fresh it's unbelievable."
And since last August, Mrs Beale has used no medication at all.
Despite having helped thousands of sufferers, the Buteyko method
is still criticised by the medical authorities and the National
Asthma Campaign. When the Hale Clinic wrote to former Health Minister
Edwina Currie, who also suffers from asthma, she wrote back saying:
"I have all the help I need."
Drake says: "The official line is that there is no known cure.
They are always looking for environmental causes, never physiological
ones. A lot of people would be very embarrassed if the Buteyko Method
is proved correct."
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