NEW CIVILIZATION FOUNDATION
7.11 HEALTH
7.11.1 Baseline: Where We Are
7.11.1.1 Health is a topic that crosses all boundaries; and increasingly,
influences that may impact on human health may originate in any area of
the globe.
7.11.1.2 In the late Twentieth Century, orthodox medicine in the industrialized
world is confronting a rise of public interest in 'holistic' medicine,
often involving modalities that have long been traditionally utilized by
human beings in less industrialized nations. This provides particular
opportunity to select from among many cultures those health practices that
work.
7.11.1.3 Holistic approaches generally may not be well-suited to emergency needs;
allopathic approaches generally may not be well-suited to prevention of
disease. Both are therefore needed, in fitting proportion, and applied
where appropriate.
7.11.2 Direction: Where We Intend To Go
7.11.2.1 NCF's direction is to work to empower those human beings who find
themselves either by necessity or by choice on a course of shouldering
reponsibility for their individual health and the enhancement and support
of the health of those around them; to provide tools, learning materials,
and direct aid and assistance for this endeavor.
7.11.2.2 NCF programs shall include provision for matters pertaining to mental
health as well as physical health; shall include provision for those with
apparently permanent disability or impairment, as well as for those
presumed more readily capable of full return to wholeness and 'normal'
living; and shall include provision for those working to overcome
substance or behavioral addictions. Compassion shall be the guiding
spirit, "First do no harm," the guiding principle.
7.11.3. Strategy: How We Intend To Go There
7.11.3.1 Health and Healing
7.11.3.1.1 In conjunction with NCF Community, Charity, and Education teams
worldwide, NCF will implement Centers, ranging in size from
'village clinics' to 'teaching hospitals', for human beings to avail
themselves of the atmosphere and practices conducive to healing.
These Centers will include the services of natural medicine
practitioners currently outside the mainstream and therefore
sometimes difficult to find, as well as the best of technologies
and modalities mainstream medicine has to offer, with the express
desire and intent of alleviating human suffering and needless loss
of human life.
7.11.3.2 The aforementioned centers will fulfill three additional related
functions:
7.11.3.2.1 Staff members will be approachable and accessible for
sharing of information about the workings of the human
body itself, knowing that health maintenance and prevention
of disease depend significantly on the understanding of
those workings on the part of the individual.
7.11.3.2.2 Likewise, staff members will offer education in both
natural medicine and conventional modalities wherever
appropriate and within bounds of law.
7.11.3.2.3 And, staff members will actively seek out local practitioners
who are the repositories of 'expert wisdom' in their fields of
practice, first to honor and to learn from them, second to
insure their wisdom is (ideally) handed down to the next
generation or is otherwise preserved as the treasure we
acknowledge it to be.
7.11.3.3 NCF will establish grants for individuals in need of therapies not
reimbursed by insurance or for unusual requirements of disease
management situations.
7.11.4 Health Education
7.11.4.1 NCF will work to "rend the veil of obscurity" surrounding health
matters. We recognize that stress itself is a non-trivial contributor
to illness and to the progression of illness, and that making the
mysteries of health comprehensible to the human being whose health
it is can reduce stress, and thereby optimize opportunity of full
recovery and restoration to wholeness.
7.11.4.2 In conjunction with NCF Education efforts, we will work to introduce
small, meaningful additions or changes of perspective in school
course offerings, intended to provide both information and tools that
work to supply a means for human beings to be responsible for their
own health. Similar efforts would be applied to benefit the adult
population, in conjunction with NCF Arts & Media teams.
7.11.5 Health Research
7.11.5.1 NCF will work to identify, validate, and make known previously
discovered approaches and previously devised techniques that
show potential to save human lives and alleviate human suffering,
right now. NCF will work to resolve "on hold" questions of
research, knowing we are likely in this way to identify helpful
approaches to human health that have, for whatever reasons,
previously "fallen through the cracks".
7.11.5.2 NCF will seek to identify, illuminate, and make known existing
impediments to health that are "hidden in plain sight". NCF will
work with and support individuals and organizations already involved
in "sounding the alarm" on heretofore unrecognized health factors.
7.11.5.3 NCF, knowing the natural state of Earth and the natural functioning of
human bodies are inextricably interwoven, will monitor for indicators
of health-affecting shifts in environment and ecology, study to
understand them, and work to reverse them as warranted. Much of
this effort would be in concert with NCF Science & Technology
and NCF Agriculture teams, NCF Ecology teams, and NCF Legal Affairs teams.
7.11.6 Health Freedoms
7.11.6.1 Identifying and publishing the facts concerning any pending threat to
the Health Freedom of human beings. NCF will participate with and
support others already involved in raising public and legislative
awareness on these matters.
7.11.6.2 Working to reverse or amend existing legislative or other hindrances
to Health Freedom of human beings. NCF will work for the release
of non-useful constraints while working for continued ensuring of
safety and authenticity of items intended for human use.
7.11.7 The Heart of the Healer
7.11.7.1 We recognize and acknowledge as Civilizational Treasures the many
'health heroes' who have come before us. NCF will seek to honor
these ones as we become aware of them, often including monetarily,
and in some cases through direct support for their ongoing projects and research.
