Exclusive: ‘Just Normal Doctoring’ — a Texas Doctor’s Eyewitness Report on Measles Outbreak
Dr. Ben Edwards, an integrative medicine and family practitioner in Lubbock, Texas, is on the ground in Gaines County, helping families whose children have measles.
Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Tuesday cheered the use of what The New York Times called “unconventional treatments” for measles, noting that Texas doctors had seen “very, very good” results using the remedies during the recent measles outbreak in Gaines County.
Treatments included cod liver oil — a food-based source of vitamin A and vitamin D — budesonide, a steroid used to relieve inflammation affecting the airways, and clarithromycin, an antibiotic.
In an exclusive interview with The Defender, Dr. Ben Edwards shared the backstory on the positive results that he and other Texas doctors have recently seen using those treatments in responding to the West Texas measles outbreak.
The “standard of care” treatment for measles is supportive care including fever reducers, cough suppressants and fluids, Edwards said. Texas Medical Board Rule 200 allows for Texas physicians to also offer “complementary and alternative” treatment options, in which he is well versed.
According to Edwards, the Feb. 26 death of a Texas child who tested positive for measles might have been prevented if hospital staff had given her breathing treatments, such as budesonide.
“Budesonide has historically been used in asthma exacerbations,” Edwards said, “but during COVID, many physicians learned of its very beneficial role in treating the inflammation triggered by respiratory viruses.”
Edwards is an integrative medicine family practitioner in Lubbock who runs a private practice serving roughly 2,000 patients. Lubbock is about an hour and a half north of Gaines County, where the current case number is highest, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS).
On Saturday, March 2, Edwards received a call from Gaines County resident Tina Siemens. “Tina said that little girl who died, her parents were real worried about the four other siblings that were all younger. Could I come see them?”
Edwards drove down.
“I’m at the one church, the viewing’s going on [for the child who passed away], lots of people there. Those kids were there, and so I assessed them and treated them.”
He wrote a prescription for budesonide, a steroid inhaler that is traditionally used for asthma but which can be “very beneficial with the respiratory portion” of a measles infection.
Edwards also gave the children cod liver oil “because that’s the best form of vitamin A.”
“Vitamin A deficiency makes measles much worse,” Edwards said. “The measles infection all by itself will deplete you of retinol, which is vitamin A.”
Edwards did not discuss using clarithromycin.
Before driving home, he also assessed two 4-month-old twin boys — cousins of the deceased child — who were also sick with measles.
One of the babies was “clinically in not good condition,” he said. “Lethargic, pale, heart rate elevated, respiratory rate elevated, with mild to moderate respiratory distress — just a really sick baby.”
He gave the babies cod liver oil and prescribed budesonide, which he then picked up from the pharmacy and delivered to the family.
“I saw the child the next morning,” Edwards said. “He looked like a completely different child. I thought it must be a mistake. This can’t be the same child. Just the life that was back in his eyes was incredible.”
“That was the first indication to me that budesonide was really going to be a miracle worker,” he added.
After that, Edwards helped facilitate what he called a “massive and amazing team effort” to swiftly get high-quality cod liver oil and budesonide to the sick children in Gaines Country.
“When a community comes together in unity, in love and wants to help each other, it’s amazing what can happen,” he said.
On Sunday, a cod liver oil supplier called Jigsaw was able to accommodate the group’s large order.
One of Edward’s patients, a private plane pilot, offered to immediately deliver the oil. “So that plane took off, got 1,700 pounds of cod liver oil — and vitamin C — and was back on the ground in Gaines County Sunday afternoon at 2:30 p.m.”
People in Gaines County met the plane and set up a makeshift clinic at a local health food store.
“They opened it up for us and brought chairs, tables, water, all the things … They got the word out and the people just started coming.”
Edwards estimated he saw about 70 patients at the makeshift clinic that day and made additional home calls to sick kids on his drive back to Lubbock.
“Then Monday, same thing,” he said. Edwards guessed he wrote 100 prescriptions for budesonide. A team of volunteers located pharmacies in the area that had it in stock, so parents could quickly get the prescriptions filled.
Hospital didn’t give ‘breathing treatments’ to child who died, says child’s father
According to Edwards, the father of the little girl who died on Feb. 26 after testing positive for measles says he asked the hospital staff in Lubbock, where his daughter had been hospitalized, to give his child “breathing treatments,” but the staff refused.
Edwards said, “This is what’s been told by the father to his community, so the community is now extremely hesitant to go to the Lubbock Hospital.”
Edwards did two things to help ensure other families wouldn’t face such refusals. He instructed Gaines County parents to specifically ask for budesonide, rather than simply a breathing treatment, if their child is hospitalized with a measles infection.
Edwards also asked his colleague and friend, Dr. Richard Bartlett, to help educate West Texas hospital doctors on the efficacy of budesonide for mitigating respiratory issues that might arise from a measles infection.
“I needed someone with all the evidence and he has it,” Edwards said.
Bartlett, a West Texas emergency room physician with over 28 years of experience, showed that budesonide could mitigate COVID-19 respiratory symptoms. His website, “Budesonide Works,” highlights studies and reports that show the steroid’s effectiveness.
“So [Bartlett] stopped in the hospital and was able to help educate the doctors. Thankfully the doctors received that,” Edward said.
Edwards could understand why hospital doctors might initially be resistant to using budesonide. “It’s an inhaled steroid and steroids can suppress the immune system.”
He said that generally, you don’t want to suppress the immune system. But he added:
“If there’s a bacteria like strep or something, you need the immune system, so I understand the hesitation. But with a viral infection — especially when it triggers a large inflammatory response … locally in the tissues of the airway — this is indicated … Not every doctor knows this.”
Budesonide’s effectiveness was well-publicized among frontline doctors who treated COVID-19 patients, but that “unfortunately wasn’t many,” Edwards said. “So this just wasn’t widely publicized in your traditional medical guidelines or societies like the American Medical Association.”
‘This is just normal doctoring’
Edwards criticized the trend among many U.S. doctors “to turn to institutions” like the American Medical Association and ask, “What does the protocol say?”
But doctors need to return to attending to the patient’s needs while respecting the patient’s values — even if the values include choosing not to vaccinate, he said.
“I’m not trying to be some anti-vax, West Texas holistic, crazy cowboy doctor out there just going solo and going off the rails. I’m doing what every doctor should do and would do.”
Edwards added:
“I would think if a kid shows up on your doorstep and can’t breathe, you’re going to help them.
“If a family calls you from the funeral for a kid that just died that you almost know for sure shouldn’t have, and they’re scared that four more might die, what doctor wouldn’t go down there and just comfort them, just reassure them, just treat them compassionately like a human being? Plus give a little medical care that could be lifesaving.
“This is just normal doctoring.”
MMR vaccine label says don’t give vaccine to kids with fevers
Some have criticized using alternative treatments in the West Texas measles outbreak. “Vitamin A is not a substitute for vaccination,” Dr. Megan Ranney, dean of the Yale School of Public Health, told CNN today.
Getting the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine is “the best way to protect against measles,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The CDC recommends children receive two doses, with the first dose at 12 to 15 months, and the second dose at 4 to 6 years.
Public health officials in Texas have been instructed to give a dose of the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine to unvaccinated people within 72 hours of their exposure to the measles to “lessen the severity of the illness if they get sick from their exposure to the virus,” according to the Texas DSHS.
However, giving a child the MMR vaccine who may be sick with measles can be dangerous, according to Dr. Mary Talley Bowden, an ear, nose and throat specialist in the Houston area.
She pointed out that Merck’s MMRII, the most commonly given measles vaccine, is contraindicated for anyone who is pregnant, immunocompromised or sick with a fever, according to its package insert.
“MMRII should not be given to anyone fighting any infection — especially not a measles infection,” Bowden said. “The vaccine can cause similar complications as the actual disease, including rash, fever, encephalitis, and idiopathic thrombotic purpura.”
MMRII is a live virus vaccine, meaning it contains weakened amounts of the measles virus, she explained. A 2024 peer-reviewed study found that a third of children who received the MMRII vaccine shed the live virus, potentially contributing to outbreaks.
“Some measles cases in the current outbreak may be a result of the vaccine virus itself,” Bowden said, “as the same test is used for both wild and vaccine-induced measles.”
The Defender reached out to the Seminole Clinic in Gaines County to find out what treatments its staff used to treat measles cases, but did not receive a response by the deadline.
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"Public health officials in Texas have been instructed".
By who?
Despite of being tragic for the girl and her family, the 'outbreak' reaches a wonderful outcome of actions by the RIGHT doctors with the great solution, which might prevents Samoa2.0...
Btw. does CDC have the number of victims who died after a positive MMR test, apparently becasue of missing vaccination???
VAERS reports that there were >480 deaths AFTER the MMR vaccine.. Which number is bigger???
With the forgotten VitC and Vit A solution, now back, all these children will certainly get healthier in general!!!
Such a great report. Thank You.
Oh, can one say, that ONE 'measles' death, like SO MANY 'covid' deaths, happened 'thanks' to HOSPITALS PROTOCOLS...???