I'm seeing this with my cousin currently. Her husband as well as her brother are peddling vitamin injections, physiotherapy, keto diets, for what is essentially late-stage lung cancer. She needs sugar - energy - to build up her stores so that she can walk into a chemotherapy clinic, but they're (perhaps rightfully) scared that they'd just be feeding the tumor instead of her.

Doctors orders should be questioned, of course, since they're also trying to reduce their own liability should anything go wrong. But this cynicism is being diverted into desperate alternatives, into the inklings of what is looking like outright superstition.

I understand it to some degree, of course; when a doctor recommends a treatment to slightly prolong your life, vs an expert who promises to completely heal your ailment -- you're likely to go with the so called expert.