Michael Gearin-Tosh is an Oxford don who has defied death by rejecting the advice of his doctors. His medical mutiny took him into the world of complementary and alternative medicine. On diagnosis with myeloma, a rare cancer of the bone marrow, he was told his maximum life expectancy was three years.

He is now 64 and celebrating ten years of remission, working full time, writing two books and supervising the garden of St Catherine's College, where he teaches English Literature. In what many saw as a mad gamble, Michael opted for the extreme vegetarian Gerson diet, visualisation, breathing exercises and acupuncture instead of morphine, chemo-therapy and radio-therapy. He hesitates at being typecast as an enemy of modern medicine. In fact the turning point to going "alternative" came for him when Sir David Weatherall, senior professor of medicine at Oxford, told him: "We know so little about how the body works." So began his journey back to health, drinking pints of fresh carrot juice and taking coffee enemas, according to the Gerson regime. He questions the modern scientific approach to medicine testing, which uses double-blind tests, in which one of two test groups is given a placebo. "This may be fine for simple medical conditions, but not for something very complex like cancer. How could you do a double-blind test with acupuncture? That would not be rational or scientific." Sir David believes Michael's case "underlines the extraordinary chasm between the world of complementary and conventional western medical practice..." The alternative methods used by Michael should be put to scientific test, he says. For some, though, this could not come soon enough. Michael told me of a friend diagnosed with myeloma at the same time as him. His friend chose conventional treatment and died after a short time.

For more information: www.gersonsupportgroup.org.uk and Living Proof by Michael Gearin-Tosh (Simon & Schuster £7.99).

SLOWLY DOES IT
Over 100,000 people world-wide have signed up to the Slow Food movement. An antidote to fast and junk food, this "eco-gastronomic movement", founded by Italian Carlo Petrini is, dedicated to the proper appreciation of food and drink. At the heart of the movement is the idea that people should consume foods that are in season in their own locality. For more information: www.slowfood.com

Mark Winter