CADAVER MUSEUM
GUBEN, Germany
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"The Plastinator"
Gunther von Hagens, known as "The Plastinator," plays
chess with one of his plastinated creatures, during the inauguration of
his Plastinarium workshop and showroom in Guben last year.
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A quirky museum that opened its doors in eastern Germany recently is a "human factory" manufacturing "plastinated" sections of cadavers to supply researchers and medical students.
The brainchild of controversial German anatomist Gunther von Hagens, the factory will churn out preserved human- and animal-body parts and arguably offer another bonus-to take a small bite out of the region's massive unemployment.
"They say I earn money with bodies," says von Hagens, who is sometimes called "Doctor Death." "It's true, but owners of funeral houses do too, and nobody censures them. And besides, I create jobs." Some 6,000 people have already offered up their bodies-after death-to the so-called "plastinarium" so their remains serve scientific ends.
Within five years, von Hagens hopes to produce up to a million preserved human and animal parts yearly, fetching up to US$9,000 apiece from research laboratories. But the factory is dedicated to the living as well as the dead. For US$15 a ticket, the curious-over 13 years old-can watch each step of the process of transforming the corpses into cured, touchable specimens.
Invented and patented by the German anatomist, the technique of plastination involves replacing water and fat in cadavers with certain plastics. The final products, revealing corpses' inner anatomical structures, do not smell or decay.
Along with fame, the technique has also garnered controversy-particularly following 2004 reports that von Hagens used corpses of executed Chinese prisoners for his traveling exhibitions.
Housed in a defunct 19th-century textile factory, the new factory cost US$1.3 million to set up. The factory's heart is an immense workshop, its white walls dotted with anatomical charts and old engravings of dissections. The gloved staff working on the corpses are surrounded by chemicals, giant freezers, and circular saws. M AFP
Hilot to the world
With no less than a former health secretary coauthoring it, a new coffee-table book is poised to add not only glamor-for the consumption of the burgeoning local medical-tourism industry-but scientific weight to a popular folk-medicine practice.
Hilot, The Filipino Traditional Healing Massage distills 30 years of research on a traditional art of healing that has been in practice in the country for thousands of years. Authored by Dr. Jaime Galvez-Tan and traditional medicine researcher Ma. Rebecca Maraña, the book explores the origins of the hilot-its links with major, alternative systems of medicines practiced by the Chinese and Eastern civilizations (ayurveda, yunani-tibb)-and attempts to locate its indigenous theories of well-being within the scientific discourse of today.
Maraña discovered the rich hilot tradition and other alternative Filipino treatment modalities while working as a community health nurse and trainor in southern Philippines. Before cowriting the book, she did a comparative study of hilot and acupuncture pressure points and has produced manuals on acupressure, acupuncture, ventosa, medicinal fruits and vegetables, and community-health training.
With Galvez-Tan, she studied the techniques of the hilot from the eclectic experiences and oral histories of healers from 24 Filipino ethnolinguistic groups. These have been synthesized and presented in a standardized sequence.
"This is the best of what the Filipino offers," Galvez-Tan enthused. "My personal dream is to see the hilots around the world, in USA, Australia, and Europe. Not only will we be exporting hilot (the technique), but banana leaf, virgin coconut oil, and the hilots themselves," he said at the book's launch in November.
The authors give a nod to innovation as well as tradition by integrating the application of the currently popular VCO as an oil rub and the banana leaf for detecting bioenergy blockages in the body, a method said to be a unique feature of the hilot. Banana leaf strips, laced with VCO, are passed over body areas to identify energy blockages, excesses of wind or cold humors-areas that will need more focus during the actual massage.
Dr. Roger Mendiola, president of the Philippine Obstetrical and Gynecological Society, said the book gives a scientific basis to what many have experienced to be an effective form of treatment.
He likened hilot to acupuncture, a complementary therapy based on the principle of energy pathways within the body. "It's about time a book like this comes out. In obstetrics, there are traditions that need to be more thoroughly researched and are vital for a woman who is pregnant, has given birth, and is recovering," he said.
Hilot's promotion as part of medical-tourism updates its image from a practice associated with elderly practitioners to a mainstream spa service on the same level of respect as Swedish and Thai massage.
The book is available in hard- and soft-bound copies in all Goodwill bookstore outlets. M Grace Roxas
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