Skeptic Short - Urotherapy (using pee for medicinal purposes)

Encouraged by actors and musicians, Urotherapy is being adopted by many as a road to good health. But what is Urotherapy? Why did I ask that question when I have the answer in my title? The world will never know. Let say you have a bad case of athletes foot. This means that your foot has a fungal infection that is very itchy, possibly scabby and extremely uncomfortable. You have a few options to tackle this inconvenience. You can run down to the local pharmacy and pick up a can of "Tough Actin' Tinactin". That might do the trick. OR...you can pee on your foot like Madonna. Topically pee does have some science behind it's effectiveness. Pee has stuff in it that is also made synthetically in skin care products.

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Hallelujah!!

Proponents of using urine claim that it can help cure damn near everything. Lets look at a short list of what it reportedly cures:

• acne
• allergies
• asthma
• diabetes
• cancer
• fungal infections
• hair loss
• nervousness
• paralysis
• but wait there's much much more!!

Can it? Can drinking your own urine, taking a leak on your skin or flushing your eyeballs with tinkle cure anything? We see this in plenty of "remedies" now a days. We've seen it with Chiropractors, Acupuncture, Mercury, Garlic, Ginger, Honey, Turpentine...some of these may provide some health benefit. Diets, homeopathic devices, diluted herbal tinctures and essential oils claim to have cures for some or all ailments as well. It's pee though...I mean, it's PEE, a waste product.

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Long Ago, In a Galaxy Far Far Away...

Urotherapy is actually a practice that has been going on for a very long time...like ancient Egyptian, Chinese and India long time. If we learned anything from them old and ancient people, we learned that they know their shit! Such as alchemy (turning metals into gold), geocentricity (belief we are the center of the universe), and mercury (heals all that ails you...wait, that sounds familiar!). Eh, I cherry picked a few false beliefs our ancients had. But still, scientists...non-hokey scientists anyway...believe drinking pee and soaking your body parts in it is not healthy. Its has no cancer curing properties and it doesn't even help if you were stung by a jelly fish so don't let your friend pee on you! But that's just science. Does anecdotal proof of successful pee cures trump science?

Do you practice urotherapy? Does it help you in some way?

Previously on Skeptic Shorts

• Astrology and Knowing your Future
• Naturopathy
• Do we live on a pizza?
• Chemicals in the Air are Poisoning You!
• Voodoo Chiropractors