Andrew Weil

Andrew Thomas Weil (Template:IPAc-en, born June 8, 1942) is an American celebrity doctor who advocates for integrative medicine.<ref name=LAT2010>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name=GumpertBloom06/>

Early life and education

Weil was born in Philadelphia, on June 8, 1942,<ref name="EB15">The editors of EB (2015). "Andrew Weil, American Physician", In Encyclopædia Britannica (online, 18 November), see [1], accessed 18 November 2015.</ref> the only child of parents who operated a millinery store,<ref name=EB15/> in a family that was Reform Jewish.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> He graduated from high school in 1959, and was awarded a scholarship from the American Association for the United Nations,<ref name=EB15/> giving him the opportunity to go abroad for a year, during which he lived with families in India, Thailand, and Greece.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> From this experience, he became convinced that American culture and science was insular and unaware of non-American practices. He began hearing that mescaline enhanced creativity and produced visionary experiences, and finding little information on the subject, he read The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley.Template:When<ref name=lattin/>Template:Rp

In 1960, Weil entered Harvard University, where he majored in biology with a concentration in ethnobotany.<ref name=EB15/> At Harvard, he developed curiosity about psychoactive drugs. He met Harvard psychologists Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert, and separately engaged in organized experimentation with mescaline.<ref name = GarnerLattinRev10>Template:Cite journal</ref> Weil wrote for Harvard Crimson.<ref name=lattin/>Template:Rp<ref name = CrimsonIndex>Template:Cite journal</ref> One published account of the period describes a falling out of Weil from the group that included the faculty—among whom the experimentation with drugs was contentious, and with regard to undergraduates, proscribed;<ref name = SmithCrimson62>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name = FinneganFreedCrimson13>Template:Cite journal</ref> the falling out involved an exposé on drug-use and supply that Weil wrote for the Crimson.<ref name = GarnerLattinRev10/> Weil wrote of faculty experimentation with drugs in a series of Crimson pieces:<ref name=Doblin00>Template:Cite thesis</ref>

• "Better Than a Damn", (February 20, 1962), his apparent first Crimson piece;<ref name = CrimsonIndex/><ref name = WeilCrimson62>Template:Cite journal</ref>
• "Alpert Defends Drugs on 'Open End,Template:'" (May 27, 1963);<ref name = WeilCrimson63a>Template:Cite journal</ref> and
• "Investigation Unlikely in Dismissal of Alpert", (May 29, 1963).<ref name = WeilCrimson63b>Template:Cite journal</ref>

and that this reporting included the claim that "undergraduates had indeed been able to obtain access to psilocybin from members" of the Harvard faculty research team that was involved in such research.<ref name=Doblin00/> As late as 1973, Weil's name appears in conjunction with an editorial regarding the 1963 firing of Alpert, which stated the view that it would be "unfortunate if the firing of Richard Alpert led to the suppression of legitimate research into the effects of hallucinogenic compounds", distancing himself and the Crimson from the "shoddiness of their work as scientists ... less [the result] of incompetence than of a conscious rejection of scientific ways of looking at things."<ref name = WeilRussinCrimson73>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Weil's undergraduate thesis was titled "The Use of Nutmeg as a Psychotropic Agent",<ref name = GarnerLattinRev10/> specifically, on the narcotic properties of nutmeg,<ref name=AoA10>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> inspired by a class with David McClelland,Template:Citation needed chair of the Department of Social Relations, and a former director of Harvard's Center for Research in Personality.<ref name = FinneganFreedCrimson13/> In 1964, he graduated cum laude with a B.A. in biology.<ref name=EB15/>

Medical training

Weil entered Harvard Medical School, "not with the intention of becoming a physician but rather simply to obtain a medical education."<ref name=EB15/> He received a medical degree in 1968,<ref name="Baer03">Baer, H.A. (2003). "The Work of Andrew Weil and Deepak Chopra—Two Holistic Health/New Age Gurus: A Critique of the Holistic Health/New Age Movements", Medical Anthropology Quarterly. 17 (2, June): 233-250, esp. 233f, 236, see [2] and [3] and [4], accessed 20 November 2015.</ref><ref name="Baer04">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name=people>Template:Cite journal</ref> although "the Harvard faculty ... threatened to withhold it because of a controversial marijuana study Weil had helped conduct" in his final year.<ref name=EB15/> Weil moved to San Francisco and completed a one-year medical internship at Mount Zion Hospital in 1968–69.<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/><ref name="Quackwatch10March2002">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> While there, he volunteered at the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic.Template:Citation needed Weil went on to complete one year of a two-year program at NIH, resigning due to "official opposition to his work with marijuana".<ref name=Quackwatch10March2002/>

Career

Following his internship, Weil took a position with the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) that lasted approximately one year, to pursue his interests in research on marijuana and other drugs;<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/> during this time he may have received formal institutional permission to acquire marijuana for the research.<ref name=lattin>Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp

Weil is reported to have experienced opposition to this line of inquiry at the NIMH, to have departed to his rural northern Virginia home (1971-1972), and to have begun his practices of vegetarianism, yoga, and meditation, and work on writing The Natural Mind (1972).<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/> At the same time, Weil began an affiliation with the Harvard Botanical Museum that would span from 1971 to 1984, where his work included duties as a research associate investigating "the properties of medicinal and psychoactive plants".<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/> His interests led him to explore the healing systems of indigenous people, and with this aim, Weil traveled throughout South America and other parts of the world, "collecting information about medicinal plants and healing", from 1971 to 1975, as a fellow for the Institute of Current World Affairs.<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 1994, Weil founded the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson, Arizona.<ref name=OUPbio>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name=UofA>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Andrew Weil is the founder of True Food Kitchen, a restaurant chain serving meals on the premise that food should make one feel better. There are currently 44 restaurants in the chain.

View of conventional medicine

Evidence-based medicine is a stated central component of the higher-order "system of systems" Weil envisions integrative medicine to be.<ref name=BellWeil02/> It is clear that in both scholarly/academic and popular settings, Weil's statements suggest practices from alternative therapies as being something to add to conventional medical treatment plans.<ref name=BellWeil02/><ref name="publishersweekly1"/> However, Weil is also on record speaking disparagingly of conventional, evidence-based medicine, both in academic and popular contexts. For instance, he is quoted as having said to a group commencing after a month-long training program in integrative medicine at the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine that "that evidence-based medicine, at its worst, 'is exactly analogous to religious fundamentalism'" (though the source leaves unclear whether any specific aspect of evidence-based medicine was given).<ref name="Econ15">Template:Cite news</ref>

Influences and philosophy

Template:BLP sources section Weil acknowledges many experiences and individuals that have influenced his philosophical and spiritual ideas, and the techniques he considers valid in his approach to medicine. Weil has been open about his own history of experimental and recreational drug use, including experiences with narcotics and mind-altering substances.<ref name=No_Bad_Drugs>Template:Cite journal</ref> Among the individuals who strongly influenced his personal and professional life is the late osteopath Robert C. Fulford, who specialized in cranial manipulation.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Weil has further stated that he respects the work of psychologist Martin Seligman, who pioneered the field of positive psychology and now directs the Positive Psychology Center at the University of Pennsylvania. Weil has also professed admiration for the work of Stephen Ilardi, professor of psychology at the University of Kansas, and author of The Depression Cure.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Weil is widely recognized as having a seminal role in establishing the field of integrative medicine, where this field is defined as:

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|CitationClass=web }}</ref> In an interview on Larry King Live, Weil focused on a view that sugar, starch, refined carbohydrates, and trans-fats are more dangerous to the human body than saturated fats.

Regarding treatment strategies, their side effects, and their efficacy, Weil advocates for the use of whole plants as a less problematic approach in comparison to synthetic pharmaceuticals. In addition, Weil is an advocate of incorporating specific medicinal mushrooms into one's diet.<ref name="Stamets2020">Template:Cite book</ref>

Weil has expressed opposition to the war on drugs,<ref name="WeilRosen2004">Template:Cite book</ref> and takes a measured, nuanced approach to the use of recreational drugs.<ref>Weil & Rosen 2004, pp. 111–112</ref>

Publications

Overview

While Weil's early books and publications primarily explored altered states of consciousness,Template:Citation needed he has since expanded the scope of his work to encompass healthy lifestyles and health care in general.Template:Citation needed In the last ten years, Weil has focused much of his work on the health concerns of older people.Template:Citation needed In his book Healthy Aging, Weil looks at the process of growing older from a physical, social, and cross-cultural perspective,Template:Citation needed and in his book Why our Health Matters is focused on health care reform.Template:Citation needed

Of his books, several have appeared on various bestseller lists, both as hardbacks and as paperbacks (many appearing so in the 1990s<ref name="publishersweekly3">Template:Cite journal</ref>), some of them being Spontaneous Healing (1995; on the New York Times list),<ref name=NYTbsWeil>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Better source neededTemplate:Better source needed Eight Weeks to Optimum Health (1997; on the Publishers Weekly and New York Times lists),<ref name=NYTbsWeil/><ref name="publishersweekly2">Template:Cite journal</ref>Template:Better source needed Eating Well for Optimum Health (2000; Publishers Weekly, New York Times),<ref name=NYTbsWeil/><ref name="publishersweekly2"/>Template:Better source needed The Healthy Kitchen (2002, with chef Rosie Daley; New York Times),<ref name=NYTbsWeil/>Template:Better source needed Healthy Aging (2005; New York Times),<ref name=NYTbsWeil/>Template:Better source needed and Spontaneous Happiness (2011; New York Times).<ref name=NYTbsWeil/>Template:Better source needed

List of popular works

Books

• The Natural Mind: An Investigation of Drugs and the Higher Consciousness (1972, rev. 2004);Template:Isbn
• The Marriage of the Sun and Moon: A Quest for Unity in Consciousness (Houghton Mifflin Company: 1980); Template:Isbn
• Health and Healing (1983, rev. 2004);Template:Isbn
• From Chocolate to Morphine: Everything you need to know about mind-altering drugs with Winifred Rosen (1983, rev. 1993 & 2004); Template:Isbn
• Natural Health, Natural Medicine (1990, rev. 2004);Template:Isbn
• Spontaneous Healing (Ballantine: 1995); Template:Isbn
• Eight Weeks to Optimum Health (1997, rev. 2006);Template:Isbn
• Eating Well for Optimum Health (2000);Template:Isbn
• The Healthy Kitchen with Rosie Daley (2002);Template:Isbn
• Healthy Aging (2005);Template:Isbn
• Why Our Health Matters (2009)Template:Isbn
• Spontaneous Happiness (2011)Template:Isbn
• True Food: Seasonal, Sustainable, Simple, Pure (2014)Template:Isbn
• Fast Food, Good Food: More Than 150 Quick and Easy Ways to Put Healthy, Delicious Food on the Table (2015)Template:Isbn

Ask Dr. Weil collections

Published collections of answers to questions received on his DrWeil.com website:

• Women's Health Template:Isbn
• Healthy Living Template:Isbn
• Natural Remedies Template:Isbn
• Common Illnesses Template:Isbn
• Vitamins and Minerals Template:Isbn
• Your Top Health Concerns Template:Isbn

Audio-only publications

• Breathing: The Master Key to Self Healing, audio CD, Sounds True (2000).Template:Full citation neededTemplate:Div col end

In addition to the foregoing individual paperback, hardback, audio, and electronic versions, various combined and compendia editions have appeared.Template:Citation needed

Academic works

As of 2015, Weil was serving as series editor of an academic imprint from Oxford University Press called the Weil Integrative Medicine Library, volumes for clinicians in more than 10 medical specialties, including oncology, cardiology, rheumatology, pediatrics, and psychology.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Weil co-edited the first volume, Integrative Oncology, with Donald Abrams, which appeared in 2009.<ref name="OUPbio"/> Academic and scholarly reviews of the series and individual volumes were lacking as of 2015—in almost all cases, the publisher's "Reviews and Awards" tabs lack society or other published reviews (apart from Doody's).<ref>E.g., for Integrative Cardiology, note absent tab at [5], and for Integrative Dermatology, note sole appearance of Doody's at [6]</ref> A cancer society review of the second edition of the series' Integrative Oncology volume, the first volume to have been published, describes the field as "an exciting new discipline" and the book as offering "best-practice methods to prevent cancer and support those affected by it on all levels: body, mind, and spirit" and as being comprehensive, and offering "meticulous, well-written chapters on proven and yet-to-be-proven methods for enhancing cancer care with integrative oncology."<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Other works

Weil was a regular contributor to High Times magazine from 1975 to 1983.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> More recently, Weil has written the forewords to a variety of books, including Paul Stamets's Psilocybin Mushrooms of the World<ref>Weil, Andrew (2011) "Foreword", in Paul Stamets, Psilocybin Mushrooms of the World: An Identification Guide, Illustrated Edition, Berkeley, CA: Crown/Ten Speed Press, Template:ISBN, see [7], accessed 17 November 2015.</ref> and Lewis Mehl-Madrona's Coyote Medicine.<ref>Weil, Andrew (2011) "Foreword", in Lewis Mehl-Madrona, Coyote Medicine: Lessons from Native American Healing, p. 13f, New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, Template:ISBN, see [8], accessed 17 November 2015.</ref> In the 21st century, Weil has occasionally written articles for Time magazine.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

Critiques and controversies

Medical

Medical professionals in particular have criticized Weil for promoting treatment claims and alternative medicine practices described as unverified or inefficacious, or for otherwise rejecting aspects of evidence-based medicine. Weil's rejection of some aspects of evidence-based medicine and his promotion of alternative medicine practices that are not verifiably efficacious were criticized in a 1998 New Republic piece by Arnold S. Relman, emeritus editor-in-chief of The New England Journal of Medicine and emeritus professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.<ref name=Relman>Template:Cite magazine</ref> The late Barry Beyerstein of Simon Fraser University, writing in the journal Academic Medicine in 2001, criticized Weil and various aspects of complementary and alternative medicine, asserting that it held a "magical world-view"; he continued, saying,

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Social

Hans Baer of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Arkansas, writing in 2003, has argued that Weil's approach represents a general limitation of the holistic health/New Age movement, in its "tendenc[y] to downplay the role of social, structural, and environmental factors in the etiology of disease" in the United States, and in doing so, represents a failure to "suggest substantive remedies for improving access to health care", generally, for the "millions of people who lack any type of health insurance"; at the same time, Baer notes (with negative connotations) that Weil instead contributes "to a long tradition of entrepreneurialism in the U.S. medical system."<ref name=Baer03/><ref name=Baer04/>Template:Rp

Ethical

Beginning in 2006, as the result of his commercial ventures, Weil—as David Gumpert has described—has placed himself in the "awkward position of ... having to defend himself against charges of inappropriately exploiting his medical-celebrity status."<ref name=GumpertBloom06>Template:Cite journal</ref> Commenting on a cover article in a recent 2006 edition of the Center for Science in the Public Interest's "highly respected" Nutrition Action Healthletter,<ref name=CSPItrustintocash>Template:Cite journal</ref> Gumpert called attention to:

• a $14 million deal Weil's business enterprise had made with drugstore.com,<ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name=GumpertBloom06/>
• the DrWeil.com personalized service of recommending supplements (purchase of which are made easy via DrWeil.com and drugstore.com),<ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name="GumpertBloom06" />
• long-standing recommendations for supplements appearing despite studies questioning their efficacy,<ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name=GumpertBloom06/> and to
• the clear nature of the pressures on Weil because of the deals, and the clear consanguinity of person and brand.<ref name=GumpertBloom06/>

The Forbes article noted, in particular, drugstore.com's 2005 lawsuit against DrWeil.com for Weil's having "failed to perform any of his marketing obligations", noting that in a 2004 Larry King Live interview, Weil failed to promote this business partner, despite the program offering "reasonable opportunity for Weil to use efforts to promote drugstore.com."<ref name=GumpertBloom06/> Moreover, the CSPI's newsletter noted that their investigations into the vitamin and supplement recommendation service led them to conclude that the algorithms behind the recommendations were, by default, set to recommend purchases: regardless of how the online inquiries of the personalized service were answered, "we couldn't get the Advisor to stop recommending that we buy supplements."<ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name=GumpertBloom06/> The CSPI article concludes, "Beware of doctors who sell what they recommend."<ref name=CSPItrustintocash/><ref name=GumpertBloom06/>

In 2006, the Center for Science in the Public Interest also commented on a Time magazine piece by Weil rebutting a recent JAMA report on the failure of fish oil supplements to significantly reduce risk of serious heart arrhythmias,<ref>"Supplementing Their Income: How Celebrities Turn Trust Into Cash", (2006) Nutrition Action Newsletter, Center for Science in the Public Interest, January/February 2016, pp 3-6. Archived from the original on June 13, 2010. Accessed December 28, 2019.</ref> where he emphasized the benefits of fish oil supplements without a disclaimer that he had a direct commercial interest in the sale of these supplements.<ref name=Advertorial>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Another specific criticism has been leveled with regard to the message of his Healthy Aging (2005), which argues that aging should be accepted as a natural stage in life,Template:Citation needed while these skin care products were being sold at Macy's with the advertising claim of the products' "optimiz[ing] skin's defense against aging"—alongside a large picture of Weil.<ref name=nytimes>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Weil has also been accused by others in the alternative health movement of being involved in the "dishonest practice of spreading fear, uncertainty, and doubt about competitors' products, while pretending to be [an] objective 3rd [party]."<ref>Corriher, Sarah C. (2015) "Doctor Andrew Weil: Whose Side Is He Really On?", The Health Wyze Report, (online, undated), see [9], accessed 18 November 2015.</ref>Template:Better source needed

Political

Weil's 1983 Chocolate to Morphine roused the ire of Florida senator Paula Hawkins, "who demanded that the book, a veritable encyclopaedia of various drugs and their effects on humans, be removed from schools and libraries."<ref name=EB15/><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Formal corrective actions

In 2009, the US Food and Drug Administration sent a warning letter to Weil's Weil Lifestyle LLC, regarding "Unapproved / Uncleared / Unauthorized Products Related to the H1N1 Flu Virus" in particular, a "Notice of Potential Illegal Marketing of Products to Prevent, Treat or Cure the H1N1 Virus H1N1 [influenza] Virus."<ref name=FDALetter>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}Template:Primary source inlineTemplate:Primary source inline</ref>Template:Better source needed The FDA was primarily concerned with several implicit claims in Weil Lifestyle LLC's marketing literature, that certain products could help ward off such viruses.Template:Citation needed

Awards and recognition

Weil appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1997 and again in 2005, and Time named him one of the 25 most influential Americans in 1997 and one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2005.<ref>Template:Cite magazineTemplate:Verify sourceTemplate:Verify source</ref> He was inducted into the Academy of Achievement in 1998.<ref name=AoA10/><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> His "Ask Dr. Weil" website was chosen by ForbesTemplate:' Best of the Web Directory in 2009 for having offered "straightforward tips and advice on achieving wellness through natural means and educating the public on alternative therapies."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The Integrative Healthcare Symposium (IHS) awarded Weil as the recipient of its 2022 Leadership Award.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Media appearances

Weil blogs for the Huffington Post<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> and has been a frequent guest on Larry King Live on CNN,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Oprah,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and The Today Show.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Weil appeared in the 2012 documentary on the need for a "rescue" of American healthcare, Escape Fire.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> He also appeared in the 2019 documentary Fantastic Fungi.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Further reading

• The editors of EB (2015). "Andrew Weil, American Physician", In Encyclopædia Britannica (online, 18 November), see Andrew Weil | Biography, Books, & Facts, accessed 18 November 2015.
• Template:Cite news
• Template:Cite journal

External links

• Template:Official website
• Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine