By Rosanne Lindsay

The Institute for Justice estimates one out of four American workers now needs some sort of government-issued license to do their job. The trend around the country sees one group threaten another to force licensure for all.

In most countries only “persons” with a medical license granted either by a specified government-approved professional association or a government agency are authorized to practice medicine.

Over the last decade, state-licensed medical doctors, under direction of their association, have begun a crusade to criminalize unlicensed holistic practitioners for practicing medicine without a license under the Medical Practice Act.

With one voice, licensed medical doctors are trying to legislate choice for everyone else. Uniformity over individuality. They attempt to apply a license like a vaccine:

• Where a license is used as a shield to protect an industry, a vaccine is used as a shield to “protect the herd.”


• Where a license usurps inherent rights for acquired state rights, a vaccine usurps innate immunity for acquired immunity.


• Where a license reflects a transfer of power from a free market (self-regulation) to a controlled-market (state-regulation), a vaccine reflects a transfer of power from self-healing to disease-based management.


• Where a license is legal permission from an authority (i.e. state government, medical board) to do something that would otherwise be deemed illegal to do, a vaccine is legal permission to inject toxins that would otherwise be deemed illegal to ingest.


• Where a license is based on the theory of “standard of care,” a vaccine is based on the standard of “The Germ Theory of Disease.”

Ask the question: “If vaccines work so well, what do the vaccinated fear from the unvaccinated?”

The “Standard of Care” Illusion

The medical authority determines the “standard of care” which is a degree of care a doctor is expected to exercise. Standard of Care is based on practice guidelines, the medical literature, hospital policies and procedures, state and federal regulations, and other sources. A 2005 article in the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law stated that “The precise definition of the standard of care varies from one state to another… Practice guidelines evolve and change, driven by new developments in clinical practice and science… After 5.8 years, half of the practice guidelines are outdated.”

Standards do not exist in reality. They shift with opinions, especially in a world where patients can get a second or third or fourth medical opinion for every diagnosis. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) holds the opinion that vaccines are “safe and effective.” The US Supreme Court holds the opinion that vaccines are “unavoidably unsafe.” And the British Medical Journal holds the opinion that medical error is the third leading cause of death in America. This is known as iatrogenic (doctor-caused) death.

What Does Licensed Medicine Have To Fear?

A medical school graduate must receive a license to practice medicine before he or she can be called a physician in a legal sense.

• Licensed allopathic medicine allows the doctor to dispense toxic synthetic drugs that come with black box warnings and adverse side effects, many of which come with an LD50 (lethal dose of a drug that kills 50 percent of the population tested).


• Licensed medicine threatens doctors for suggesting holistic healing alternatives since the doctor is liable under threat of malpractice. FDA regulations apply to specific substances used in treatments, not to treatment regimens or practices.


• Licensed medicine authorizes a doctor to regulate your body using standard medical protocols and bill you according to standard medical codes.


• Licensed medicine means the State owns your body (as a ward of the State) and can claim your body.


• Licensed medicine allows a medical doctor to “prescribe,” “treat” and “diagnose,” to puncture the skin, and to cut into the body.

Ask the question: “If the license works so well, what do licensed doctors fear from unlicensed healers?”

Holistic Medicine Is Not Licensed Medicine

Holistic practitioners do not attend medical school. They do not practice licensed medicine. They do not prescribe, treat, or diagnose. They do not puncture the skin, and do not cut into the body. They do not suggest medical alternatives. They do not use standard medical protocols or bill using standard medical codes.

Holistic doctors work with Nature’s tools (not synthetic drugs) to allow the body to heal itself. The holistic practitioner sees each individual as pure potential and unique in body, mind, and spirit. Individuality over Conformity.

Both allopathic and holistic medicine are healing modalities on a spectrum of choice. Where allopathic medicine ends, holistic medicine begins. One does not encroach upon the other. One is an apple, the other an orange. Choosing the orange is not a crime.

As has been the case for two hundred years, the practice of licensed medicine co-exists alongside unlicensed medicine because choice exists. One cannot legislate choice for others. As history shows, rulers don’t eliminate choice through unjust laws. They drive it underground.

In a free society, everyone has the right to give advice and the right to choose – allopaths, osteopaths, naturopaths, homeopaths, functional medicine doctors, nutritionists, chiropractors, judges, and you.

Medical Freedom Under Threat

The argument for “freedom of choice” in medical care is based on the concept of an individual’s fundamental right of privacy. The right of privacy “includes a general right to be left alone and to be protected from governmental interference. It also includes the freedom of the individual to make fundamental choices involving the individual, his or her family, and relationships with others, except where such choices prove to be harmful to others and possibly oneself.” However, an absolute right to choose any treatment has not held up in court, with few exceptions:

In Schneider v. Revici, 817 F.2d 987 (2nd Cir. 1987), the court’s opinion addressed responsibility of a patient for his own care:

[W]e see no reason why a patient should not be allowed to make an informed decision to go outside currently approved medical methods in search of an unconventional treatment. While a patient should be encouraged to exercise care for his own safety, we believe that an informed decision to avoid surgery and conventional chemotherapy is within the patient’s right “to determine what shall be done with his own body.”

Limitations on such fundamental rights are justified only by a compelling state interest. At least one court opinion held that:

parents have natural rights that encompass a private family life, but viewed the child’s well-being as an overriding interest.  [The Laetrile Cases, Ohio State Law Journal 42(2):523-550, 1981.]

How to Preserve Choice?

According to the National Center for Health Statistics, 38 percent of Americans choose to spend $33.9 billion annually, out-of-pocket, on products and services ranging from nutritional supplements to yoga and chiropractic care.

Choice represents freedom and freedom is embodied in each of us. Using free-will, each individual authorizes any practice over his own body, his private property, through consent or the withdrawal of consent.

The State of Wisconsin was featured in the March 2000 Journal of Family Practice  showing demand for more alternative healing options. Four reasons emerged as the basis for this: 1) Holism (whole person approach), 2) Empowerment, 3) Access, and 4) Legitimization.^[i]

People who want to preserve choice and legitimize holistic medicine must stand up and speak out. Each is responsible for her own body and her own health. We can ask the question:

“In legislating the choice to heal, do legislators practice medicine without a license?” We can ask our legislators, “Who pays your salary? Who do you work for? Would you prevent your own ability to choose what’s best for you?”

The National Health Freedom Action is a non-profit organization working to protect choice in order to access natural healing modalities, while also protecting the rights of practitioners of Naturopathy, Herbalism, Homeopathy, Ayurveda, etc., to practice medicine without a license. Contact them at www.nationalhealthfreedom.org/nhfa

[i] Barlett, B., L. Marchad, J. Scheder, and D. Applebaum, Bridging the Gap Between Conventional and Alternative Medicine, Journal of Family Practice 49, no. 3 (March 4, 2000): 234-9; available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10735483 (accessed June 15, 2017).

Rosanne Lindsay is a board certified Naturopathic doctor under the Turtle Island Provider Network. She is a writer, Earth Keeper, President of the National Health Freedom Coalition, co-founder of Wisconsin For Vaccine Choice, and author of the book The Nature of Healing, Heal the Body, Heal the Planet. Find her on Facebook at Rosanne Lindsay and Natureofhealing and consult with her using the tools of nature to heal yourself (virtual consults available) at natureofhealing.org, where this article first appeared.