July 8, 2004
BABELFISH (From Orrin Judd)
Leeches Get Blood Flowing (Rich Duprey, Motley Fool, 6/30/04)
It may sound like a lawyers' convention gone horribly awry, but soon blood-sucking leeches could be everywhere.Sometimes, being a conservative is suspiciously easy. Posted by David Cohen at July 8, 2004 12:58 PMA French firm has won approval from the Food and Drug Administration to market leeches as a medical device. According to the law, a medical device is any article designed to diagnose, cure, treat, prevent, or mitigate a disease or condition. Leeches have been used by medical practitioners for thousands of years and are used now to help heal skin grafts and amputations. Ricarimpex SAS is the first company to request and receive the government's imprimatur to market them.
French leeches appearing all across the country -- this is news? John Kerry and his wife have been campaigining for over a year now.
Posted by: Mike Morley at July 8, 2004 1:18 PMNext you'll be shilling for Reverend Smith's All-Natural Vegetable-Extract Health Elixir and Energy Tonic.
Posted by: Peter B at July 8, 2004 1:50 PMI think that problem with older Leech usage
was that the much of the theory behind the usage turned out to be erroneous. I think many a person with a non-fatal virus was sped along in their demise through the use of leeches.
They've been used for years in the US anyways. I've seen children with meningitis being treated with leeches here in Atlanta. I've no doubt they were American leeches rather than the inferior product from across the pond.
Posted by: Bruce Cleaver at July 8, 2004 2:22 PMBruce is right. They have been used for quite sometime, particularly after operations reattaching severed appendages.
Posted by: Jeff Guinn at July 8, 2004 3:29 PMHave the French come up with a good cream sauce, that goes with sauteed leeches? Excuse me I have to....
Posted by: h-man at July 8, 2004 4:22 PMI swear I remember seeing a large bottle of them in the window of an old school pharmacy in Chicago back in the 70's. The memory is not what it was once, though.
Posted by: Rick T. at July 8, 2004 5:02 PM