Ozone for Lunch

“Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine…”, oh, wait - that was a different story. I don’t work in a gin joint, I work in an oxygen therapy shop, and I’m not Humphrey Bogart, but I sure felt like he looked when Ingrid Bergman walked through his door.

This lady had class written all over her: tall, blonde, that kind of sculptured face that you only see in fashion magazines. In fact, she looked like she’d just stepped out of a fashion magazine. She wore a little black dress with a string of pearls as her only ornamentation; she carried a little black bag.

I sat behind the front counter and raised an eyebrow. I’d heard the ability to lift one eyebrow at a time was genetic - I don’t know about that, but it sure looks cool whenever Sean Connery does it.

“May I help you?” I asked her. I was the only one in the shop; Dr. Murphy was gone to lunch.

“Yes, perhaps you can.” Her voice matched the rest of her: smooth, silky, beautiful. “I would like to find out some information about ozone therapies.”

“Well, you’ve certainly come to the right place,” I said, reaching for some of the sales brochures. “That’s what we do.”

Her brow crinkled.

“Yes, I know.” She said. “That’s why I came in here.”

Ohhhhkay, so maybe she wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. But when she looked like that, maybe she didn’t have to be. I spread one of the brochures out on the counter in front of her.

“What kind of therapies are you interested in?” I asked.

“I’m not sure, actually. I’d heard ozone treatments are good for a lot of things. Can you explain to me how it works?”

“Sure.” I tapped the brochure. “Now, before I start, are you aware of exactly what ozone therapy is?”

“No.”

“Well, contrary to popular opinion, ozone is not quite the bugaboo that it’s been made out to be.”

“Wait,” she stretched her hand out and put it on my sleeve. “What’s a bugaboo?”

“Oh, uh, it means that ozone has gotten some bad press. Everyone thinks it’s a horrible substance because it becomes a pollutant when mixed with hydrocarbons, like emissions from cars. A bugaboo is something that causes people to be frightened.”

“Oh, ok, go ahead.” I could almost see my explanation working its way through her lovely little mind in slow motion. Glacial, at best.

“Anyway, ozone itself is an energized form of oxygen.” I decided to skip the more technical explanation. She wouldn’t have understood it. “It’s been used in therapies in Europe for decades, but here in the U.S. it’s not as widely accepted.”

“Why?”

“Because the government won’t allow clinical trials to be held here. The FDA says ozone is a toxic gas with no known medical uses.”

She looked at me with those big, beautiful vacant blue eyes.

“Why would they say that if it wasn’t true?”

“Because places like the FDA or the NIH, uh, that’s the National Institute of Health, are often influenced by the big drug companies, and ozone is a very inexpensive way to treat a whole lot of different ailments. Plus, it’s not something you can patent.”

“What isn’t? Ozone?”

“That’s right. So the drug companies can’t make a profit on it, by jacking up the price like they do on other drugs.”

“Oh,” she considered this. Slowly. God, she was beautiful, but my grandmother could think faster than she could. And Gram was 87. “Ok, so what kinds of things will it treat?”

“Well, in Europe they’ve used it to treat heart disease and gangrene and emphysema and asthma and arthritis and diabetes and migraines and cancers and chronic bacterial infections and viruses, even HIV.”

“All that?”

“Oh, yes,” I rattled on; this was my favorite part of the presentation. “And much, much more: Parkinson’s Disease, you know like Mohammed Ali has? And parasites and the flu and M.S. and Alzheimer’s and cerebral vascular disease, like strokes and memory loss.” I stopped to take a breath.

“But if it cures all those things, why isn’t it being talked about by everyone who has one of those diseases?”

“Because no one knows about it.” I said. “Because the government isn’t running tests, and doing clinical trials, so the word isn’t getting out.”

“Ummm.” I still couldn’t tell what disease or condition she wanted treatment for. Usually when I rattled off my list, new patients would give some indication, a blink, a jerk of the head, something, to give me a hint as to why they were interested. From her - nothing. “And how do you, uh, take the therapy, or whatever you call it?”

“Ah, that’s the interesting part.” I picked out another brochure and opened it in front of her. “There are a variety of ways medical ozone can be administered to you. First, we have auricular insufflations.”

“What?”

“I know,” I smiled mischievously. “Sounds obscene, doesn’t it? Relax, it just means that we put it in your ear.”

“My ear?”

“Yep. We irrigate your ear canal with an ozone/oxygen mixture from a medical ozone generator.”

“And how does that help?”

“Well, doctors believe that the ozone enters the blood system and the lymphatic system that way. Depending on the disease you’re being treated for, you should have this treatment 2-3 times a week.”

She didn’t look like she was impressed.

“What else?”

“Well, there’s the good old rectal insufflation.”

She looked horrified.

“You mean, like a … “

“Well, yes, just like.”

“Oh, no, no, no, I couldn’t possibly…” her voice trailed off. Her cheeks were bright pink. “What else?”

“Um, if you didn’t like that, you won’t like this one either.” I said, trying not to laugh. “Vaginal insufflation.”

Now she looked ready to barf.

“You can’t mean… no.”

“Actually, I understand it’s more comfortable than the rectal procedure, because there’s no danger of pressure buildup.”

“Pressure buildup?”

“Yes.” I again tried to direct her attention to the brochures. We had some simply stunning photographs, but she didn’t appear to be interested. “Many women have reported relief from yeast infections and various sexually transmitted diseases such as herpes.” I was only trying to be helpful.

“Isn’t there anything else?”

“There are a couple of other ways we can administer ozone - one is by use of a body suit.”

“You mean like a sauna suit?”

“Sort of. In this treatment, you take a warm shower first, in order to open the pores of your skin, then you climb into the suit, and we pump ozone into it.”

“How long do I have to stay in there?”

“A typical treatment takes anywhere from 15 minutes to 40 minutes, again depending on what you’re being treated for. In the body suit, the ozone is absorbed through the skin.”

“What else?”

“Ozonated olive oil.”

“Olive oil?”

“Our scientists have discovered that using olive oil is the only way to stabilize ozone without using chemicals or preservatives. In fact, some people drink the olive oil directly in order to obtain immediate benefits, but we don’t recommend that.”

She was watching me with horrified fascination. I remained cheerful.

“So, can I sign you up for a procedure today?”

“Maybe just a jar of the olive oil.”

I retrieved a jar from under the front counter, and rang her up. She turned and started for the door, shaking her head slightly as if bemused and bewildered.

“If you come back in before Friday, I can offer you a 10 percent discount on the insufflations,” I called, and she turned to look over her shoulder at me.

“I don’t think so.” She said, and pushed her way out the door.