Ryke Geerd Hamer (17 May 1935 – 2 July 2017) was a German, former physician and the originator of Germanic New Medicine (GNM), also formerly known as German New Medicine and New Medicine, a system of pseudo-medicine that purports to be able to cure cancer.
The Swiss Cancer League described Hamer's approach as "dangerous, especially as it lulls the patients into a false sense of security, so that they are deprived of other effective treatments."
Ryke Geerd Hamer was born in Mettmann, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, in 1935.
He received his high school diploma at age 18 and started medical and theological studies in Tübingen, where he met Sigrid Oldenburg, a medical student who later became his wife.
1962
At age 20, Hamer passed the preliminary examination in medicine, and in April 1962 passed his medical state examination in Marburg, Hesse.
1963
Hamer held a licence to practice medicine from 1963 until 1986, when it was revoked for malpractice.
He was granted a professional license as a doctor of medicine in 1963.
1972
After spending several years at the University Clinics of Tübingen and Heidelberg, Hamer completed his specialization in internal medicine in 1972.
He also worked in several practices with his wife and patented several inventions.
1978
On 8 August 1978, Hamer's son, Dirk, was shot by the son of the last king of Italy, Vittorio Emanuele of Savoy, while asleep on a yacht off Cavallo and died on 7 December of that year.
Sometime after Dirk's death, Hamer developed testicular cancer and thought there was a link between the two events, so he began to develop Germanic New Medicine (GNM), which can be summarized in its "five biological laws":
Therefore, according to Hamer, no real diseases exist; rather, what established medicine calls a "disease" is actually a "special meaningful program of nature" (sinnvolles biologisches Sonderprogramm) to which bacteria, viruses and fungi belong.
Hamer's GNM claims to explain every disease and treatment according to those premises, and to thereby obviate traditional medicine.
The cure is always the resolving of the conflict.
Some treatments like chemotherapy or pain relieving drugs like morphine are deadly according to Hamer.
These "laws" are dogmas of GNM, not laws of nature or medicine, and are at odds with scientific understanding of human physiology.
1986
Hamer's license to practice medicine was revoked in 1986 by a court judgment, which was reconfirmed in 2003.
As he continued to practice, Hamer was investigated several times over allegations of malpractice and causing the deaths of patients.
1995
His system came to public attention in 1995, when the parents of a child suffering from cancer refused medical treatment (chemical therapy or chemotherapy) in favour of Hamer's methods.
Hamer was charged with malpractice and imprisoned in several European countries.
Hamer claimed that his method was a "Germanic" alternative to mainstream clinical medicine, which he claimed is part of a Jewish conspiracy to decimate non-Jews.
In 1995, Hamer was associated with the case of Olivia Pilhar, a six-year-old Austrian girl who suffered from a Wilms' tumor.
Pilhar's parents were members of Fiat Lux, a new religious movement whose leader Uriella referred them to Hamer.
He diagnosed the girl as having several "conflicts" rather than cancer.
When the parents refused conventional medical therapy for Pilhar, the Austrian government removed their rights of care and control.
The parents fled with their daughter to Spain, which was Hamer's place of residence at the time.
After negotiations, including the intervention of the Austrian President Thomas Klestil, the parents were persuaded to return to Austria.
By then, Pilhar's health had deteriorated.
The tumor had grown very large, weighing four kilograms, filling most of her abdominal cavity and was pressing against her lungs.
The lack of treatment had reduced the estimate of survival probability from 90% to 10%.
1997
He was jailed for twelve months in Germany from 1997 to 1998, and served a prison term from September 2004 to February 2006 in Fleury-Mérogis, France, on counts of fraud and unlicensed practice of medicine.
Hamer's habilitation thesis about the GNM at the University of Tübingen was rejected after multiple examinations by several members of the medical faculty, who concluded that his work lacked scientific methods and reproducibility and his arguments did not support his theories.
Hamer claimed that his system was verifiable and that the University of Trnava in Slovakia had already confirmed some of his theories.
In fact, the University of Trnava has no real medical faculty and the documents which allegedly confirmed his view are not available and registered at the university.
That university also rejected his habilitation thesis.
2007
Hamer lived in voluntary exile in Spain until March 2007, when Spanish medical authorities held him responsible for dozens of preventable deaths.
2010
After a court ordered conventional cancer treatment with surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy, Pilhar recovered completely and was still alive in 2010.
Her parents received an eight-month suspended jail sentence in Austria.
Hamer purported that his method is a "Germanic" alternative to mainstream clinical medicine, which he claimed is part of a Jewish conspiracy to decimate non-Jews.
2017
By 1997, Hamer owned clinics in Germany, Belgium, Italy, Austria, and the Netherlands, and resided in Norway until his death from a stroke on 2 July 2017, age 82.
