Although previous efforts to try and find this doctor had proved unsuccessful, after inquiries with the College of Surgeons we were given the name of a general surgeon by the name of Andrew McIrvine. Many calls later, we finally traced the doctor and obtained his mobile phone number. Without delay we dialed the number and explained our situation. When Doctor McIrvine heard that we wanted details of an operation he performed 20 years ago, his immediate reply was that it would be very difficult as he had performed thousands of operations over the years. However, as soon as we mentioned Srila Prabhupada’s name he immediately remembered the case, saying it was such a special case that he could never forget it. He spontaneously remembered how Srila Prabhupada was the Hare Krishna leader, that he was "amazingly calm and stoical", and also the fact that he visited Prabhupada at the manor the day after the operation.

He agreed to send a statement noting down the important facts that he remembered from Srila Prabhupada’s condition at the time, and this letter is included in its entirety at the bottom of this page.

Before giving his statement, it is pertinent to give a little background to this topic, and also to discuss the consequences of the doctor’s statement on the medical claims made by Nityananda Das in his book ‘Someone Has Poisoned Me’ (SHPM).

In our previous papers on the VNN and Chakra web sites, we have focussed on how the overwhelming mass of scientific and medical evidence supports the diagnosis that Srila Prabhupada was suffering from advanced diabetes which led to serious kidney damage, loss of appetite and related systemic complications.

In SHPM (Appendix 7), Nityananda Das tries to discount the diagnosis of diabetes, in an attempt to attribute all of Srila Prabhupada’s symptoms to his theory of arsenic poisoning. On page 350 he makes the following claims:

Srila Prabhupada did not have diabetes serious enough to display the symptoms of diabetes. For example, loss of vision or blindness is sometimes seen in diabetes. Srila Prabhupada, however, did not exhibit the signs of an advanced case of diabetes which would produce loss of vision. Further, not one doctor or kaviraja even mentioned diabetes as a factor in His Divine Grace’s health, nor did he require insulin. Diabetes is thus ruled.

Nityananda Das, SHPM. Page 350.

As we will see below, Srila Prabhupada did in fact display the symptoms of diabetes, so much so that the doctor who treated him only 9 weeks before his passing, immediately diagnosed diabetes as soon as he saw Prabhupada, and confirmed his diagnosis by blood and urine tests. So much for no symptoms. As for blindness, Prabhupada’s deteriorating eyesight was clearly documented by Tamal Krishna Goswami in TKG’s diary:

Amazingly, Nityananda Das, after convincing the reader that loss of vision (as a symptom of diabetes) was not present, explains that loss of vision (as a symptom of arsenicosis) was present. Not only that, but it now miraculously appears as a symptom "unique" to arsenic poisoning:

Symptoms Unique to Arsenic Poisoning And Not to Kidney Diseases.

A9 LOSS OF VISION due to brain damage or optic nerve damage

Nityananda Das, SHPM (page 68)

In ‘Nityananda’s Diagnosis 1’ we stated that the impartial reader should regard Nityananda Das’s claims with caution due to his lack of academic qualifications and one-sided representation of the scientific literature. In light of the above example (and others like it), we would now go so far as to seriously question whether much of his reasoning is even logically coherent, what to speak of approaching the rigorous standards of a scientific or medical research text.

The claim that Srila Prabhupada did not have diabetes because he didn’t require insulin also shows either accidental or intentional ignorance of the literature. Prabhupada was clearly suffering from diabetes type 2, which is also known as non-insulin-dependant diabetes. From Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine (p. 2065), which is listed in SHPM’s list of references, we learn that insulin-dependant diabetes (type 1) most commonly begins in the teenage years and is caused by a complete inability to produce insulin. Without insulin shots the patient would quickly die. In contrast, non-insulin-dependant diabetes (type 2) usually begins in middle life or later, with symptoms appearing gradually. It results not from a lack of insulin, but rather the body’s inability to properly process insulin, and is often treated by a controlled diet and exercise. Therefore it is patently untrue to say that Prabhupada couldn’t have had diabetes because he didn’t require insulin.

As for Nityananda Das’s claim that "not one doctor or kaviraja even mentioned diabetes as a factor in His Divine Grace’s health", we will let Doctor McIrvine’s statement speak for itself. After due consideration of the above points, we will leave it to the reader to decide how much credence we should put in Nityananda Das’s conclusion that, "Diabetes is thus ruled."

The statement from Doctor Andrew McIrvine, who performed the operation on Srila Prabhupada at Watford General Hospital on September 8^th, 1977 reads as follows:

Dear Mr Hooper,

I hope this is of some help,

My best wishes,