Ep 70-The Essential Oil Myth Machine: D Gary Young

A tiny bottle can carry a huge promise, especially when it is wrapped in “natural” language, a charismatic founder story, and a sales network that feels like community. We take a hard look at Young Living Essential Oils and founder D. Gary Young, separating what is documented in reporting, regulatory actions, and court records from the mythology that helped power a billion-dollar wellness brand.

If you care about evidence-based medicine, consumer protection, essential oil marketing, and how wellness misinformation spreads, hit play. Subscribe, share with a friend who gets pitched miracle products, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show.

Sources

Rachel Monroe, “How Essential Oils Became the Cure for Our Age of Anxiety,” The New Yorker, 2017.
 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/09/how-essential-oils-became-the-cure-for-our-age-of-anxiety

William M. London, “D. Gary Young (1949–2018): Diploma Mill Naturopath and Promoter of Essential Oils,” Skeptical Inquirer, 2019.
 https://skepticalinquirer.org/exclusive/d-gary-young-19492018-diploma-mill-naturopath-and-promoter-of-essential-oi/

Young Living, “D. Gary Young Obituary,” 2018.
 https://www.youngliving.com/en_ca/company/media/news/d-gary-young-obituary

U.S. Department of Justice, “Essential Oils Company Sentenced for Lacey Act and Endangered Species Act Violations,” 2017.
 https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/essential-oils-company-sentenced-lacey-act-and-endangered-species-act-violations-pay-760000

U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Young Living Warning Letters, 2014 and 2022.
 https://truthinadvertising.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/2014-FDA-Warning-Letter-to-Young-Living.pdf
https://www.fda.gov/inspections-compliance-enforcement-and-criminal-investigations/warning-letters/young-living-essential-oils-corporate-615777-06102022

National Cancer Institute, “Aromatherapy With Essential Oils.”
 https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/cam/patient/aromatherapy-pdq

National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, “Aromatherapy.”
 https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/aromatherapy

Federal Trade Commission, “Multi-Level Marketing Businesses and Pyramid Schemes.”
 https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/multi-level-marketing-businesses-and-pyramid-schemes

Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization, “Technique Enables to Evaluate Rosewood Oil Purity.”
 https://otca.org/en/technique-enables-to-evaluate-rosewood-oil-purity-a-product-valued-by-the-perfume-and-cosmetics-industry/

TRAFFIC, “Jatamansi Trade From Nepal.”
 https://www.traffic.org/what-we-do/thematic-issues/promoting-sustainable-trade/jatamansi-trade-from-nepal/

Transcript

Greetings And Friend Visits

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Hi, Jenny.

SPEAKER_00 0:25

Yay. Hello.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

How are ya? I'm doing real good. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 0:31

I am great.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Gouda. How's everybody in the fam dam line? The fam dam is good. We we had kind of a big last almost week. I had one of my friends from grad school came up to visit with her husband and her kiddo. And yeah, so we were hanging out with them. Oh fun. Your friend, so you went to school in Washington. Are they from the West Coast? They are from the Pacific Northwest, yes. But now they live in the Midwest. Down in Missouri.

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Similarly, oh I'd rather be in Minnesota than Missouri people.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

I mean, I I said move up here. Forgive me, mid-Missouri people.

unknown 1:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:12

Oh, so did they do touristy stuff? Yeah, they did do some touristy things. Otherwise, we kind of just hung out and our kids' nap times don't really align. So we were at the house a lot, but I had not seen her since my wedding. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I mean we talk obviously frequently, but yeah, I hadn't seen her in person since my wedding.

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Oh, good for you.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

And we got to meet each other's kiddos because we didn't have kids at that time. So yeah, it was really, really nice, really fun. Good to see them. You know, kind of recharges your soul, and then they leave, and you're like, I know.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Oh. Yeah. Oh, good for you. That's awesome. What's new with you? Well, I have a new companion in my yard, apparently. I was gone this weekend, and my when I saw my landlady on Monday, she said, Hey, you know, we've got a 300-plus pound black bear in the backyard. And she's all pleased. And I said, Excuse me. A what? And she's like, Oh, yeah. And I said, What wait, what why? She's like, I'm like, should we be like putting the garbage away? Like, what, why is this bear just hanging out? And she says, Well, oh, you don't know about the the hives? Oh, yeah, there's this you know like honey hives, like beehives, and

A Black Bear In The Backyard

SPEAKER_00 2:30

in the vicinity, not in the backyard, but close by. So that so this bear's like Winnie the Pooing it over there and dipping into the honey and chilling in the backyard.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

So part of me is horrified outside of Yeah, I was gonna say, outside of it being like a 300-pound bear and like your landlady texting or whatever, notifying you, like so layer about it. Like, it's kind of cute when you mention.

SPEAKER_00 2:57

So I'm like, and she's like, Oh, I'm sure it's super cute. Cause I was like, should I be worried? She's like, Oh, I'm certain, I'm sure it's super cute. So I was like, Yeah, yeah, it's probably super cute until it gets you. Like, I don't know. So until it's chasing you up a tree, right? Because it's like the perfect mat. Like, it's probably like, you know what? I can swim faster, I can climb trees, I can run faster than you, and I'm big. And I've got razor sharp claws and big teeth. It's like, why aren't we hearing more about bear issues? But apparently black bears are supposed to be shy, but if this thing's hanging around the house, how shy could that be? I just pray, I just pray it doesn't have babies because I know that's when they get aggressive. Yeah. Part of me is like, oh, I want to see it. I want to, you know, get a video. I want to show how brave I am because I went in the backyard and made friends with a bear. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

When I lived up north, there were like people have security cameras outside, like blink cameras or whatever. And they're they would capture the bears going through the garbage. I feel like they were little black bears. Yeah. And they would be like shaking the garbage bag and the garbage is lying everywhere. And I would tell my friend, like, I bet they weren't impressed with your garbage because I had so many dirty diapers in it. Yeah. That's probably why they left it.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Oh shit. Shoot, I need a baby. Can I borrow yours?

SPEAKER_01 4:22

Let me send you some diapers.

SPEAKER_00 4:24

Oh, yeah, I have to open with caution. What I'm throwing out now.

SPEAKER_01 4:31

Yeah. Got speed with the bear. I hope you can see it from the window and that's it.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

Yeah. I think I'll be taking my garbage back to Bellplane with me, back to my weekend house. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because obviously my leftovers are going to be tantalizing bits of leftover pizza and chips and whatnot.

SPEAKER_01 4:54

Not going to be dirty diapers for sure.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

Oh, bless. Well, should we talk about our episode today? I I mean, sure. Well, I don't know why we wouldn't. Today we're talking about a company called Young Living Essential Oils and its founder, D. Garrett Young. And this topic is courtesy of friend of the podcast and mini episode. Mini extraordinary contributor and guest pod entertainer, Mary Beth Basicy.

SPEAKER_01 5:27

I mean, you know, she does it all, you guys. Mary Beth. So hit that ham horn for her.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

Oh, I'm not, I'm not going

Young Living Setup And Warnings

SPEAKER_00 5:41

to give up my day job yet. I'm not quite ready to be the DJ, but I'll get there. I'll get there with this mixer someday. Anyway. You look good doing this. So this company that the founder founded is called Young Living, and it's one of the companies most responsible for bringing essential oils into modern wellness culture. Today's trigger warnings include infant death, birth trauma, cancer, unlicensed medical practice, unproven cancer-related claims, medical misinformation, patient vulnerability, and an occupational fatality. My research for this episode came primarily from Rachel Monroe's reporting in The New Yorker, William M. London's article in Skeptical Inquirer, FDA warning letters, the U.S. Department of Justice, the National Cancer Institute, the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, and Young Living's own public materials. These and remaining sources will be cited in our show notes. So now it's time for the corrections section. Do we have any major corrections from last week?

SPEAKER_01 6:47

I don't think so. I think the only thing that I would like to mention is I'm going to personally work on my trigger warnings because I'm always like, I don't think there are any. And then last week I started reading about all these horror horrific procedures, and then I was like, ooh, this is kind of genital mutilation, eh, it might be a trigger warning.

SPEAKER_00 7:07

I mean, I might overdo it, but I think you might underdo it so we could both work on it. But yeah. Listen, your story was was gripping and super important. And I've gotten a lot of good feedback about it. But yeah, it was it was triggering for one. Yeah. Sorry guys. No, don't be sorry. I mean, it means different things to different people. So it's not like there's any hard and fast rules about what to say. But yeah, a heads up. But the title probably gave the heads up anyway. Genital mutilation was in the title.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

So I mean, you could you know what? In my defense, you knew what you were getting into before you display.

SPEAKER_00 7:55

So, anyway, for today, um, under the correction section, I just wanted to be careful about wording and make sure that we don't end up with corrections because there's gonna be some gray areas here. So, whenever there's a conviction, I'm gonna specify that there was an actual conviction. When something came from a civil complaint, a regulatory warning, lawsuit, or investigative reporting, I'll identify it that way. You can see a lot of stuff online and discussions about Gary Young that collapses these categories and can lines can get blurred. And so this case is already serious enough without blurring the record. So there's that. But before we get to it, let's talk about our first sponsor. Our Cheeky first sponsor. Cheeky mouth guards for grinding. GetCheky.com. Stop your teeth grinding and clenching with a custom night guard from Cheeky at a fraction of the cost of a dentist. Easily affordable and guaranteed. Smile, sleep, and repeat. Cheeky offers affordable custom night guards delivered to your doorstep at a fraction of the cost that dentists charge. Their easy-to-use impression kit captures your bite from the comfort of your home, ensuring a dentist quality night guard tailored to your teeth. Cheeky night guards protect teeth from grinding by absorbing

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SPEAKER_00 9:16

the forces of grinding, preventing headaches, jaw pain, and chip teeth, which I would also say tinnitus too, because a lot of times our patients will come in as audiologists with, you know, they're super like ear pain and tinnitus from clenching. So this is something that can help relieve that as well. And it's also going to promote healthier gums and a more confident smile. So they offer free shipping and 100% money-back guarantee. Cheeky is the perfect solution for teeth grinding or clenching. Try it risk-free and join thousands who choose Cheeky to solve their grinding clenching problems. Don't delay. This deal's limited. Visit Cheeky or sorry, visit getcheeky.com and use our promo code STAYSUSPIOS for 30%. 30% off your order today. Listen, you know what it costs to go to a dentist? You know how hard it is to get an appointment these days? This is a lifesaver. GetCheky.com.com. All right, so here we are. Get into it here. So, to many people, Young Living is associated with lavender farms, home diffusers, glossy product catalogs, and the idea that health can be found in something natural, ancient, and beautifully packaged. But behind that brand story is a much more complicated history involving alternative medicine clinics, questionable credentials, regulatory scrutiny, civil complaints, criminal charges, and a founder whose personal mythology became inseparable from the company he built. This is not an episode about whether essential oils smell nice or whether some people find aromatherapy calming. They can, and they do. This episode's

The Brand Story Meets The Record

SPEAKER_00 11:03

about what happens when wellness products are marketed in ways that begin to sound like diagnosis, treatment, or cure. It's also about the difference between personal belief, business storytelling, medical evidence, and legal accountability. A few quick disclaimers before we begin. This episode is for education and commentary. It's not medical advice. I'm not saying that every person who uses essential oils is doing something dangerous, and I'm not saying that every complimentary therapy is fraudulent. We're looking at the documented history of one major figure in the essential oil industry and the public record around his clinics, credentials, company, and claims. Donald Gary Young was born in Idaho Falls, Idaho in 1949. Young Living's own obituary describes him as a child of rural hardship, raised with his family in a small cabin without running water or electricity. According to the company's version of his life story, he moved to British Columbia as a young man, worked in logging and ranching, and later suffered a serious logging accident that left him with years of pain and disability. The way his company tells his story, that logging accident became the turning point that sent him searching for natural approaches to healing, including herbs, nutrition, and eventually essential oils. Donald Gary Young's origin story later became part of the emotional foundation of Young Living. Young wasn't marketed simply as a businessman. He was presented as a survivor, a seeker, a farmer, a researcher, and a man who supposedly found something that conventional medicine had missed. Which, you know, to me brings shades of our recent Miracle Bleach episode, right? Yeah. Young Living's obituary said he spent 35 years studying essential oils, and he built a billion-dollar global business around what he considered the gift of essential oils. The New Yorker described Gary Young as a central figure in Young Living's internal culture, someone whose image and presence were part of the company's mythology. At company events, he appeared in theatrical ways, including one event where he attended by riding into the arena on a sled pulled by huskies. He had a way with a way with words, and he would announce new oil blends with a language that blended wellness, spirituality, and physiology. By the time Young Living was a major brand, Gary Young was not just the founder. For many distributors, he was the story. But the public-facing story was only one version of his history. One of the major issues in this case is credentials. Young presented himself for years as a healer and a medical authority, but the record around his education is troubling at best. The skeptical inquirer reported that Young claimed a doctorate in naturopathy from Bernadian University, which it describes as a male-order diploma mill that was never authorized to operate or grant degrees in the first place. The New Yorker similarly reported that Young's only medical degree was a doctorate in naturopathy from an unaccredited school. It's scary to me that he misrepresented himself as a doctor because, as you'll hear, the rest of the story repeatedly involves medical adjacent settings, birth services, cancer-related claims, blood testing, alternative clinics, and treatment programs. In a consumer wellness space, someone could call themselves a founder, teacher, researcher, or pioneer, and many listeners might assume that that means they have medical expertise, as you would. But charisma, personal experience, and self-directed study are not the same thing as a medical license. In 1982, before the company Young Living existed, Gary Young opened a health center in Spokane, Washington. According to The New Yorker, the center included birthing services. That same year, Young's own infant daughter died during a whirlpool birth. The New Yorker reported that the baby spent about an hour underwater in a whirlpool bath. But yet the death was ruled as an accident. And the county coroner said the baby likely would have survived under conventional delivery conditions. Uh uh. Yikes. So as painful as this is, and I mean, part of me is like, listen, it was your clinic. You thought you knew

Birth Tragedy And Unlicensed Medicine

SPEAKER_00 15:42

what you were doing. Your own wife is giving birth to your child, and you let them die in this water. Like you didn't know what you're doing. I'm not saying whirlpool, like bathing or birthing children in water. It's wrong. He didn't know what he was doing. It was his own kid. So they still called it an accident. But I I just I don't know. I it's it's weird with me, but and it's one of the most painful parts of this story. And it's a part that's misstated online because understandably people will criminalize this act. Obviously, I don't think he was out to murder his baby. He was just out of literally out of his depth, and this should have been a sign, but he wasn't criminally charged over his daughter's death. And the reason I bring it up is that it just sits in the same early period when he was operating a health center with birthing services, and he continued to do so despite not being a licensed physician and despite his daughter dying. This became part of the broader scrutiny of his activities in Washington. The clearest criminal conviction tied directly to Gary Young himself came in 1983. According to skeptical inquirer, Young was arrested in Spokane after a three-week undercover investigation. Investigators alleged that he offered to deliver a baby, treat cancer, detect cancer using a blood sample, and determine nutritional needs during pregnancy by drawing blood and interpreting the results. Young pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of practicing medicine without a license. After all that, he was given only a six 60-day sentence. He was fined $250. Wow. That's not even a copay for those things. And he was placed on probation for a year. I am crazy, man. The 80s. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_01 17:40

I was like, this is so 1983.

unknown 17:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:44

Practicing medicine without a license can sound at first like a bureaucratic offense, but the facts alleged in this investigation weren't minor wellness suggestions. They involved pregnancy, blood testing, cancer. Those are areas where patients need qualified medical evaluation, not just confidence and a convincing story. So this conviction establishes an early pattern that follows Young through the rest of the record. He repeatedly operated near the boundary between alternative wellness and medical practice. And at least once the law found that he crossed it. So after the escapades in Washington, Young moved his work into other alternative clinic settings. And in the late 1980s, he ran the Rosa Rita Beach Clinic in Tijuana, Mexico, which is on the West Coast. So he just kind of took his business south of the border. Public sources say the Rosa Rita Beach Clinic offered reinfusion of blood that had been drawn from patients and exposed to direct electrical current. Available reporting doesn't give enough detail to know what the exact machine dose, volume of blood, voltage, sterility protocol, or claim mechanism was actually used. But in plain language, the pitch behind this kind of treatment usually falls into the world of bioelectrical alternative medicine. The idea that electricity can somehow charge or cleanse

The Tijuana Clinic And Fake Testing

SPEAKER_00 19:07

or stimulate or weaken disease in the blood. Quackwatch.com. Their overview of questionable cancer therapy specifically lists devices that claim to pass low voltage current through tumors or the body, as well as devices that claim to charge blood samples taken from patients and later reinject them among unfounded cancer-related devices.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

This feels very like brickman deal. Absolutely. Or camper weirdo.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

Mm-hmm. It was were those in the 80s, 90s. I feel like they were. Like I think this time have to look back and see back. I think so. Yeah. I can't like I don't remember.

SPEAKER_01 19:47

We're on episode 60, 70 something. It's it's almost like I hope it was, because if it was more recent than that, it's like, ah. Yeah, if this happens now. No, I just quickly looked, and I'm so sorry to report 2015.

SPEAKER_00 20:02

Ah oh boy. Who was Rec Van Dolis? 2015? Okay, but also that's 11 years ago. But on too close for comfort, right? Because he was he was the naked guy operating from his trailer. Take it off. Oh my gosh. Episode 21? What episode was that? I don't. Oh, I thought you were looking. Oh no, I looked up something.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

Is it the one that has Adam's medical mishap attached to it? I think so. That could be just too much good in one episode.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

But if that's the case, it's something. In case it's the golden, it's the golden episode of our entire show. If there was an Emmy or some sort of award for the best episode, it would go to that one. So Adam would have to.

SPEAKER_01 20:48

So if you guys have not have not listened to our Rick Van Thiel episode, you should. And if it's not number eight, listen to whatever one it is, plus number eight.

SPEAKER_00 20:59

Absolutely. Oh. All right. So I mean, so here we are taking blood away, electrifying it, and then reinjecting it. But we need to distinguish this from legitimate medicine because, you know, as with anything, there's a tiny grain of truth that people can manipulate. So there are real medical procedures where blood or blood components are removed, processed, and returned to the patient, such as autologous blood recovery during surgery or certain cell therapies. But these are regulated indication-specific procedures with defined protocols. The FDA says its Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research regulates blood and blood components used for transfusion, as well as related products like cell separation devices and blood collection containers. Federal regulations also require written standard operating procedures for all steps in collecting, processing, testing, storing, and distributing blood and blood components, including autologous transfusion. There are also legitimate cancer treatments that involve electrical fields, but they aren't the same thing as electrifying your blood and putting it back in a body. For example, tumor treating fields use electrode pads on the skin near a tumor to deliver low-energy alternating electrical fields. And the American Cancer Society notes that FDA-approved devices exist for certain cancers, but that's a specific studied device-based therapy. It doesn't validate the much older alternative clinic practice of drawing blood, electrically, zapping it, and putting it back in a person's body. Later California court filings also accused providers at the Rosarita Beach Clinic of promoting cancer cures using techniques that included implanting electrodes into tumors and reinfusing electrically treated blood. Among the Rosarita Beach Clinic services, the skeptical inquirer also reported they offered latrial, colonics, iridology, massage, vegetarian diet, vitamin C therapy, and blood crystallization analysis. Young reportedly claimed that this blood crystallization analysis was 95%, 95% accurate for identifying current and future diseases, including arthritis and leukemia. Yeah, aim high, dude. So God's gift. So I looked through some of these. Some of this like massage and vegetarian diet is kind of self-explanatory, but like this latri L-E L-A-E-T-R-I-L-E, latrial, latrial. Well, that was apparently an alternative cancer treatment that was popularized in the in the early 20th century and often misleadingly called vitamin B17. It's related to amygdalin, which is a compound found in apricot pits and some other plants, and it can break down into cyanide in the body. Despite being marketed as a natural cancer treatment, human trials did not show anti-cancer benefit, and the FDA has not approved it for cancer or any other medical use. I mean, cyanide can be harmful. So I, you know, here we are playing with cyanide. And the other one that I wasn't sure about was iridology. That's exactly what it sounds like. It's like a diagnostic practice where they look at the iris. So they examine the colored part of the eye and compare it to charts that supposedly map the sections of the iris to different organs. The claim is that markings or color changes in your iris can reveal disease elsewhere in the body. But controlled studies have not shown iridology to be a reliable way to diagnose medical conditions. So in this case, it belongs in the same category as the clinic's other questionable diagnostic tools.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

You know, I know a lot of ophthalmologists. I want to ask them about that.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

Yeah, ask them. That would be I've never heard that. That would be a nice, that would be a really welcome little segment in the future. Yeah. Because yeah, sometimes you see things like, yeah, we haven't been able to prove it clinically, but is it is it just like way, is it because we haven't studied enough people, or is it just way out there? Like you might as well look at your horoscope.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

Is it yeah quackery or we're just having a yeah? Because if that is an actual thing, that's cool. You know, like when people come in for a hearing test, like sometimes that can be an indicator of like kind of early signs of a different thing.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

Or they'll say the I don't know, the color and type of your wax or your ear canal can reveal whether or not you have diabetes or you know, maybe there's something to it. I don't know. And then we just don't have enough of an end to say, but certainly if there's not enough evidence, you can't go around touting that that's what you're doing, you know. Yeah, yeah. The blood testing story where he said he got 95% sp specificity on diagnostics, including arthritis and stuff, by looking at crystallized blood spots. That's where the story in this case becomes surreal. In 1987, an LA Times reporter submitted blood samples to the clinic while posing as a prospective patient. This is cheeky. Love it. I love it because they submitted a sample from a healthy cat. Oh, I love it. And the clinic reportedly interpreted that sample as showing aggressive cancer and liver problems. And when the reporter revealed the blood came from a cat, the clinic just doubled down and said, Well, the cat wasn't healthy and probably had leukemia, but the cat didn't have any cancer. And then it gets worse. Another sample came from a chicken that they purchased from a poultry shop. According to Skeptical Inquirer's summary of the LA Times report, the clinic again failed to identify the sample as non-human, and they instead suggested liver inflammation and possible prelymphomic condition. The clinic also recommended detoxification. And the Times reported that the clinic's detoxification program costs $2,000 a week, payable in advance out of pocket. Bah-bah. Of course. Bah boom.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

That would have been funny if they showed up with the chicken. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Well, I'm like, did they just get a chicken breast or like was this an alive chicken? I don't, I don't even know. It doesn't matter. It's still ridiculous. If you're sending in blood, it must be alive. Well, I guess I don't know what the sample was. Yeah, I just assumed it was blood. Okay. Well, I I sounded like because it said they went to a poultry shop. So yeah, maybe they were alive. Yeah, whatever. It was a chicken. Butcher? Yeah. Well, shame, man. I hope those chickens lived a long and happy life.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

I hope so. Donating blood. I hate driving by semis with animals. Oh my gosh, that was a really good sound.

SPEAKER_00 28:00

Terrible. And on another note, this movie that I've been waiting for, The Sheep Detectives, is out on Prime. So I can't wait to watch it. It's about this. Never heard of it. Sheep Who Saw the Murder of their Shepherd. It looks so amazing. So sheep detective, everybody. We should watch it. Anyway, back to the darkness. So it was bizarre, but the concern isn't just that the test was wrong. The concern is that what that kind of wrongness can do in a clinical feeling environment. A person that's already afraid of cancer, already dissatisfied with conventional medicine, or already desperate for an answer may hear a confident interpretation of a blood test and make major decisions about it as a result of it. So the cat and chicken samples are memorable because they show how impressive-sounding diagnostic language can collapse when tested under basic conditions. Around the same period, Young was also connected to the Young Life Wellness Center and Young Life Products in Chula Vista, California. Skeptical inquiry reports that in 1988, a female investigator for the California's Department of Health Services submitted her own blood sample using the medical history of a fictitious male patient. The clinic reportedly responded that the test showed, among other things, an enlarged prostate and a potentially aggressive carcinogenic cells. So obviously, this woman patient did not have a prostate. Yeah, yeah. So the legal response in California was civil, not a criminal conviction against Young. According to a skeptical inquiry, the district attorney's office obtained a temporary restraining order related to misleading and deceptive health care advertising and later preliminary injunction prohibiting operation of the Chula Vista Clinic. The district attorney's office also filed an unfair business practice complaint, alleging that the defendants claimed they could cure cancer and other degenerative diseases, identify dozens of medical conditions, sell unapproved medical devices and unapproved new drugs, manufacture drugs and devices without a license, advertise drugs and devices to cure cancer, and practice medicine without a license. I mean, good Lord. I want to point out that the 1983 conviction wasn't an isolated controversy followed by a clean exit from medical claims. I mean, it represented a pattern. A pattern. The same themes appeared again and again: disease detection, cancer claims, blood analysis, detoxification, and a clinical environment where people could reasonably believe that they were receiving medical insight. Young Living Essential Oils was founded in the early 1990s and incorporated in 1994. Young Living's own public history says Gary and Mary Young built the company from farming, Gary and Mary, from farming distillation, and a desire to share essential oils widely. The company grew into a global business with farms, international offices, thousands of employees, and millions of members. Young Living used a multi-level marketing model. The New Yorker described the model as one where distributors buy products at wholesale prices, sell them at retail markup, and earn commissions from recruits in their downline. The same article reported that a public income statement showed more than 94% of Young Living's 2 million active

MLM Growth And Vulnerable Customers

SPEAKER_00 31:38

members made less than $1 in 2016. Oh. While less than one-tenth of 1% earned more than a million dollars. So there you go. MLM to the T. A traditional company can control a product label and official advertising copy, at least in theory, but an MLM has thousands or millions of independent distributors that tell their own personal stories, post testimonials, hold classes, and sell to friends, relatives, neighbors, and church communities, parenting groups, and online audiences. So the FTC's general guidance explains that MLMs involve direct sales and recruitment and warns consumers to be skeptical of these extravagant earnings claims, heavy recruitment emphasis, inventory pressure, and health products marketed with miracle claims or guaranteed results. In Young Living's case, the products weren't just socks or candles. They were wellness products. That meant distributors were often selling inside conversations about anxiety, grief, sleep, immune support, pain, pregnancy, children, chronic illness, and cancer. The product was a bottle of oil, but the sales environment often involved trust. And before we talk more about this, it's time for a J. Welcome to the chart note segment. Where we learn about what's happening in medicine and healthcare have to be barky because who knows what's in the backyard. Today's chart note is about when an essential oil becomes a drug claim. The FDA does not treat every scented product as a drug. A lavender oil sold for fragrance or a massage oil sold for aroma or a diffuser blend marketed for ambiance may fall into a very different category than a product marketed to treat disease. The line changes when the seller claims suggests or implies that the product is intended to diagnose, cure, mitigate, treat, or prevent a disease. That's why claims about cancer, Ebola, Parkinson's, urinary

When An Oil Becomes A Drug

SPEAKER_00 33:42

tract infections, high blood pressure, Alzheimer's disease, diabetes, or other medical conditions matter legally. These are not casual wellness statements. They're medical claims about treating disease. And this is an important distinction because the concern is not that people enjoy essential oils. The FDA is not saying someone can't like lavender, use a diffuser, or find a scent comforting or relaxing. The issue is the claim changes what the product legally becomes. So the same bottle can be framed very differently depending on the language around it. The oil itself may not change, but the marketing does. A product described as pleasant, calming, or fragrant is being sold in one context. A product described as treating infection, shrinking tumors, replacing medication, or reversing chronic disease is being sold in a very different context. So medically, that makes sense. Someone using lavender because it makes bedtime feel calmer isn't the same as someone being told that an essential oil can treat cancer or replace a prescribed medication. So personal comfort and symptom support are one category and disease treatment is another. Once a seller crosses into disease language, the burden of proof becomes much higher because now that product is being presented as medical care. The National Cancer Institute describes aromatherapy as something that may be used alongside standard cancer treatment to help with symptoms like stress, anxiety, nausea, vomiting, pain, and quality of life. But the NCIA also states that no peer-reviewed studies have shown aromatherapy treats cancer itself. A scent that helps someone feel calmer during treatment isn't the same as a treatment for the disease. The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health describes aromatherapy as a complementary health approach, most often used by inhaling essential oils or applying a diluted form to the skin. It also notes that for some common uses, like insomnia, there's little rigorous research. So even for relatively ordinary claims, the evidence is still limited. That doesn't mean that people can't enjoy it. It just means we need to be careful about turning personal experience into medical certainty. The risk increases when the claim becomes bigger than the evidence, especially if it causes someone to delay their diagnosis, avoid proven treatment, stop a medication, or spend money on something they believe is medical care. This scent helps me relax is a personal experience. This oil treats cancer is a medical claim. Peppermint smells refreshing, is not the same as peppermint cures infection. Semantics matter because words can change patient behavior. And so that's why this chart note connects so closely to today's case. Gary Young's story isn't just about essential oils as products, it's about authority, trust, and the way wellness language can drift into medical promise. Once that happens, the question's no longer whether something smells nice. The question is, what exactly is being claimed? What evidence is there to support that claim? And what could happen if someone believes it? And I will say a good example is like, so I used to work in the vestibular lab and people would be like, Oh, my nauseated. Yeah, exactly. I was seriously gonna say queasies. Yes. And we have these beautiful wand. Like I discovered it because when my daughter was coming out of anesthesia when she was little, after having tubes put in, she was nauseous, and they provided her this magical little stick that she was supposed to sniff. And I'm like, excuse me, what is that? And it's a blend of essential oils, including spearmint and lavender and other and lemongrass and things that have been known to help like relieve nausea. And so we use it in the vestibular lab for people who are feeling nauseous or dizzy after a testing. And so it might help relieve their nausea, but it's not curing their reason for their dizziness. I guess it's kind of like, yeah, and it's absolutely valid that there's a place for essential oils and aromatherapy. It's just we have to be careful about what we claim it can actually do.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

So and fun fact, outside of the vestibular clinic, I was handed a queasies when I was in labor. Oh. I was like, oh my gosh, queasies, and they were like, Oh, you know what that is? And I was like, Yes, give me that thing. I need to sniff it out.

SPEAKER_00 38:03

It's very pleasant, it's very nice. It is really nice. Yeah. And you know, smell is powerful. Like, I get why they're talking about a lot of the therapeutic benefits of essential oils and different the olfactory system, it's so strongly linked to the limbic system that it's it's pretty powerful in that way, you know, that you can rearrange your body's stress response to things, but it's not a cure for the reason for the issue that began to do that. The underlying reason why you have the symptom, yeah. Yeah. So in the year 2000, Gary Young opened the Young Life Research Clinic in Springville, Utah. The New Yorker reported that the clinic administered essential oils and other alternative therapies to patients with conditions including heart disease, depression, and cancer. The clinic employed a pediatrician named Sherbin Johnson, whose medical license had recently been reinstated. Red flag! You got it taken away to begin with? A pediatrician? Why are you hiring this person? Sorry. About a decade earlier, this pediatrician had been investigated after a woman died while he was treating her for cancer. First of all, why is he

Utah Clinic Fallout And Safety Death

SPEAKER_00 39:20

a pediatrician treating a woman for cancer?

SPEAKER_01 39:23

Thank you. You read my mind. I was like, okay.

SPEAKER_00 39:27

I didn't notice that when I was writing it, but like, okay, that's your first mistake. In that earlier case, according to the New Yorker's summary of the Salt Lake Tribune reporting, Johnson pleaded guilty to manslaughter after the woman died from a demerol overdose administered by him. And that clinic in Utah later became the subject of a lawsuit. In 2005, the clinic settled with a patient who claimed that vitamin C infusions caused renal failure and nearly killed her. So after that, Young closed the Utah clinic and opened one in Ecuador. Oh, as you do. Let's get out of the spotlight, right? Former Young Living Executive David Sterling told a New Yorker that he became alarmed after seeing a video of Young performing gallbladder surgery.

unknown 40:16

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 40:17

So this this man's this unqualified man's. He's unqualified to be a doctor. He's definitely super unqualified to be a surgeon. He was performing gallbladder surgery.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

It's like, I hope when I'm on the table, he takes out the right organ.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

What the hell? And he gave her essential oils through an IV. Oh my gosh. What the hell? So, like, not only that, but you're putting oil in. It's bad enough that you're doing this, but like, wouldn't that cause clots and blockages? Oh my god. I just can't believe that this guy got away with this. The New Yorker notes in the same passage that Young's only medical degree was from an unaccredited school in naturopathy. It wasn't even, we're not even talking medical or or like surgery. Yeah. So of course Young declined to speak to the reporter while a company spokesperson defended him. He was a pioneer. He's a founder with a cowboy spirit. Oh, a killer spirit. Okay. Again, I have to kind of come back to legality and say that this story isn't a criminal conviction against Young, but it's part of a record of how he continued, and it should, to me, in my mind, should be a criminal history. But this is how he continued presenting himself in medical or quasi-medical roles long after his Washington conviction and the California clinic controversy. So the same question keeps resurfacing. What happens when a person with charisma, money, followers, and self-styled expertise, in other words, ignorance, masked as charisma, operates in spaces where patients believe they're receiving legitimate medical care on their gallbladder. I'm just, I'm just I'm dumbfounded. It's it's just yikes. In addition to that, there's a workplace safety event on the public record. So skeptical inquiry reports in August of 2000, one of Young's homemade distillers ruptured at the lid and fatally wounded. In other words, killed one of his workers at Young Living Farms in Mona, Utah. Young Living Farms was fined $10,280 for seven safety violations that resulted in one man's death. Again, don't understand the lightness of that. But according to the Utah Occupational Safety and Health Division report, quoted by Skeptical Inquirer, the operation was designed by Gary Young, built on site. Vessels were not built to code, and there was no pressure relief device installed on the vessels. And so when I was reading this, I was thinking about how I have a pressure cooker. I mean, you're putting your your little Korean barbecue ribs in there or rice or whatever. That thing can blow your hair back and take some skin off if you don't release it properly. And that's for a small little thing on your kitchen counter for food. Can you imagine what they were using for these essential oils? And they weren't built with any safety in mind. No standards adhered to.

SPEAKER_01 43:19

Again, throwback to medical mishap. Episode eight. That's how my husband got burned.

SPEAKER_00 43:27

That's the companion episode to this one, right? Oh man. Yeah. Um, and then later not essential oils. No, but they're dangerous. Look what happened to him. Yeah, yeah. You could get things stapled where they don't need to be stapled. And I would just skip to the warning letter back. So Gary Young died. Let's go there. Gary Young died on May 12th, 2018, in Salt Lake City, Utah. Young Living announced that he died at age 68 from complications following a series of strokes, and that Mary. Gary Young, the company's co-founder and CEO, along with president and COO Jared Turner, would continue running the business. His death marked the end of his direct role in the company, but it didn't end the regulatory issues around how young living products were promoted. Although the company was built around Gary Young's story, his personality, and claimed expertise, by the time he died, the brand and distributor culture were much bigger than him. The founder was gone, but the sales model, product language, and wellness claims continued. In 2022, the FDA sent another warning letter to Young Living, this time addressed to Mary Young, as co-founder and CEO. The FDA said it reviewed Young Living websites and social media accounts for several Young Living consultants and found the products were again being marketed for disease-related issues or uses, making them unapproved new drugs and misbranded drugs. The listed claims involved essential oils,

FDA Warnings And Environmental Crime

SPEAKER_00 44:57

vitality products, ninxia products, and CBD products, with disease references ranging from urinary tract infections and kidney stones to cancer, Alzheimer's, diabetes, epilepsy, glaucoma, and Parkinson's disease yet again. The other major criminal case involves the company rather than Gary Young personally. In 2017, young living essential oils pleaded guilty in federal court to misdemeanor charges related to illegal trafficking of rosewood oil and spikenard oil in violation of the Lacey Act and Endangered Species Act. The U.S. Department of Justice announced that the company was sentenced to pay $600 or sorry, $760,000, a $500,000 fine, and $135,000 in restitution, and $125,000 community service payment for conservation of protected plant species used in essential oils. The company was placed on five years of probation with special compliance conditions. The Department of Justice also noted that Young Living voluntarily disclosed the rosewood violations and cooperated with investigators while stating that violations by certain employees were intentional and substantial. I wasn't quite sure what these were, so I looked into a bit more. Spikenard oil is an essential oil distilled from the roots of a Himalayan plant called Jatamansi or Indian Spikenard. It has a history in fragrance and traditional medicine, but the plant itself is threatened because harvesting the root can kill it. And that's why international trade in spikenard is regulated and why it showed up in Young Living's environmental criminal case. Rosewood oil sounds like it comes from roses, but it doesn't. In this case, rosewood refers to Aniba Rossadora, also called Brazilian rosewood, boista rose, palosa, or palo de rosa. It's an Amazonian tree whose wood produces a valuable essential oil with a sweet, woody floral aroma. The oil is rich in linolule, which is a fragrance compound used in perfumery and cosmetics. And historically, rosewood oil was especially valued as a perfume ingredient and fixative. The conservation issue is that traditional rosewood oil production often meant cutting down the whole tree. So the tree's aromatic wood could be harvested, chipped, and steam distilled to extract the oil. Rosewood trees can grow very large, up to 30 meters tall and two meters in diameter, but they've been heavily exploited over time because of the commercial value of the oil. So the Amazon Cooperative Treaty Organization notes that Aniba Rosadora is listed in CITES Appendix 2, which is a protected species list. And since July 2010, commercialization and export of rosewood oil has been restricted to authorized management areas. And so that's why the Young Living case isn't just a paperwork, paperwork problem. According to the DOJ, from June 2010 to October 2014, several young living employees and contractors harvested, transported, and distilled rosewood in Peru and imported some of the resulting oil into the U.S. through Ecuador. Peruvian law prohibited unauthorized harvest and transport of timber, including rosewood. And the DOG said neither company nor its suppliers, employees, or agents had valid authorization from the Peruvian government. The company also didn't obtain the required export permits from Peru. So the scale was substantial. The Department of Justice said company employees harvested, transported, and possessed approximately 86 tons of rosewood. And I think of that in elephants. How many elephants is that? That's like a lot of elephants, at least 40. Yeah. And that's in violation of Peruvian law. The rosewood was intended for distillation and export to the U.S. and some has already been illegally brought in. The Department of Justice said the company lacked an internal compliance program to identify and stop these violations at the time. And between November 2014 and January 2016, Young Living purchased more than 1,100 kilograms of rosewood oil from a U.S. supplier importer without conducting sufficient due diligence to make sure that it was lawfully sourced. So the government calculated the fair market retail value of the plant products involved, including almost 2,000 liters of rosewood oil, at more than 3.5 million and no more than $9 million. And there's a broader industry issue here too, because authentic rosewood oils, valuable and restricted, difficult to source, adulteration and authenticity testing are major concerns in the market. So sometimes people mix rosewood oil with other natural or synthetic oils, add other plant products. You know, this all just leads to ill gain, ill-gotten gains that are not good for the environment, illegal and unfair business practices. So a company that claims to be built around natural products didn't follow the law or the rules about protecting nature and the ecosystems that the products came from. So you know, right there it's like untrustworthy when it was part of what they claimed was the product's truth. By the time Gary Young died in 2018, Young Living publicly described him as the father of the modern essential oil movement and credited him with building a billion-dollar global business. Well, that's one version. But the public record shows another version. A misdemeanor conviction for practicing medicine without a license, investigative reporting about dubious blood testing and cancer-related claims, civil action involving California clinics, reports of alternative clinics treating seriously ill patients, FDA warnings about disease claims, a workpace or workplace safety fatality, and a criminal conviction against the company for environmental violations for basically raping nature of its bounty. So what makes this case compelling isn't simply that Gary Young sold essential oils, it's his authority that he

Trust, Evidence, And Accountability

SPEAKER_00 51:16

built around them. His life story made him seem like he was a guru, like someone who survived what medic medicine couldn't fix. His clinics gave alternative treatments of medical setting. His company created a community and a following. His distributors gave the products personal testimony. And over time, that combination allowed small bottles of plant extracts to carry claims much, much larger than any evidence was behind them. And this is where the case fits into Doctoring the Truth. It's a story about trust and how trust can be transferred from a person to a product, from a product to a company, and a company to an entire community. It's a reminder that when someone says they're offering wellness, it's worth asking. What are they actually claiming? Where's the evidence? Who profits from this? And what is the accountability if the claim is wrong?

SPEAKER_01 52:06

Oh wow. Great job covering this case. It had so many different facets. We had people who I don't know, had fake degrees acting as surgeons when they are most certainly not. I think this is our first MLM that we've covered. I think so, yeah. I think so. You're right. I had never heard of Young Living before, but and then also I I love that you touched on how this like affects nature too. Like how many tons of the rosewood? It's super sad. It's also super sad when people claim that they can you know cure all these diseases and health issues. I hope we all know that neurological diseases cannot be cured by essential oils, but we do know now. But and we've talked about this in many other cases, but these people are so desperate, and so by the time they find something completely different, they are going to probably hop on a wagon because they are so desperate. They're in pain, they're suffering, or like maybe you found it, and you know, a family member or someone you love is suffering. So you're gonna be like, hey, let's just get these oils, let's try this. So it's preying on the vulnerable.

SPEAKER_00 53:28

Yeah, at at personal, great personal expense too, because these weren't cheap. So I mean, it's not only come so they're claiming not only erroneous claims to cure things, but they're basically not respecting endangered species and raping the environment for what they claim is all natural and healthy and whatever. And so it's all just a lie built upon a lie, built upon a lie, and yeah, victimizing.

SPEAKER_01 53:55

It's like when the lie gets so big you don't even know what shade of a truth was inside the lie, and then you build an MLM out of it.

SPEAKER_00 54:02

And not all MLMs are evil. I mean, I think, but I think when it's built on a lie, it it doesn't stand a chance. Yikes. Well, great job. For listeners who want more background, the FDA has consumer information about health fraud scams, including products that claim to prevent, treat, or cure disease without being proven safe and effective for that use. The FDA notes that these products can waste money, delay proper diagnosis or treatment, and in some cases actually cause serious harm. The National Cancer Institute has a patient summary on aromatherapy and essential oils. It describes aromatherapy as a complementary approach that can be used alongside standard cancer treatment for symptom management like stress, anxiety, nausea, pain, and quality of life. But it also states that no studies of aromatherapy used to treat cancer have been published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal anywhere, anytime. The National Center for Complimentary and Integrative Health describes aromatherapy as the use of plant essential oils as a complementary health approach as well, usually through inhalation or diluted topical use. They note that for some common uses like insomnia, there's very little rigorous research. And because Young Living uses an MLM model, the FTC consumer guidance on MLMs is also useful, as we talked about. So you can say, you can see kind of the FTC explains that MLMs involve selling products and recruiting others into the sales network, and that some MLMs are illegal pyramid schemes, but not all. But it also notes that most people who join legitimate MLMs make little or no money, and many lose money. So just something for our listeners to remember, just to super underline and highlight that. But let's talk about our second sponsor. So last week Amanda asked me a question. When was the last time you treated yourself to something that actually improved your everyday life? And I was like, and she was like, Well, chances are it's time to fix that for you. And I think it's true for all of us. Quality sleep is one of those things that's easy to overlook until you finally experience the difference. And that's why we love cozy earth. Their bamboo sheet sets are designed with cooling, moisture-wicking fabric that's perfect for anyone who tends to sleep hot. And boy, do I sleep hot and I have my thermostat leg out at night. I can't wait to climb into those soft, incredibly soft sheets that are cooling as well. And don't even get us started on the PJs. They're so comfortable.

Sponsor Cozy Earth Sleep

SPEAKER_00 56:34

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SPEAKER_01 57:00

All right, y'all. Time for medical mishap. This time, this email reads Hi Jenna and Amanda, longtime listener, first-time email. Love what you ladies bring to the healthcare and podcast podcast space. I have a medical mishap that cost me an urgent care copay and every ounce of my dignity. Oh no. Oh no. I was home alone one evening when I felt something crawling up the inside of my t-shirt. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Oh my gosh. So they write, I absolutely hate spiders. Me too. So I did what any rational person would do. I completely lost my mind. Absolutely. I started

Medical Mishap The Invisible Spider

SPEAKER_01 57:44

jumping around the living room, slapping at my shirt and trying to shake whatever it was out. Something in the chaos, or I'm sorry, somewhere in something probably in the chaos, I tripped over my dog's bed and crashed shoulder first into the coffee table. The spider disappeared. My shoulder, however, hurt more every minute. By the next morning, I couldn't lift my arm above my head, so I went to urgent care. And the doctor asked, What happened? I said, I was attacked by a spider. He looked concerned and asked, Did it bite you? I said, Actually, I'm not sure there ever was a spider. So he just stared at me for a second, and it turns out I sprained my shoulder, diving away from what was actually eventually discovered to be dot dot the little plastic stinger string that attaches to the sales tag inside my brand new t-shirt. Oh my gosh. That is hilarious. I hate those things. The doctor told me I was far away from the from the first patient that he'd treated for injuries caused by something that only might have existed. So, Ellie Cats, if you've ever done something like the invisible spider dance, you are in good company. They write, Meanwhile, stay suspicious of spiders and stay safe while suspecting them. Love Amelia. Oh, Amelia, I'm with you. That totally stinks. You have to be a cope for that.

unknown 59:19

I know.

SPEAKER_00 59:21

For one of those stupid tags that I usually try to rip with my teeth, and then when they don't work, sometimes you rip a hole in your garment trying to rip those things out.

SPEAKER_01 59:31

Yeah, yeah. I'm always like, I can rip this with my fingers, and then you're feeling it like this is definitely gonna slice my finger, but why am I not stopping? I don't know. I should get a scissor. Oh, it's starting to hurt.

SPEAKER_00 59:41

I get mad at those things, man. Well, thank you, Amelia. Listen, we're at the hour and five-minute mark. We should probably wrap this up. What can our listeners expect to hear next week, Amanda?

SPEAKER_01 59:55

Well, we're either going to be covering a case on fentanyl patches, or my friend that was just visiting told me about a pretty garbage pediatrician. So I might look into that. Um so you'll have to stay tuned to see which route we go, left or right. But until then, can't wait. Yeah, don't miss a beat, you guys. Subscribe or follow Doctoring the Truth wherever you enjoy your podcasts for stories that shock, intrigue, and educate. Trust, after all, is a delicate thing. You can text us directly on our website at doctoringthe truth at buzzprout.com. Email

Next Week Tease And Signoff

SPEAKER_01 1:00:29

us your own story ideas, medical mishaps, and comments at Doctoringthe Truth at Gmail, and be sure to follow us on Instagram at Doctoring the Truth Podcast and Facebook at Doctoring the Truth. We're on TikTok at Doctoring the Truth and ed odd pod. Don't forget to download rate and review so we can be sure to bring you more content next week. And until then, stay safe and stay.