NCCIH Publishes Updated List of Most Common Alternative Deaths.....

Bethesda, MD - The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) has published an updated list of the most common causes of alternative deaths in the United States over the past 12 years.

Space reiki, shown here incapacitating a young moisture farmer, was the 6th most common cause of alternative death in the United States since 2010

"Here at the NCCIH we are dedicated to deepening our knowledge of corporeal magic and all related mystic arts, which is just our fun way to describe human physiology and medicine," NCCIH Director Helene Langevin explained. "And one of our core missions is public education based on the most current data."

Spontaneous combustion has become the most common cause of alternative death among humans in the United States, according to the NCCIH data. According to integrative forensic pathologist Mort Fishman, MD, children are significantly less likely to randomly burst into flames than any other age group, though it isn't unheard of. "Pediatric alternative deaths are rare by any measure, and spontaneous combustion is unexpected by definition, so it's a profound tragedy in a unique way."

Since 2010, the last time that NCCIH released data on alternative deaths, the leading causes have included spontaneous human combustion, space reiki, accordion syndrome, Pfft syndrome (acute acupuncture-induced deflation), asynchronous vibration of Steve, haunted colons, overdilution of homeopathic remedies, congenital chi deficiency, storchus, and splennic ennui.

"When we looked at all these leading causes of alternative death, from people exploding without a good reason to a fatal case of storchus, we said, 'Yikes, wouldn't it be nice to have some simple, safe intervention we could do to get rid of even just one of them?" Langevin revealed. "And that's why it is so important to continue funding the NCCIH, because that's what we have been trying to do...for decades."