It has been the long standing policy of Central Organizations to handle physical illness and insanity in the following manner.

Any process labelled "healing", old or new refers to healing by mental and spiritual means and should therefore be looked upon as the relief of difficulties arising from mental and spiritual causes.

The proper procedure in being requested to heal some complained of physical disability is as follows:

1. Require a physical examination from whatever practitioners of the physical healing arts may be competent and available;

2. Clearly establish that the disability does not stem from immediately physical causes;

3. If the disability is pronounced to be curable within the skill of the physical practitioner and is in actual fact a disease or illness which surrenders to contemporary physical treatment, to require the person to be so treated before Scientology processing may be undertaken;

4. If, however, the physical practitioner's recommendation includes surgery or treatment of an unproven nature or the illness or disease cannot be accurately diagnosed as a specific physical illness or disease with a known cure, the person may be accepted for processing on the reasonable assumption that no purely physical illness is proven to exist, and that it is probably mental or spiritual in origin.

With insane persons or persons with a proven record of insanity, do the following:

1. Establish to the best of your ability within reasonable administrative limits and known tests that any HGC pc accepted for processing does not have a history of deserved institutionalization in an insane asylum or similar place;

2. Process only those persons who have no such history;

3. Do not recommend any other treatment by practitioners in the field of insanity where there exists any evidence that such practitioners injure, disable or maltreat patients by violently reacting drugs, by painful shocks, surgery or other barbaric and outdated means of "mental treatment";

4. If no recommendation is possible under (3) above, recommend only rest and a change of environment, but not in a professional capacity.

Policies similar to those regarding physical illness and insanity exist for types of persons who have caused us considerable trouble.

These persons can be grouped under "Threatening Sources". They include:

(a) Persons intimately connected with persons (such as marital or familial ties) of known antagonism to mental or spiritual treatment or Scientology. In practice such persons, even when they approach Scientology in a friendly fashion, have such pressure continually brought to bear upon them by persons with undue influence over them that they make very poor gains in processing and their interest is solely devoted to proving the antagonistic element wrong.

They, by experience, produce a great deal of trouble in the long run as their own condition does not improve adequately under such stresses to effectively combat the antagonism. Their present time problem cannot be reached as it is continuous, and so long as it remains so, they should not be accepted for auditing by any organization or auditor.

(b) Criminals with proven criminal records often continue to commit so many undetected harmful acts between sessions that they do not make adequate case gains and therefore should not be accepted for processing by organizations or auditors.

(c) Persons who have ever threatened to sue or embarrass or attack or who have publicly attacked Scientology or been a party to an attack and all their immediate families should never be accepted for processing by a Central Organization or an auditor. They have a history of only serving other ends than case gain and commonly again turn on the organization or auditor. They have already barred themselves out by their own overts against Scientology and are thereafter too difficult to help, since they cannot openly accept help from those they have tried to injure.

(d) Responsible-for-condition cases have been traced back to other causes for their condition too often to be acceptable. By Responsible-for-condition cases is meant the person who insists a book or some auditor is "wholly responsible for the terrible condition I am in". Such cases demand unusual favours, free auditing, tremendous effort on the part of auditors. Review of these cases shows that they were in the same or worse condition long before auditing, that they are using a planned campaign to obtain auditing for nothing, that they are not as bad off as they claim, and that their antagonism extends to anyone who seeks to help them, even their own families. Establish the rights of the matter and decide accordingly.

(e) Persons who are not being audited on their own determinism are a liability as they are forced into being processed by some other person and have no personal desire to become better. Quite on the contrary they usually want only to prove the person who wants them audited wrong and so do not get better. Until a personally determined goal to be processed occurs, the person will not benefit.

(f) Persons who "want to be processed to see if Scientology works" as their only reason for being audited have never been known to make gains as they do not participate. News reporters fall into this category. They should not be audited.

(g) Persons who claim that "if you help such and such a case" (at great and your expense) because somebody is rich or influential or the neighbours would be electrified should be ignored. Processing is designed for bettering individuals, not progressing by stunts or giving cases undue importance. Process only at convenience and usual arrangements. Make no extraordinary effort at the expense of other persons who do want processing for normal reasons. Not one of these arrangements has ever come off successfully as it has the unworthy goal of notoriety, not betterment.

(h) Persons who "have an open mind" but no personal hopes or- desires for auditing or knowingness should be ignored, as they really don't have an open mind at all, but a lack of ability to decide about things and are seldom found to be very responsible and waste anyone's efforts "to convince them".

(i) Persons who do not believe anything or anyone can get better. They have a purpose for being audited entirely contrary to the auditor's and so in this conflict, do not benefit. When such persons are trained they use their training to degrade others. Thus they should not be accepted for training or auditing.

(j) Persons attempting to sit in judgement on Scientology in hearings or attempting to investigate Scientology should be given no undue importance. One should not seek to instruct or assist them in any way. This includes judges, boards, newspaper reporters, magazine writers, etc. All efforts to be helpful or instructive have done nothing beneficial as their first idea is a firm "I don't know" and this usually ends with an equally firm "I don't know". If a person can't see for himself or judge from the obvious, then he does not have sufficient powers of observation even to sort out actual evidence. In legal matters, only take the obvious effective steps - carry on no crusades in court. In the matter of reporters, etc. it is not worth while to give them any time contrary to popular belief. They are given their story before they leave their editorial rooms and you only strengthen what they have to say by saying anything. They are no public communication line that sways much. Policy is very definite. Ignore.

To summarize troublesome persons, the policy in general is to cut communication as the longer it is extended the more trouble they are. I know of no case where the types of persons listed above were handled by auditing or instruction. I know of many cases where they were handled by firm legal stands, by ignoring them until they changed their minds, or just turning one's back.

In applying such a policy of cut-communication one must also use judgement as there are exceptions in all things and to fail to handle a person's momentary upset in life or with us can be quite fatal. So these policies refer to non-Scientology persons in the main or persons who appear on the outer fringes and push toward us. When such a person bears any of the above designations we and the many are better off to ignore them.

Scientology works. You don't have to prove it to everyone. People don't deserve to have Scientology as a divine right, you know. They have to earn it. This has been true in every philosophy that sought to better man.

All the above "Troublesome Sources" are also forbidden training and when a person being trained or audited is detected to belong under the above headings (a) to (j) he or she should be advised to terminate and accept refund which must be paid at once and the full explanation should be given them at that time. Thus the few may not, in their own turmoil, impede service to and the advance of the many. And the less enturbulence you put on your lines, the better, and the more people you will eventually help.

Scientology is an applied philosophy designed and developed to make the able more able. In this sphere it is tremendously successful.

Efforts to involve philosophy with medical imperialism, psychiatric sadism, the bigoted churchman, bring about a slowing of our progress.

These people are sick spiritually because of their own continuous harmful actions against patients and the society and are beyond our normal means to help.

These policies will continue in existence until such time as those interested care to invest the time and treasure necessary to build the institutions and re-educate the professions which now practice medical and physical mental healing, and this is definitely not within our time, but would belong to some remote future when more men are sane.

However, such a programme would depend upon the continued existence of the medical imperialist and the psychiatrist and as their more reprehensible activities are rather new and very radical they may be abandoned by public and government long before Scientology could help them. This is probably the more likely occurrence as even in Russia, the Communist has now foresworn all violent treatments of the insane according to their delegates to the London Medical Conference of this year, and Russian practitioners look with contempt and scorn upon the Western psychiatrist. The medical doctor of England, taken over by Socialism, has lost his ambition for medical imperialism and has no contest with Scientology. In the United States the American Medical Association has become locked in mortal combat with the government and probably will be socialized entirely in a few years due to fee abuses and lack of gains. The medical doctor remains strong only in more backward small nations such as Australia where world trends are late in arriving.

Even the Church in Rome is considering a surrender of principles and amalgamation with other faiths in an effort to save a dwindling religious membership.

Thus there may be no medical practitioner as we know him left in a few decades. Membership in the psychiatric profession is declining.

In the place of these institutions, if we ever get around to them, we may find ourselves dealing with completely different practices in the fields of physical healing and the treatment of the insane. All we ask of them is that they are competent in their treatments and less greedy for monopoly than their predecessors. And if this is so, then our policies will then remain fully in force, but in a spirit of co-operation, not with the desire to protect ourselves and the public from them and the products of their bungling.

[See also HCO P/Ls 5 November 1964, Corrections to HCO Policy Letters, next page, 27 October 1964 (reissued 23 June 1967), Policies on Physical Healing, Insanity and Potential Trouble Sources, page 517; 7 April 1965, Issue 11, Healing Policy in Field, page 521, 21 February 1969, Cancellation of "Corrections to HCO Policy Letters" - Pol Ltr of November 5, 1964, page 523; 13 March 1969 Addition to HCO Pol Ltr of 23 June 1967 "Policies on Physical Healing, Insanity and Potential Trouble Sources"- Potential Trouble Sources (b), page 523, and 7 May 1969, Policies on "Sources of Trouble" page 525.]