Source : The Irish Times (August 12, 2008).
By Michael Kelly.

Diviner Brendan Murphy walks around the perimeter of our house carrying two dowsing rods. The rods seem to twitch and swivelat random on the end of histhumbs as he does so. After abrief session of divining, he tellsus that he has located an undergroundstream beneath ourhome, running at a depth of about 200ft, from west to east.

We move inside the houseand Murphy tours the bedrooms.In the main bedroom, hestops to inform us that thestream is running directly beneaththe left-hand side of ourdouble bed, and the running wateris disturbing the earth's geomagneticenergy field.

This, he tells us, is geopathic stress and it has the potential tomake the person who is sleepingon the left side of the bed verysick indeed. He recommendsthat we move the bed away fromthe stress line. I have to admit tobeing extremely sceptical aboutthe concept of geopathic stressand I am glad to report that theperson sleeping on the left sideof the bed is perfectly healthy -but later that day we move thebed anyway, just to be on thesafe side, you understand.

So what is geopathic stress?Proponents say that the earthhas a geomagnetic energy fieldwhich, when distorted, becomesharmful to our health. Althoughit is claimed that the Chineseknew about stressful places(and refused to build theirhomes on them) over 4,000years ago, the modern "father"of geopathic stress is thought tobe a German scientist and dowserGustav Freiherr von Pohl.

In 1929, von Pohl mapped geopathicstress lines in the townof Vilsbiburg and found that allof the people who had died ofcancer in the town since recordsbegan, had slept in beds in areasmarked on his map - von Pohldecided that cancer was "a diseaseof location".

There have been some incredible claims made about the impact of geopathic stress on human health: that sleeping in areas of geopathic stress causescancers and a whole range ofother illnesses from cot deathsto heart disease; that animalsand infants will instinctivelyavoid sleeping on geopathic stress lines, and that trees willhave stunted growth if placedon them.

Scientists and doctors generallytreat these claims with derision,and there has been no seriousscientific research carriedout on the issue since von Pohl'stime. Though there is a wealthof compelling anecdotal evidence,there is an almost totallack of scientific evidence to supportclaims.

Murphy's company PositiveEnergy Ltd is one of a numberin Ireland that specialise in dealingwith geopathic stress andelectromagnetic radiation. Murphyhas been divining stresslines full time for nearly 15 yearsand charges €120 for the service.

His suggested remedies forgeopathic stress include the installationof "neutralises" in and around the house (see panel)."I start outside the houseand look around for the obvious things like mobile phone mastsor electricity pylons, which might be a source of stress. I then look for underground streams entering and leaving the building, which tells me where I need to check inside the house".


Murphy believes geopathic stress itself does not cause an illness,but that it impacts the immune system, rendering the patient unable to fight disease.When a bed is located over a geopathic stress line, he says, it presents particular difficulties since it is during sleep that the brain is sending out signals to cells to regenerate.

"It blocks the electric pulses from the brain from getting to the particular part of the body and so that particular area is prevented from healing itself.This is why geopathic stress-related problems are so localised.
"He is well used to sceptics, he tells me, and has carried out several trials for curious newspapers,documentary makers and radio stations. These trials involved him being brought to the home of a cancer patient and successfully identifying which bed the patient slept in and where in their body the cancer was located.

"That is surely worthy of investigation,"he says. "It always puzzles me that so much money is spent trying to cure cancer and so little money is spent trying to find the cause. I have no problem with scepticism -I welcome it - and I always find that if I can turn a sceptic around,they will be my biggest ally."

Neutralising the effect of geopathic stress
When their daughter Ava was about a year old, John Walsh and his wife Anita movedher out of her cot and in to a bed in their Kilmeaden, Co Waterford home. They were surprised to notice a dramatic change in her sleeping pattern.

"When she was born first and was in the cot, she was sleeping soundly, but when we put her in the bed, she started waking during the night. She would be wide awake for two or three hours and that was very tough on us. On top of that, myself and Anita were suffering from persistent backproblems.

"Convinced that geopathic stress might bethe cause, Walsh approached Positive Energy and an examination of the housefound underground water running rightunder their own bed and that of their daughter.Because they didn't have the option to move the beds, Positive Energy recommended the installation of a copperring in a trench around their house, which it is claimed neutralises the effect ofgeopathic stress before it enters the building. This project, which included substantial ground work, cost €4,800.

Walsh claims that as soon as the work was finished, his wife's back trouble disappeared and that Ava has been sleeping soundly since.His own back problems disappeared too after about five weeks. All in all, he believes it was money well spent."What was worrying us was what might come after the back pain. You hear stories locally about people with cancer of the throat and the line running right across the irpillow. My mother died of cancer so these things are never far from your mind."