What is a Panacea?
A panacea is a substance which is capable of curing all disease. As you might imagine from the well-stocked shelves at your local drugstore, no one has been able to find a panacea, although people have certainly tried. The myth of a panacea endures to this day in some corners of the alternative medical field, and a variety of products have been sold to the unwitting public as “panaceas.” As a general rule, if a medicine is labeled as universal, there is a strong probability it won’t work for anything, not to mention everything. In addition to being used to refer to a cureall medicine, people can also describe the cure to social, environmental, or political problems as a “panacea.” In this sense, many people use the term pejoratively, with the goal of undercutting people who believe that there is a simple and quick fix to a problem. When people talk about a panacea for a social problem, they suggest that someone’s wishful thinking is clouding their judgment. Although most people today a
The terrain is slightly uneven in this area, but it looks like a great place for a picnic. Watch the kids by the water though. The word panacea means the “Cure All”.” In the 19th century, Wakulla boosters were determined to transform the county’s natural mineral springs into a tourist attraction. That’s how ‘Smith Springs’ became ‘Panacea’–Greek for ‘healing all’–in 1889. Advertisements boasted that each of the town’s 13 bubbling ponds cured a different ailment. Tourists flocked to Panacea to bask in the restorative springs. There were hotels, restaurants, health spas, baths, bottled water for drinking, boardwalks, piers and pavilions over the bay, all oriented around the healing power of the springs and bringing prosperity until the Depression. Most of the development was destroyed by a hurricane in 1928, and the springs property soon fell into neglect. Thanks to Wakulla High School a local clean up effort is underway. Please use CITO in the area and imagine how grand this area once
