For Real: 1.6 Million-Dollar Magnetic Hover Bed Floats on Air Not too long ago it would have sounded like futuristic science fiction,?but here it is – the world’s most expensive luxury bed that is not suspended but, instead, is tethered to the ground so it does not simply drift up and away. Seven years of study went into the development process of the permanent, non-degrading magnetic support system for this seven-figure sleeping platform. The bed frame itself is a simple rectilinear board, painted black, that appears to hover on invisible legs.As the old argument goes: if you are going to spend a third of your life lying on something, you might as well make it something nice. Since it can hold up over fifteen hundred pounds, well, weight will not pose a problem for most people.To be fair, it is worth questioning the real value in such an expensive solution. How is this so fundamentally different from a normal bed – or a hanging, water or other specialty sleeper? And what is it about that experience that makes the design worth as much as a mansion?
Perhaps it is just another plaything for the rich, for now at least, but who knows … as technology evolves maybe it will be a teenage fad ten years from now, too. What the military did for flight, architect Janjaap Ruijssenaars may just do for the sleep (or entire furniture) industry. Looking at the long list of ailments which the machine in front of me is meant to relieve, you feel like a diner in a restaurant, wondering which dish to order. Should you go for the stress or the skin disorders? For the migraines or the muscle tension? For the back pain, the knee pain or the poor circulation? The Bemer 3000 Magnetic Therapy Machine promises to help all of them. That's not to mention arthritis, asthma, gout, osteoporosis, stroke rehabilitation, open wounds, infertility, multiple sclerosis and tinnitus - a menu of ailments so extensive you can't help wondering if you're actually being served up prime loin of codswallop, on a bed of humbug. Christopher Middleton tries his luck with the Bemer 200 Magnetic Therapy machine
I must admit I'm tempted to make an early exit, except that when I rise from my chair, I get that old twinge from the lower back (ruined from lifting my children into car seats). And besides, you never know, do you? I mean, I don't believe in miracle cures, but there may be something in this magnetic therapy business. After all, a lot of people swear by copper and magnetic bracelets, to counteract joint and muscle pain. It's estimated that the worldwide market for magnetic devices is £2.45 billion a year. We all couldn't have got it wrong, surely? What's more, the Bemer ( pronounced 'beamer') 3000 isn't just a little silver disc or patch that you put on one little, painful bit of you; it is what's called a Bio Electro Magnetic Energy Regulator, which, when you switch it on, transmits the magnetic goodness throughout your entire body. Or so its maker claims. All you have to do, they say, to tap into the Bemer's benefits, is to lie down. 'It's a roll-out mattress, with built-in magnetic coils,' explains Kathy Geminiani, who's 57, South African, a mother-of-three, and the bringer of the Bemer to Britain.
The Bemer machine claims to be able to help conditions including asthma, arthritis and back pain It turns out there's a stock of the machines waiting in a warehouse and Kathy has just opened, in South-West London, the first dedicated electromagnetic clinic in the UK, where she aims to give treatments and sell some Bemers to other would-be therapists. 'The great thing about the machine,' Kathy explains, 'is that it emits a pulse which is actually just below that of the earth's own magnetic field.'And what, I ask, is the pulse rate of the earth's magnetic field? There is an awkward pause. 'I'm not entirely sure,' admits Kathy. 'I'd rather not get too scientific, actually.'Further questioning reveals the machine was invented by one Dr Wolf Kafka, of the Max Planck Institute, somewhere in Germany, who was a world expert in emphyspace. Only it's not quite clear what emphyspace is. In the space of a few minutes, then, it has become clear that although she is operating from a nice, smart treatment room, Kathy is neither a scientist, a doctor, a physiotherapist nor any other diploma-holding professional.
Not that she is pretending to be. 'I'm just a lay person who has discovered a serious interest in health and well-being,' she says. 'I don't have certificates, but I do know that this machine can help people.' According to the instruction manual, plus accompanying DVD, the magnetic workout raises oxygen levels in the blood by 15 per cent, and increases blood flow through the capillaries by 12 per cent, improving circulation and promoting the body's own preventative and self-healing mechanisms. To illustrate this, the DVD shows the effect of monsoon rains on dried-up African riverbeds. Only it's actually footage of blood returning to previously flow-free capillaries, after a brief session on the Bemer. And so we begin. I am relieved to report that my ten minutes on the mattress was painless. As for the coils, these aren't the twangy, bedspring kind, but ultra-thin filaments which don't leave any mark. There's no reassuring humming sound, even when Kathy presses the button to increase the magnetism (there are 'intensity level' buttons on the console, which go from one to ten).
There are people who believe they've benefited from the machine at her South African clinic. 'I hurt my elbow badly in a cycling accident and went for a couple of weeks' intensive treatment,' says lawyer Charles Garai, a former mayor of Port Elizabeth. 'The pain cleared up after about ten sessions.' More dramatically, 43-year-old sales rep Monique Maritz lost her left foot in a motorcycle smash. 'The doctors took a skin graft from my inner thigh to seal up the stump, but they didn't take enough and the bone kept coming through,' she says. 'My leg then started to reject the metal plates that were inserted to keep the bones together, and I was told I'd have to have my leg amputated below the knee. 'But thanks to some intensive treatment with the Bemer, the wounds healed up and my leg was saved.' Indeed, it's in this field of wound and ulcer treatment that magnetic therapy has achieved the most acceptance among the medical establishment. A 2006 study, published in the British Journal Of Community Nursing, found that ulcers treated with magnetic leg-wrap therapy healed in three-and-a-half months, instead of four-and-a-half years.
And bioelectromagnetic machines, such as the Bemer, have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of bone fractures. That said, Edzard Ernst, professor of complementary medicine at the Peninsula Medical School, Plymouth, is wary of some of the Bemer promotional claims. He was part of a 2007 research project into magnetic patches and bracelets, which, while conceding they could possibly help treat osteoarthritis, reached the overall conclusion that: 'The evidence does not support the use of static magnets for pain relief.' Professor Edzard Ernst's 2007 research project into the effectiveness of magnetic patches and bracelets, similar to those pictured right Now, having looked at some of the claims made for the Bemer, he is not convinced about the plug-in kind either. Back pain sufferers, too, should think twice before leaping on to the Bemer mattress, says Sash Newman, chief executive of the charity BackCare. 'Anyone considering this should first have a very clear understanding of exactly what the machine does.'