Keith Richards' 1973 'Blood Change' — The Infamous Swiss Clinic Treatment for Heroin-Induced Septicaemia

In early 1973, Keith Richards was so deep into heroin addiction that a contaminated needle gave him septicaemia – a blood infection that nearly killed him. Desperate, he checked into a private clinic in Zurich run by Dr. Max Aschwanden, who performed what Richards later called a “blood change.” It was essentially a complete blood transfusion paired with a brutal detox: they drained his infected blood and replaced it with fresh, clean blood over several days.

There’s a lot of myth around the procedure – some say it was a full body blood swap, others that it was just dialysis. Richards himself claimed his entire bloodstream was replaced, which caused his skin to peel off and his hair to fall out temporarily. Whether literal or not, the treatment saved his life, though he didn’t kick the addiction for several more years. The “blood change” became a legendary rock-and-roll survival story, a testament to how far he pushed his body and the extreme measures needed to keep him alive.