Another example of profits coming before people in the medical establishment. (Note that prostate and breast cancers have many similarities, so women may want to read this for themselves as well as for the men in their lives.) Last year, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published an editorial advising doctors to be […]
More reason to question their common use among the very old and very young. A new study has found that taking powerful antipsychotic drugs significantly increases the likelihood of premature death for Alzheimer’s patients. The study looked at 58,000 people diagnosed with Alzheimer’s between 2005 and 2011. Those who were prescribed antipsychotics (usually to control […]
Is it reaching a criminal level? A recent report by Reuters details how hospitals around the country are outrageously negligent when it comes to reporting outbreaks of antibiotic-resistant infections, and it’s costing lives. Consider this story. Between 2008 and 2011, twenty-one patients were infected with a deadly, drug-resistant bug at St. Anthony’s Medical Center in […]
Studies on the effectiveness of the drug industry’s biggest sellers are frankly shocking, according to researchers. We—as individual consumers and as taxpayers—are apparently wasting money on expensive drugs that don’t work. And the side effects are often disastrous. “Every day, millions of people are taking medications that will not help them,” says Nicholas J. Schork, […]
Not only do they make your acid reflux problems worse, they actually sicken your unborn child. Action Alert! An analysis of eight different studies, including data from over 1.6 million patients, found that taking heartburn medication during pregnancy significantly increases the risk for asthma for the baby. The researchers found that proton pump inhibitors (such […]
Another key natural medicine to bite the dust? Action Alert! The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is moving against cannabidiol (CBD), a supplement used to control pain and inflammation. The circumstances are extremely suspicious. Late last year, the DEA published a final rule that classifies marijuana and hemp extracts, including CBD, as Schedule 1 controlled substances—a […]
Governments and much of the press seem to be covering up that Flint is just the tip of the iceberg. State-based Action Alert! We reported last month that in Flint, Michigan, tap water in residents’ homes contained astonishing levels of lead, as high as 104 parts per billion (ppb), when the Environmental Protection Agency’s limit […]
And hobbles your doctor. Action Alert! In the waning days of 2016, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ignored the expressed will of Congress. The agency completed a “guidance” document that prohibits traditional compounding pharmacies from stocking doctors’ offices with custom drugs. In December 2015, Congress included a provision in an end-of-the-year spending bill […]
Keeping Francis Collins as director of the National Institutes for Health (NIH) would send exactly the wrong message. Action Alert! Right now, the federal government subsidizes the pharmaceutical industry, then grants it legally enforced monopolies which allow it to charge insane prices on those subsidized drugs, then buys the drugs in huge quantities at those […]
If you forgot the pharmaceutical industry, don’t worry. The federal government will take care of it for you. The refrain we hear from representatives of the pharmaceutical industry is that drug costs are high because the research, development, and shepherding of drugs through the FDA’s approval process is astronomically costly. What they fail to mention […]