http://news.independent.co.uk/health/article2896181.ece

Paul Flynn, the Labour MP, warned that a failure to change attitudes would be disastrous. He said: "We are heading towards pharmageddon. The medicalising of society is convincing people they need a pill for everything. Drug companies recruit patients, particularly good-looking and articulate ones, to help promote new drugs in the media. Life and death decisions should not be taken by tabloids."

Doctors now write an average of 81 prescriptions a day compared with 64 five years ago. More than 730,000 prescriptions for antidepressants are being handed out each week, to the point where they almost match those for antibiotics at 870,000 a week.

Brave New World?

Over the last decade, pharmaceuticals has become the biggest industry in the world. They typically spend 4x as much on promotion than research. They have infiltrated the NHS to the extent that you can no longer tell them apart. They deprive the Third World of affordable AIDS drugs...

Probably the biggest misconception about science is that medicine is somehow scientifically validated. It isn't.

Pharmaceuticals have multiple ways of corrupting the research, through 'legitimate' bribery at every level, burying research and preventing evaluation of the double blind.

The latter means that trials almost never check who knows they took the drug vs the sugar pill. Obviously, if people correctly determine they took the sugar pill (which is quite easy) then that significantly inflates the results for the drug. More here.

When you force phamaceuticals to compete on a (more) level playing field, then non-drug interventions will look good in comparison. Doctors and patients will have real science showing that non-drug treatments are as effective and often more effective than drugs.

100,000 users of SSRIs in this country alone will be suffering drug-induced suicidality. A further 30,000 will be suffering drug-induced psychotic depression. Not to mention missing out on more effective, long-term treatments.

This is a truly appalling state of affairs where huge profits motivate the torment of the most vulnerable people in society. It must be stopped.

DG, my GP warned against the overuse of anti-biotics 20 years ago and that was just from the point of view that their efficacy would be affected. Who knows how to counter these self-interests?

Forcing the drug companies to publish all studies is relatively simple if not easy. You just make it a law, punishable by unlimited fines for non-compliance. Police would be able to secure access to premises with a warrant.

Chances are the drug companies would rather pull out of the UK market than do this so you'd have to get the EU to do it.

The problem with making medicine science is that you should throw out practically all the research. OTOH, NICE and the MHRA could start prioritising on medicines where the blind has been tested and ideally shown to be valid. NICE, for example, could assume that the blind has been broken to at least the average extent (75% of subjects know what they've taken). There are presumably statistical ways to incorporate this uncertainty.

It's really the BMA who should be making a big deal about the corruption within medicine but it would tarnish them and presumably they're getting cushy treatment too.

Its a nice little earner on the mental health side of things

And we wouldnt want a few facts getting in the way of

capitalism would we;

Most psyciatric drugs are recomended for treating schizophrenia

In fact Olanzapine is and costs lincolnshire NHS £5,000,000
annualy.Just the 1 drug ,as a treatment for schizophrenia .

Psyciatrists,have agreed that schizophrenia has no scientific or medical or other meaning whatsoever.

It is a term that used to be used for lots of
different and varied conditions.
Non related.

It has been used as a basket / catch all term,for things they
didnt understand or couldnt name,or were to to lazy to find out about.

Worse still ,they discovered that the very diagnosis of
schizophrenia made 15% of people sick with depression if
they didnt already have it and made depression worse in
those that did have it. Never mind the stigma.

I think the term has stopped being used ( in Britian )

1) How did the drug companies get approval to use a drug
on a non existent illness.

2)Why are we still spending £5,000,000 in lincolnshire
alone annually on a treatment that cannot possible work for its intended purpose as it does not exist anymore.

Another point is if you go to a 3rd world country and see
a sharman,witch doctor,medicene man or other such like.
You have a 50% chance of being cured of mental illness

In this country an probably the states there is only a 30%
chance of recovery with all the drugs an psycotherapy ect
we spend money on.

One good point (I call it that loosely ) is that psychiatrists in this country have at least admitted
they are making things worse and have adopted a very
hands off approach.To limit their damage I suspect (bless em)

This leaves patients without the help they need at a
vunerable time.The NHS has not dumped these people rather
it has set up self help groups that run fortnightly or
monthly with a trainee nurse or care coordinator present.

In times of crises patients can talk to or see a C.P.N
community psyciatric nurse who will try talk them or let them talk themselves into a carmer frame of mind or put them on a drug such as Olanzapine .

Also these drugs do not even attempt to cure they mearly
hope to suppress symptoms.

The capitalist drug companies prefere to suppress symptoms
somtimes making people more ill,because you buy more of
their drugs,and make them richer.

If they were so foolish to cure someone they would lose
there income,(making no commercial sense too do so).
They get rich making you sicker.They are rich.

The drugs industry in america is said to own
their government via lobbing and political donations

So their government gets rich by making you sick aswell.

Making it very unlikely this will change.

Phys (Firstly congrats The above is clear and readable)

Secondly.. One of the reasons I stopped studying pshychology over 30 years ago was that there was no cure for the most severe forms of mental illness.

In fact most therapy doesn't aim at cures only at ameliorating the current mental condition.

And not much appears to have changed.

OK that is Psychiatric stuff.

But you are being very unfair to a lot of the other stuff.

The development of a cure for anything is a long and involved process demanding years of studies and trials which must be stringently monitored and results published etc before the FDA or NICE or whovever licence that drug for release and use on real patients.

Make no error that this is a long and hugely expensive proceedure often taking 10 to 15 years R&D. If it were not for potential profit why should the big drug companies bother?. they and their investors certainly did not go into it philanthropically.

But thank heavens they did.. Drugs are emerging which offer real hope for survival for cancer. (for example) My Brother had a condition which involved chemotherapy for 18 months but now he is cured!

And then there are people working very hard on finding effective cures for HIV Aids for example. Expensive and long term research involving highly trained people with specialized equipment.. these things do not come cheap.

Two books in as many days, I am doing well!

I would recommend The $800 Million Pill written by Michael Goozner (here!). It's an interesting account of the US pharmaceutical sector, which is the second largest oligopoly in the states after the private military sector.

It's quite worrying some of the parallels that are developing between the US and Europe. Let's just hope our markets are protected enough to handle themselves!

jonjii

Another example is called for : :)

The condition PREECLAMPSIA ,

Preeclampsia is a disorder that occurs only during pregnancy and the postpartum period and affects both the mother and the unborn baby.

Affecting at least 5-8% of all pregnancies,
it is a rapidly progressive condition characterized by high blood pressure and the presence of protein in the urine. Swelling, sudden weight gain, headaches and changes in vision are important symptoms.
(rapidly progressive means it gets worse and worse )

sourced from here;http://www.preeclampsia.org/about.asp

This affects lots of people ,women and I know someone who has sufferred for over 10 years,with its horrible,
headaches,swelling and the blood pressure swings that
cause fainting with no warning,,,,,,,,happening often.

Debilitating,embarrasing,suffering and ,,UNNESSASSARY.
As I will show later.

The Pharmaceutical companies make billions of pounds
with pills for the headaches,pills for the swelling,
pills for the blood presure, ect.....mostly ineffective.

It is NOT and NEVER has been there intention to CURE anyone.
of anything....Financial suicide.

However THERE IS A CURE.

It was found by INDEPENDANT researchers.
It has been scientifically tested and proved
to work and cure.Not treat but CURE.

THE CURE IS ..... MILK OF MAGNESIA.

Now I heard about this on one obscure BBC RADIO program
and I read about it in a small article in THE NEW SCIENTIST

Both sorces I trust.They check there facts.
The NEW SCIENTIST publishes references so you
can check them out too.
The BBC however was set up during WW2 as a
propogander outlet which it remains to this day.
This WAS and IS its PRIMARY function.

I digress : Back to BIG Pharmaceutical companies.

Now I have a bottle bought today of:

PHILIPS MILK OF MAGNESIA ; produced by GlaxoSmithKline

under the heading : WHAT IT IS FOR is

relief from:indigestion (a catch all term)
over acidity; (who measures their acidity levels and how)
What is over I wonder?
flatulance;(it will pass anyway,)
heartburn;(is this not the same as indigestion)
stomach discomfort;(ditto above)
laxative;(10 times normal dose)

What it DOES NOT mention is PREECLAMPSIA

In the DO NOT TAKE section ;
Under the heading CONSULT YOUR DOCTOR before you take,
Are;
1)kidney problems (ok)or are taking other medicene.
ie;(there customers or victims?)

2)IF YOU ARE PREGNANT.

These are big scary words to put pregnant women off.

There is no evidance it causes any problems in pregnant
women.

They (mothers) may inadvertantly cure a more serious problem
reducing GlaxoSmithKlines profits a lot.

Also The Preeclampsia Trust,a charitable foundation
FAILS to mention this cure; (strange ?)

The true aim of BIG Pharmaceutical companies is

TO PROFIT FROM KILLING YOU

Coincedently a meathode used by the NAZIs in WW2

if you get my drift.

An update to my post on preeclampsia (eclampsia)

63,000 women died last year of this unessesarily.(fact)
4,000,000 suffer from it now.(fact)
300,000 children died of it last year.(fact)

Milk of magnesia (epsom salts)cost $1 a dose
It could have saved them all.

It is thought that it is too cheap for "BIG PHARM" to
make profitable.

They will not promote its use .(fact)

Non profit orgs are promoting it slowly
One is Engender Health who held a conferance
last week in London.Called "Women Deliver."

Shocking ,an criminal if I might offer my opinion.

jonjii wrote:

I've been a psychotherapist for over 10 years. Over that time, the field has changed radically.

10 years ago CBT barely existed and psychoanalysis was all you could get on the NHS. CBT is now the primary form of psychotherapy ie most therapists had to completely change the way they did things or retire.

CBT is pretty basic. It deals entirely with rationalising your way around problems. This can work wonders for depression but is quite limited with other problems which are eg due to conditioned emotional responses.

30 years ago, a hypnotherapist called Milton Erickson was curing all kinds of people.

NLP was founded largely upon his work. Unlike CBT, NLP is highly complex. There was initially some academic excitement about NLP but the people doing the clinical research didn't understand what they were doing and got bad results. Thus NLP remained on the fringe until its principles infiltrated every field from the legal profession to education to sports psychology. NLP itself has become more famous due to Paul McKenna.

Over the last few years, EFT has grown rapidly. It is a ridiculously easy kind of therapy, extremely powerful yet safe -and as such will eventually supplant CBT and most of psychiatry.

While psychoanalysis typically has a 30% success rate and takes years, a decent EFT therapist has a 60-90% success rate and takes weeks.

DaveGould

I am a service user.

I notice that china has a success rate
in excess of 90%.possibly 98%

Their definition of success is,
not only cured of mental illness but
back in full time work as well,

Im impressed.

Their method is to stucture a patients day,fully,
Patients are given an occupation such as art,music
craft I dont know them all,
for half an hour,when it is changed to another occupation
again and again all day every day.

Now granted that physiological trauma induced mental
illness is included (I did not here them exclude it)

This is amazing is it not.

(sorce BBC radio documentary)

I am in C.B.T

what is N.L.P

what is E.F.T.

I am seeing my C.C.C in the morning and
C.P.N in the afternoon.after some,C.B.T.
am wondering if it would help me?
I will ask them.

From your profession I can tell you are a (kind and noble )man .I am sorry I baited you on another thread.

physics911comfan wrote:

In my field (mostly NLP) the definition of success is whatever the client wants.

For example, I guarantee that alcoholics will be able to go to the pub, have one drink and be satisfied. This is impossible according to AA. In my field, lots of impossible things are possible - which is fun for those of us who distrust the establishment.

The standard NHS definition of success is does the client feel a bit better after 4 weeks.

Needless to say, it's a world of difference.


Hard to see how that would achieve anything.


Neuro-Linguistic Programming: based on perpetually refined models for success. Applications go far beyond therapy. You can bet most politicians have heard of it.


Emotional Freedom Technique. Able to permanently eradicate (actually release you from) any (negative) feeling.


I've yet to find someone who wouldn't benefit significantly from either NLP or EFT. NLP especially depends on the practitioner and lots of mainstream people are negative about these things (without knowing much about them).


I am hard to bait. I got into the field based on an intuition I could significantly improve the way my mind works. I have found no real limit to what can be achieved.