Trust me...you're really SICK!

[redstar2000]

Drug firms 'inventing diseases'

Pharmaceutical firms are inventing diseases to sell more drugs, researchers have warned.

Disease-mongering promotes non-existent diseases and exaggerates mild problems to boost profits, the Public Library of Science Medicine reported.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/health/4898488.stm

Much easier and far more profitable than actually coming up with real drugs to cure real illnesses. :lol:

http://www.websmileys.com/sm/cool/123.gif

[JazzRemington]

This is news?

[RebelOutcast]

Corruption in the pharmaceutical industry isn't a new thing.

[ComradeOm]

I actually had the "pleasure" to do a few months work in a pharma company last year. Since the work was pretty straightforward I spent a fair amount of time reading up on the industry news available. I was mildly entertained to discover that each and every one of the pharma giants (some of the biggest corporations in the world) are in severe financial trouble. The biggest problem is that there's simply no new drugs coming through the pipeline. This is despite the billions being spent on R&D.

So expect these corporations to get a lot more desperate in their quest for profits.

[Lord Testicles]

It reminds of the Dead Kennedy song "trust your mechanic"

[RedCeltic]

You know, there is something profoundly disturbing when you really take a good hared look at the medical and pharmaceutical industries in the United States. I once thought that it was just loony leftists such as myself that saw a problem with a healthcare industry who’s bottom line is profit and not healthcare.

However, I must tell you that I’m 35 years old… have been a worker both in the north and the south, both in the city and more rural parts, and have yet to meet a person who worked for a living who did not have a major problem with for profit healthcare and pharmaceuticals. Now I don’t go preaching socialism to people at work when I can help it. When politics do come up however I am always all ears. Now, I’ve worked with people who seemed to be very right wing, and those who seemed to be very left wing. I’ve worked with pro union people and anti union people. I’ve worked with people who are very religious, and those that are very much against religion. I’ve worked with people from very different ethnic backgrounds and from very different walks of life. It always seems to be utterly amazing however that when the topic of healthcare, drug companies, etc comes up, no matter who they are, workers seem to always agree that there is something seriously wrong with for profit healthcare.

It shouldn’t be surprising at all that anyone who works for a living has issues with this system. Not when every time you turn on the television you see a commercial for some expensive drug you don’t need and can’t afford. Not when so many workers don’t get medical benefits from their jobs and can not afford to pay for it on their own.

Meanwhile drug companies have been consistently trying to condition society into a drug dependant culture. A culture where all the answers to any and all medical problems can be found in a little magic pill. Need to loose weight? High cholesterol? Kid not paying attention in school? Depressed? Stressed out? Sick? Nauseous? Can’t go to the bathroom? Can’t stop going to the bathroom? Can’t get it up? Cramps? PMS? Bloating? Gas? ………….We’ve got a pill for that!

[overlord]

Under capitalism you do not have a babysitter watching over you. You have a choice. If you don't think a quack medicine will benefit you, the only place you have a right not to take it is a free society

[RedCeltic]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14 2006, 07:15 AM
Under capitalism you do not have a babysitter watching over you. You have a choice. If you don't think a quack medicine will benefit you, the only place you have a right not to take it is a free society
"Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose, And nothin’ ain’t worth nothin’ but it’s free" --- Kris Kristofferson, Fred Foster Me & Bobby McGee

You don't really make a choice as to what doctor you go to in the United States, that choice is made for you by the kind of medical insurance you have (or don't have.)

[fernando]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14 2006, 12:15 PM
Under capitalism you do not have a babysitter watching over you. You have a choice. If you don't think a quack medicine will benefit you, the only place you have a right not to take it is a free society
Great if you have that choice, but this "free" choice can be influenced, for example by these disease mongering morons.

[Chrysalis]

Originally posted by [email protected] 14 2006, 04:42 AM
Meanwhile drug companies have been consistently trying to condition society into a drug dependant culture. A culture where all the answers to any and all medical problems can be found in a little magic pill.
I couldn't agree more, Redceltic. The latest maneuver, and a very telling one I might add, of the pharma companies to "push drugs", so to speak, is their refusal to put the black box label on drugs that are potentially fatal/dangerous in terms of the users becoming suicidal, violent, severely depressed, or poisoned. Debate after debate showed how they fought against it. And we should really wonder Why such a measure, putting a big warning on the bottle that is supposed to help the consumers, is being denied by the drug companies?

[loveme4whoiam]

I watched a documentary in Psychology made a couple of years ago about Prozac and the dangers of it. About 45 minutes in they said that pharmaceutical companies were marketting the drug at teenagers with "social anxiety" disorder. The symptoms of this disorder include mood swings, bouts of energy and lethargy, shyness, depression, and anger. So, that'd be being a teenager then? The drug companies came up with a new disorder and then magically produced a pill for it! A pill which, I might add, has several links with suicide, homicide, and causing severe physiological and psychological problems.

[Capitalist Lawyer]

Menopause invented?????

And how many other non-diseases are treated as diseases by people other than the drug industry? Alcoholism and drug abuse are the first that come to mind.