[Jinxu]

SELLING SICKNESS exposes the unhealthy relationship between society, medical science and the pharmaceutical industry. It explores the unhealthy relationships between society, medical science and the pharmaceutical industry as they promote their new miracle cures -- selling not just drugs but also the latest diseases that go with them. The sale of SSRI anti-depressant medications, such as Paxil, Zoloft and Prozac, has become an annual $20 billion market. Selling Sickness features commentary from paid medical consultants to the drug companies, patients, researchers, patient advocates, advertisers, attorneys, and psychiatrist Dr. David Healy, a critic of the pharmaceutical industry. The film also examines the deceptive use of clinical trials sponsored by the pharmaceutical companies, the highly addictive nature and many adverse side effects (like suicidal impulses among adolescent patients) of popular SSRI anti-depressants. At an FDA hearing in Washington, D.C., the testimony of parents who have lost their children to suicide starkly emphasizes the need for greater regulation of these heavily promoted and prescribed anti-depressants. The film features commentary from paid medical consultants to the drug companies, patients, researchers, patient advocates, advertisers, attorneys, and psychiatrist Dr. David Healy, a critic of the pharmaceutical industry. SELLING SICKNESS also visits trade shows and professional conferences to show how the pharmaceutical industry promotes the use of its drugs within the medical community.

Selling Sickness: Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Viagra, Lipitor, Cialis and Nexium (Part 1-5)


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Any thoughts?

[Prunesquallor]

Oops. I clicked on no, because that was my answer to the title for the thread. But the poll was worded opposite...

Um, yeah. I love my drugs. Love them.

Some medications are overprescribed and have unexpected side-effects but, in sum, more people are being helped then harmed, as far as I can see. One or two bad eggs doesn't discredit medical science. I don't like the system but I don't think it's totally poisoned either. And increased diagnosis, in some cases, is absolutely grand. Fifty years ago I would have been told I was imagining what I have and probably ended up killing myself. In fact, ignorant people still tell me that. It really depends on the disease....

[Synamon]

	Originally Posted by Prunesquallor To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Oops. I clicked on no, because that was my answer to the title for the thread. But the poll was worded opposite...

I edited the wording on the poll because it was VERY confusing (and corrected the vote).

My position, drugs help people.

[Jinxu]

I don't think drugs are really helping. Especially the psychiatric drugs. They only mask the symptoms, instead of curing the cause.

[speedsuit721]

I never thought twice about the pharmaceutical industry until I got sick. Here's the thing about 99% of prescription drugs--they are symptom maskers. Doctors don't find the root cause of conditions--like depression, fatigue, pain, etc. They prescribe drugs to mask the symptoms.

For instance, irregular menstrual cycles indicate a hormone imbalance. What do doctors do? Prescribe birth control, a synthetic hormone medication that simply masks the underlying problem. Fibromyalgia drugs--mask pain, don't fix the underlying problem. Psychiatric meds--mask symptoms, don't address the underlying problems.

Also, pharmaceutical companies are not allowed to patent hormones produced by the human body. Therefore, selling bioidentical hormones is not profitable. So the companies make a synthetic version that is slightly different than what is found in the body and sell it for an astronomical price. And since this new substance is different than what is produced by the body, it causes side effects. And then doctors prescribe new drugs to mask the symptoms produced by the first drugs that caused the side effects. Doctors get visits from pharmaceutical reps selling their drugs every day. My mom is a nurse and sees it all the time. They're always attractive young men and women with shining personalities (extroverts) who woo the doctors with incentives, and the doctors don't have the time or energy to do research. The FDA says blah blah blah so it must be true.

If you think the FDA and pharmaceutical companies don't have a very cozy relationship, you are naive.

[Plane Stress]

I agree with Jinxu and speedsuit721, for the most part. I think there are a lot more drugs out there than there should be, and a lot more people taking them than need them, but I think that they do have their place. Most of the stuff you see in commercials, like that one drug that promises to reduce the risk of transmitting herpes for instance (with 20 side effects), or the one about jittery leg syndrome or something, seem like total crap to me. Also something like lowering cholesterol can probably be achieved much more effectively and healthier with a change in lifestyle instead of taking a bunch of pills.

On the other hand, there are a lot of people that need prescription drugs in order to lead quality independent lives-the best example I could come up with is inhalers for people who have asthma.

So my position is that yes, drugs have their place and they can help people, but they are over used and often substituted for a real diagnosis/prescribed without much thought (ie "I don't know what's wrong with you-here, try this. Maybe it will work?").

Edit: (It's late and I can't formulate what I'm thinking into words very well)
I also think that people (especially in America) have been conditioned into thinking that prescription drugs are a normal and necessary part of daily life. Antibiotics weren't even invented until what, the 30s? *Looks it up*: Penicillin wasn't mass produced until 1942. It was discovered in 1928, first recorded use on humans in 1930, wasn't really researched until 1939. I think that it is a bit over the top these days the shear volume of drugs out there.

[towith]

I agree that the current way drugs are produced is patently ridiculous, but so is the blanket statement that pharmaceuticals do not work. The vast majority of drugs are not advertised on television and do actually help people. For example anti-malaria drugs alone have literally saved billions of lives.

Full disclosure; I do have siblings in the medicinal industries, working currently I believe on treatment algorithms for bowel-cancer.

[Brittle]

The right drugs for the right conditions are of immense help. However, I believe many people are being prescribed things they don't actually need because doctors are either too busy or lazy to investigate beyond their prescription pads. In these instances, drugs are either of no use or downright dangerous.

[leann]

Hey, guess what, our economic system...capitalist. Just an FYI.

Without that, ya'll woud not have Lipitor for your cholesterol, Valtrex for your herpes, interferon for that autoimmune disease, vaccinations for your children (don't even start on that autism bullshit), Ativan for your nerves, Dilaudid for the inexplainable abdominal pain that made you come to the ER the same day you didn't feel like going to work, MRIs to diagnosis glioblastoma multiforme, screws to stabilize your spine after traumatic spondylolethesis, prosthetics to fit better than that three month old piece of bone (which has either been in your abdomen or freezer) for your skull after traumatic brain injury, minimally and more precise mechanisms to biopsy and resect cancer, brain stimulation for Parkinsons and OCD, anything for the treatment of a myocardial infarction, Adderal for that college studying and losing 20lbs in one week, and most importantly Viagra for that limp dick from the side effects of smoking too much pot.

Oh, yea, and we wouldn't have Starbucks, AT&T, Pumas, bottled water, and BMWs without that capitalistic undertone.

Screw it, we don't need rx companies. Despite the fact that the development costs millions, if not billions and the time frame is extensive, nawh, let's just use tax payer money. New tax: medicine development, expect it to be high, titanium screws ain't cheap honey.

[JohnDoe]

	Originally Posted by Brittle To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	The right drugs for the right conditions are of immense help. However, I believe many people are being prescribed things they don't actually need because doctors are either too busy or lazy to investigate beyond their prescription pads. In these instances, drugs are either of no use or downright dangerous.

I just want to emphasize the first part of this. For people who need them, these drugs save lives.

[thegnat]

They absolutely are. Let's pretend you're an epileptic with grand mal seizures. And the only way you can control them are certain medications. Grand mal seizures could potentially kill you. Your medication is saving your life. And allowing you to be able to drive and lead a normal life. There are countless other examples I could come up with. Yes, there probably is an issue with abuse or using the wrong drug or using when not actually needed, but they really do help people.

[gestalt]

Here's my POV. I think we're missing a KEY dimensional aspect in pharmaceuticals. Let's be honest, a lot of pharmaceuticals are derived from fundamental herbal properties recognized for thousands (millions?) of years by doctors (shamans). What are we missing in terms of RITUAL? Popping pills throughout the day does not adequately address the holistic effects of medicine. It is profoundly unhealthy to imbibe white nothingness if you don't know or care what is actually in said pills or what effect they're supposed to have. Know thyself, know the medicine, know what is to come.

[Vagrant]

	Originally Posted by Jinxu To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I don't think drugs are really helping. Especially the psychiatric drugs. They only mask the symptoms, instead of curing the cause.

I'm currently taking Sertraline HCl, brand name Zoloft.

I'll tell you right now, it is helping me out by the boatload. See, I have chronic depression. But there is no underlying cause in my life, no hidden event tucked away in the recesses of my brain causing me to feel depressed.

Guess what's making me depressed? Stress. That's right, my depression cycle almost exactly follows my stress levels. And I've been through therapy -- we know this already. And the amazing thing is that I already have the best stress-reducing habits (before I came to therapy). And I still am getting stressed out and depressed. So the Zoloft really helps me a ton. I can operate normally, and best of all, FEEL normal.

[Medicine Man]

If you think pharmaceutical drugs as a whole don't help people, then you are truly ignorant. Antibiotics, Anti-inflammatories, bronchodilators, anticonvulsants, analgesics, anesthetics, immunomodulators, vaccines, antivirals, contraceptives, antihypertensives, beta blockers, vasodilators, antithrombotics, antacids etc. etc. etc.
Psychiatric drugs are always tossed about as proof that pharmaceuticals are out to rip us off. However, even they have been proven to help many people.
NEWSFLASH: half of you would be dead from infectious diseases without pharmaceutical companies pumping out new antibiotics every few years.

[towith]

Originally Posted by gestalt To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Here's my POV. I think we're missing a KEY dimensional aspect in pharmaceuticals. Let's be honest, a lot of pharmaceuticals are derived from fundamental herbal properties recognized for thousands (millions?) of years by doctors (shamans). What are we missing in terms of RITUAL? Popping pills throughout the day does not adequately address the holistic effects of medicine. It is profoundly unhealthy to imbibe white nothingness if you don't know or care what is actually in said pills or what effect they're supposed to have. Know thyself, know the medicine, know what is to come.

Division of labour. The market functions on our never needing to know anything beyond our personal professions, thus enabling specialization. Indeed it may be helpful to know a great deal about that which we take, I certainly educate myself, but to be philosophically consistent in this would be a step backward.

[ClydeB]

I can only speak for myself here. But my pharmaceuticals do help me. I can definitely tell the difference on days I do not take them. No, there's no cure for what ails me. And the drug is a crutch. But it works.

And no, its not an antidepressant. Its this stuff called
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.

[Brittle]

Originally Posted by JohnDoe To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

The right drugs for the right conditions are of immense help. However, I believe many people are being prescribed things they don't actually need because doctors are either too busy or lazy to investigate beyond their prescription pads. In these instances, drugs are either of no use or downright dangerous. I just want to emphasize the first part of this. For people who need them, these drugs save lives.

Absolutely agree. I've benefitted from life-saving drugs on a number of occasions. Sadly, however, I was also prescribed an anti-depressant for depression I didn't have and the fall-out was very bad.

I wish, with suspected depression especially, that counselling and other treatment options were made available before resorting to drugs. I'm sure for most people this would be far more effective - even if combined with ADs where necessary.

But yes, for infectious disease and other physiological conditions, the right drugs are worth their weight in gold.

[Frodis]

I have this book (Selling Sickness by Ray Moynihan and Alan Cassels), and while it has been a while since I read it, I think their argument is not that "all pharmaceutical drugs are bad" (like the poll question implies), but that pharma has played a big part in manufacturing demand for some of these big sellers (antidepressants, statins, etc). The "conditions" the authors discuss are: high cholesterol, depression, menopause, ADD, high blood pressure, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, social anxiety disorder, osteoporosis, irritable bowel syndrome, and female sexual dysfunction --- so ClydeB, I don't think they consider diabetes to be in quite the same category.

Basically, this is about pharma expanding or creating demand for their products (which, from a business perspective, seems like a logical thing to do). They're not arguing that insulin, anti-hypertensives, and antibiotics - or even antidepressants - are necessarily bad things. Just that the drug industry has helped expand the market for these to people who probably don't need them.

I think there's some validity to that argument. I know that it was unbelievably easy to get a script for anti-anxiety meds (just told my OB/GYN that I was feeling anxious), and ta-da! I had Xanax - and probably really didn't need it. Maybe my OB/GYN was just a terrible doctor, but I doubt my experience was rare. It seems frighteningly easy to get scripts for psychiatric drugs without ever seeing a psychiatrist.

[Medicine Man]

Frodis, I like your statements. I have two points.
1. Big Pharma is a Big Business, and just like any other big business, it needs to make money, and will aggressively market their drugs. The conditions you mention are certainly gray area issues. Some people need the drugs, others don't. The negative effects of taking these drugs is usually pretty negligible compared to the positive effects they have for people who DO need them.
2. I get sick of patients coming on here talking about how they "fooled" their doctor into prescribing them a drug they did not need. Do you think physicians have a magical wand that says "You are depressed"? No! Blood work or MRIs won't tell you anything either about the patients emotional state. For psychiatric conditions, the doctor relies heavily on the patient to truthfully convey their inner state of mind. It is a collaboration. Of course a savvy individual can trick a doctor into prescribing them something they don't need. It does not follow that the drug is useless or the doctor is bad.

[Sequoia]

I wish there were one more choice on that survey: sometimes. Pharmeceuticals do a lot of good and do save lives. I need to rely on a couple to function due to a progressive congential disability.

But:
-the longer you take a medicine, the larger a change that a side effect will do more harm than the medicine is doing good.
-taking any medicine unnecessarily will almost always cause more harm than good, even with the placebo effect.
-As mentioned before, pharmeceutical companies are creating problems and their solutions to make a profit. They also are hiding risks of both new medicines and established ones whenever they can get away with it, so consumers and doctors never know the true risks or the best uses of the medicine.

It is foolhardy to refuse all medicines simply because they come from conventional medicine. It is equally foolhardy to demand an unproven medicine for a condition when older and safer treatments might be available that are just as effective just because a pharmeceudical company is heavily promoting it. If medicine is really needed and the best one has been carefully picked, the wise thing to do is to pay attention to potential side effects and watch for them. Especially if you must take the medicine for a cronic condition.

[Vagrant]

I get sick of patients coming on here talking about how they "fooled" their doctor into prescribing them a drug they did not need. Do you think physicians have a magical wand that says "You are depressed"? No! Blood work or MRIs won't tell you anything either about the patients emotional state. For psychiatric conditions, the doctor relies heavily on the patient to truthfully convey their inner state of mind. It is a collaboration. Of course a savvy individual can trick a doctor into prescribing them something they don't need. It does not follow that the drug is useless or the doctor is bad.

Bing. That's probably why my antidepressant works so well for me -- I told everything as honestly as I could, making sure I wasn't exaggerating or dumbing down.

	-the longer you take a medicine, the larger a chance that a side effect will do more harm than the medicine is doing good.

Not true -- side effects tend to diminish the longer you take a drug. That's why druggies need more of their drug every time they want to get intoxicated, because their body builds up resistance over time.

Personally, when I started taking my anti-depressants, one of the known side effects is nausea. First week I started taking the stuff, I was nauseous the entire week. But all the subsequent weeks since then, I've been fine.

	They also are hiding risks of both new medicines and established ones whenever they can get away with it, so consumers and doctors never know the true risks or the best uses of the medicine.

Bear in mind that "big pharma" is not a single company. In fact, it's quite a few companies competing. Competition tends to encourage companies to be honest about their products, as it establishes good reputation in our capitalist economy. Not to mention, competition encourages the companies to produce the best products. So, by the same argument that capitalism is causing this problem, it is also remedying another problem.

[mnmeq]

I don't like the way the question is phrased because the problem to me is not whether pharmaceutical drugs help people, because there are obiviously many cases in which they do (antibiotics, judicious application of psychiatric drugs in severe mental cases).
Inappropriate and over prescription with a strong tendency to reliance on pharmaceuticals when other potentially less severe natural treatments may suffice is more the issue to me. I believe that the root of it lies to a large degree in phara profit motive and a culture of immediate gratification.

[uncon]

	Originally Posted by Vagrant To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Competition tends to encourage companies to be honest about their products, as it establishes good reputation in our capitalist economy. Not to mention, competition encourages the companies to produce the best products. So, by the same argument that capitalism is causing this problem, it is also remedying another problem.

This is as pie in the sky as a liberal thinking that government has all the answers. Competition rewards dishonesty as much as honesty. The current financial fiasco is a good example.

A funny example is sports. Here's an open secret: they're all on steroids. Remember Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa and the home run battle? Both on roids and if you look at their wrester's physique it's pretty obvious.

Competition as an idea in no way implies fairness. Wal-Mart is at the top b/c of questionable practices (undercutting competition then raising prices after they fail). Is it fair? Hardly. Is there a better system? No, unless it doesn't involve human beings.

Capitalism sucks but it's the best system we have and the alternative sucks worse but let's not pretend there's a benevolent invisible hand (outside of small cottage industries that Smith was talking about) gently guiding capitalism in the spirit of fairness. We need to be aware of the good and bad and not live in a world of imaginary absolutes and ideals.

When I look at Bono I see the inverted face of Bush. Both delusional and extreme idealists. Both dreamers. Both idiots. They dream while the rest of work in a practical way with what actually is.

Back to OP: They help a lot of people, if only temporarily, and they harm others. My sister committed suicide after a week of being on an anti-depressant and it wasn't a coincidence. The black box warning label is a reminder of my sister and of big pharma which didn't want their product regulated even though they knew of a 1% psychosis rate - too much profit motive at the top to worry about 1% though. No, it's more profitable to wait and deal with bad publicity. It's not so much the system as it is what makes up the system - human beings.

[OnionKnight]

They have and still are helping me a lot. As a kid penicillin made wonders to my frequent ear inflammations, painkillers certainly helps and I can't be thankful enough to my medicine against asthma. I've had SSRIs, and I'd say it made my brain rot. I am well aware that medicine is a huge ass industry that of course wants to make profit, and that anti-depressants are mostly found through accidents yet get shoveled to the people for the strangest reason such as insomnia. But this I think is just a narrow case and I view it more like the back alley of the industry. No reason to think ill of medicine at large.

[Vagrant]

This is as pie in the sky as a liberal thinking that government has all the answers. Competition rewards dishonesty as much as honesty. The current financial fiasco is a good example. A funny example is sports. Here's an open secret: they're all on steroids. Remember Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa and the home run battle? Both on roids and if you look at their wrester's physique it's pretty obvious. Competition as an idea in no way implies fairness. Wal-Mart is at the top b/c of questionable practices (undercutting competition then raising prices after they fail). Is it fair? Hardly. Is there a better system? No, unless it doesn't involve human beings. Capitalism sucks but it's the best system we have and the alternative sucks worse but let's not pretend there's a benevolent invisible hand (outside of small cottage industries that Smith was talking about) gently guiding capitalism in the spirit of fairness. We need to be aware of the good and bad and not live in a world of imaginary absolutes and ideals. When I look at Bono I see the inverted face of Bush. Both delusional and extreme idealists. Both dreamers. Both idiots. They dream while the rest of work in a practical way with what actually is.

I was never speaking of fairness. Fairness is quite different from honesty and efficiency. The businesses that tend to do well are honest and efficient. Sometimes honesty and efficiency conflict (as you pointed out with walmart). But that doesn't remove the fact that since all these pharmaceutical companies are essentially producing the same products, they must differentiate themselves by their behavior -- which means honesty, efficiency, etc.