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The Prophetic Physician

Thursday, April 24th, 2008

Uncritical faith is rampant, especially in this country. America tries to focus its energy on affording individuals the freedom to pursue whatever endeavor they wish (unless its a gay endeavor). This means that people can claim just about anything they want and expect no obstacles blocking that claim from generating money.

A perfect example is Bishop Womack.

Dr. Shammah Womack-El is a world class Naturopathic Holistic Scientist and Master Herbalist of Drugless Medicine, which he calls God’s Natural Pharmacy. He believes that God has a cure and a remedy in the earth for all dis-eases. Dr. Womack-El can help you with supervision to rejuvenate your life and detoxify your body tissues for improved health and longevity.

Most doctors spend time trying to suppress symptoms instead of treating root causes of problems. At the Chapel of Miracles my approach is just the opposite, my holistic team and I offer our clients a serene, supportive and skillful environment, where advanced natural techniques support healing and HIGH LEVEL HEALTH, rather than settling for the shortsighted goal of mere symptom suppression.

Poor saps come to people like this expecting miracles and willing to pay through the teeth for it. Womack need not supply his customers with evidence or logic because most Americans have lost the ability to care. What this means is hard working Americans lose their money to schemes and tricks and never become the wiser. The imagination is a powerful thing, and it is easily manipulated.

However confused you are, whether it is believing in magical Jews walking on water or that the cure for MS and ALS can be found in plants growing in Asia BECAUSE SOMEONE TOLD YOU SO, you will always be able to ask questions and form logical opinions. This ability is present in all humans of sound mind, yet so few use it.

If one were to look at Womack’s page carefully, one could see logical flaws right off the bat. For example:

Thousands have reversed chronic and degenerative diseases through our all naturopathic healing approach.

A sentence like that convinces almost all average thinkers of just about anything. But it is a logical fallacy. It even has a name, its called the bandwagon fallacy. Just because x number of people believe that y is true doesn’t make y true.

Another slightly more complex logical flaw in Womack’s ‘argument’:

There is a remedy in the earth for every dis-ease.

If this were true, why would we still have diseases? Earth is also the source of a lot of death. Consider arsenic, a natural but extremely fatal element found on Earth. How about Earthquakes? Volcanoes? Tornadoes?

People are all too often fooled by the word “natural”. Just because something is natural doesn’t mean it is healthy. There are many natural mushrooms that are poisonous.

The most hilarious has to be:

Also, see our products for holistic living, such as our Supernatural Manna, which works your body out without you going to the gym. I call it “THE GYM IN A BOTTLE”, which shapes your body into a healthy, fat-burning machine. It’s a Magic Green Superfood that works you out and into shape.

Isn’t it amazing that people will just believe something like that? Without evidence, without proper support or logical reasoning? This is absolutely rampant in this country. And it is this uncritical thinking which can lead to wars, injustice, crimes, violence… Imagine believing someone is a terrorist because someone told you to. Without evidence or logical reasoning you continue believing this person to be a terrorist and treat him as such. This happens all the time.

Womack is an extreme example of someone taking advantage of REALLY stupid people. Like everything in life there are varying degrees of mysticism and superstition. But if you can remain critical and skeptical of any claims without proper peer reviewed evidence, than you can spot these shams very easily. In fact, purchase my new magical book for only $4509.78 where I teach you how to channel spiritual energy from the 98th dimension to see schemes and scams easily! Learn it in just minutes a day!

P.S. – If you were to look closely at this website you can find MANY spelling and grammar errors.

Enjoy.

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Posted in Health, Religion, Science | 1 Comment »

Ignorance with Wings Part 4 ::embryonic stem cells::

Sunday, December 9th, 2007

Embryonic stem cells:

ES cells are pluripotent. This means they are able to differentiate into all derivatives of the three primary germ layers: ectoderm, endoderm, and mesoderm. These include each of the more than 220 cell types in the adult body. Pluripotency distinguishes ES cells from multipotent progenitor cells found in the adult; these only form a limited number of cell types.

I’m sure you know what this means. ES cells have a wondrous potential to treat or even cure some very debilitating, paralyzing, or fatal diseases and conditions. At this moment, there are millions of men, women and children who are alive and breathing that suffer from one of a number of these diseases. Their lives are torturous, painful, and barely worth living. It seems rather ridiculous then that we don’t fund or expand our research with embryonic stem cells. It fact, it is extremely ridiculous.

The uncritical religious, who’s decisions and beliefs require faith (a principle that has no evidence to back it up) to exist, do everything they can to stop embryonic stem cell research. Why, you ask? The reason is surprisingly absurd.

The religious think that life begins at some point before the embryo, and that destroying an embryo for the stem cells is killing a life. These very same people will turn around and fully support the death penalty keep in mind! For some reason, they are obsessed with controlling people and their choices, and therefor wish to remain on the side of the argument that lacks reason and evidence.

Let us consider some facts, shall we?

1) Embryos consist of 50 to 150 cells IN TOTAL. They are nothing but a collection of microscopic cells that you could count with your eye. At this stage, the embryo is known as a blastocyte, which forms 4 to 5 days after fertilization. In fact, some scientists don’t consider a blastocyte and embryo. You have to understand that there is NO human qualities in a blastocyte. It is literally a simple collection of cells that can be counted by the human eye. 2) Embryos abort naturally ALL THE TIME. In fact, more than half of all embryos die naturally. Embryo destruction is actually the norm, rather than the exception. So that puts an enormous hole in the religious or faith-based idea that embryos are lives that should not be knowingly killed. 220 million embryos die a year naturally, that is more than any other cause of death that we know of. Keep in mind that; Cancer, in all its forms, kills 7.6 million people per year, In six years, the Second World War killed around 60 million people…

We don’t defend an embryo’s right to free speech, because it cannot speak, in fact, it cannot do anything. It has no neurological system, no consciousness, no thoughts, no mind, no brain… no nothing. Yet some would ascribe more rights to it than a black man on death row. This is the ultimate contradiction of the religious right in the United States. Infuriatingly stupid, isn’t it?

There are certain moral questions that are common, that test one’s true morals. For example, consider the train that is flying out of control at break neck speeds. If it continues on its current track, it will fly off of a cliff a la Back to the Future Part III and kill everyone on board; men, women, children… embryos. But you are standing at a switch on the track, and you can switch the track to safely divert the train away from the cliff, however, there is a man tied to the diverted track. If you flip the switch, you kill the one man tied to the track but save the hundreds of passengers on board.

This is not meant to be an easy decision, but no one would call you immoral if you were to flip the switch.

The point is, we have millions of people today who are alive, breathing, have nervous systems, thoughts, dreams, the right to free speech and so on, who suffer and are at risk of death. Trying to save the life of a group of cells over these living breathing human beings is like not switching the track to save the one man tied to the diverted track. In fact, it is much worse. It is as if instead of another man tied to the track, it was a cockroach, and you saved the roach at the expense of everyone on the train.

So how come we don’t consider all 220 million naturally destroyed embryos loss of human life? Because it isn’t loss of human life. You cannot die if you were never born.

If Christians really cared about the lives of children, we’d see a stronger push for decreasing infant mortality in developing worlds. But we don’t see that. We see anti-homosexual bills, sodomy laws, and fighting Islam.

Obviously the potential for life is not the same as life itself, because then every time we wore a condom, every time we used spermacide, every time we went to the sperm bank, every time we masturbated, we would be killing hundreds of millions of people. Does this sound right to you? No. Of course not. An embryo is not a life, a zygote is not a life, a fetus is not a life. Potential life is not life, hence the word “potential”. You don’t put people in jail before they commit the crime.

But MisterE, why not cut the controversy and just stick with adult stem cells? Well, adult stem cells may not have the potential the embryonic stem cells have. We of course need to do more research on this, but science is under the impression at the moment that adult stem cells are unlikely to be nearly as useful as embryonic stem cells.

Embryonic stem cells are obtained from human embryos. They have the capacity to turn into any cell type in the body. Adult stem cells have been found in some mature human tissues, including the brain and bone marrow. There is a scientific debate over whether their ability to become specialized is limited to their tissue of origin, or whether they can turn into other types of tissue.

Adult stem cells have proven their value to medicine. For example, bone marrow transplants are routinely used to treat some cancers and blood diseases. But it’s unlikely that bone marrow stem cells can replace all of the different types of cells that are damaged by disease. Embryonic stem cells are the only ones that are likely to do that.

You have to understand that science does not recognize most, if any religious tenants as fact. But science is where we get our medicine, our help, our computers and advancements and so on… so its obviously the area of reality that we can be sure is real. We have no scientific definition for a human life, and obviously, it has to start somewhere. Since ethereal ideas such as spirits and life creation by a deity are extremely unlikely, we avoid them as explanations. To define a human life, we can only turn to science for the answer, and if science doesn’t have an answer then there may be no answer.

If you look at it purely from a scientific and natural perspective, we are mammals. We are simply organisms that live on this planet that have evolved some very fancy brains. However, a mammal can only live when separated from its chromosomal donor, physiologically. As long as it is a part of the mother, it cannot survive as its own entity, and perhaps remains simply a part of the mother. A human fetus doesn’t develop a nervous system and a brain-stem until very late in the game, and even then it is uncertain whether or not they can comprehend or understand pain, for they are not yet alive. They are being made, like bread in an oven. The question can then become: “Does life start when consciousness starts”? Again, science does not yet have a theory that tells us the precise moment consciousness begins. It is entirely feasible that someday we may find that moment, for it is becoming increasingly clear that consciousness is merely the result of incomprehensible numbers of neural connections in our brains. Without neural connections like that, are we conscious? Are apes conscious? Are cockroaches conscious?

These are all very interesting questions that science may or may not some day answer (and will adhere to script scientific scrutiny so it can be considered fact, unlike religious tenants that can withstand no scrutiny and have no supporting evidence). In the meantime, we are sure (to a statistically significant degree) that an embryo cannot feel pain, is not a human life, and should not be considered so over the well beings and mortality of those we KNOW to be alive.

Enjoy.

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Posted in Family and Society, Health, Law, Politics, Religion, Science | 1 Comment »

Ignorance with Wings PART 2 ::sex::

Monday, December 3rd, 2007

If you’ve ever had sex, then you know it can be one of the greatest experiences on Earth; better than chocolate, videogames, and even certain episodes of Star Trek The Next Generation (I know… ridiculous). I know since I became sexually active in High School, I’ve had a wonderful time, and I feel that I’ve grown from it (no pun intended).

Unfortunately, I wish I could maintain a light-hearted air about sex with this post, but I cannot. For there are atrocities of sex perpetrated by the uncritical and faithfully religious, covering a broad spectrum from condemning pre-martial sex to stoning your daughter because she was raped.

Abrahamic religion has been against sex (and therefor against human life) for its entire history from what we can tell. Influencing generation after generation of lemmings to fear it and abstain from its wonders. Like drugs, a righteous orgasm can be and has been described as a spiritual experience, and it is for that reason that the religious condemn it. How dare you know pleasures greater than accepting Jesus into your heart. Those who control others know that accepting Jesus into your heart amounts to no amount of pleasure when compared to fornicating with two hotties in your college dorm room. They know that if they don’t condemn it forcefully, they will lose converts and lose their control over them. But why? Why do millions of people remain so confused and tortured by their uncritical faith-based lives? Because they know no other.

Let us explore how this is dangerous. Why don’t we start with the tamer side of things. In America, we have a serious lack of critical thinking. Most people here believe in things without evidence, without rationality, and without logic. This is very dangerous for a number of reasons, but when you focus on sex, you can see how dangerous faith really is. You see, faith is simply a word used by those who can’t rationally explain their feelings or judgments. When evidence and logic are absent, one has to either admit they are probably wrong or play the faith card, which gives them the license to believe whatever they want without evidence. When it comes to sex, these people believe that doing it before you are married is somehow bad or harmful. In additional, these very same people believe that certain forms of sex are just plain wrong, i.e. anal sex, oral sex, group sex, etc…

Smarter people ignore such tenants on the grounds that there is no evidence to these claims. Smarter people know that faith is crap in this situation, at least. To date there have been NO studies that suggest that anal sex is bad, wrong, or harmful to anyone. The same holds true for pre-marital sex, oral sex, kinky sex, BDSM, group sex or masturbation. So the question remains, why ban, shun, or insist on denying these pleasures to people who wish to seek them? The answer is that there is no good reason, so one must play the faith card. One will quote from an antiquated text that is poorly translated and contradictory, one will invent some kind of wishy-washy moral rule or law that they insist is omnipresent but is really just a bunch of bullshit, and one will simply invoke the irrational faith-based religion that they subscribe to.

Let me make it clear that I am NOT SAYING THAT every example of the usage or invoking of faith is dangerous or harmful, I’m simply focusing on sex for now.

Let us do what the religious hate most and look at facts: 1)Human beings are sexual 2)The human brain derives enormous amounts of pleasure from sexual contact 3)Sexual attraction is different for every person 4)Marriage is a human-created entity (Apes don’t get married) 5)Without sex, nobody would be here 6)Sex is beneficial to your health, if safe

I can hear the straw-man and red herring arguments blasting from the religious already: “But STDs kill people, and women shouldn’t have sex with more than one man in their life, and teens having sex is bad, and…” yada yada yada.

The reason why teen pregnancy and STDs remain prevalent is because of lack of education regarding sex. We have found that the more educated about sex people are, the lower the incident of abortion and STDs. It makes sense. If you are taught very frankly about sex, about how to have it safely, you will be less likely to spread STDs, more likely to control urges and hormones, and more likely to be safe and careful. This is true with anything in life. The more you know about something, the less mistakes you make!

Therefor, the problems we face are actually CAUSED by the religious who cite them so frequently when arguing against sex. They create the taboo and the abstinence only education, which in turn creates uneducated kids, which in turn creates abortions, teen pregnancies, and the spread of STDs, which in turn pisses off more religious people who in turn create MORE taboo and MORE pushes for abstinence only education.

Let us also not kid ourselves. Anti-sodomy laws are in place expressly for the purposes of making homosexuality illegal. Now, we know that NO ONE obeys these laws because they aren’t respectable laws. They are a travesty and direct threat to the very idea of a free country. But we know that Christians use faith to explain away their discomfort with homosexuals. Their uneducated and irrational fears include a fear of conversion by gays (they recruit straights to become gay) and not having children. Aside from the FACT that many straight couples either choose not to or can’t have children, the idea that homosexuality is wrong because they can’t produce children is seriously lacking in any merit. Similarly, the idea that gays recruit others to be gay is even more ridiculous. Intelligent people actually laugh at the less reasoned, under-educated religious who think this.

This is bad, wrong, and has got to stop. When we now turn to the more severe side of things, we see this very same dogmatic approach to sex by the uncritical and the religious and the results are much worse. People are dying by the hundreds of thousands. Small girls are being stoned to death by family, men in Africa are being restricted from access to condoms, women in the middle east are being treated like breeding machines instead of human beings, and teenage girls are having their genitals mutilated. Does ANY of this sound good, beneficial towards society or bettering of humankind? Fuck no!

President Bush cut off funding to any overseas family-planning group that provides INFORMATION on abortion. His actions, according to the New York Times “has effectively stopped condom provision to 16 countries and reduced it in 13 others, including some with the world’s highest rates of AIDS infection.” One third of the U.S. government’s AIDS prevention fund was wasted and squandered on abstinence-only education … as a result millions of people will die. If you have any sensibility in you, any interest in human kind, any kind or caring feelings; this should make you furious. Here we have tenants and claims WITH NO EVIDENCE ruining the world… literally. Christianity continues to kill people, just like Islam does with the promise of 49 virgins in heaven after slaying the non-believers. Go to the website I linked above and see what the effects have been. Maybe, if you supported this before or continue to support this now, after reading FACTS and EVIDENCE, you’ll change your mind. If not, then you need serious help.

In Islam, an adulterous wife or a raped girl are to be punished by death. This is another terrible consequence of the religious fear of sex. Sex has become so shunned and terrible that its a wonder any human beings remain. It doesn’t matter if you are Christian and condemn the act of stoning your 15 year old daughter for being raped, the point is that the same uncritical faith or untested ‘theories’ about reality that include how to treat sex is at play.

In Africa, Christians incorrectly believe that abstinence-only education will work in the prevention of AIDS. Christians prove their inability to regard evidence by ignoring the fact that this increases the prevelance of AIDS. Maybe they know this and they don’t care, maybe they want black men to die of AIDS, I can’t say WITHOUT EVIDENCE.

People will always have sex, no matter what. It is a biological function, a basic human need, and something that is stupid to ignore. For ignoring our sexual urges is ignoring the very thing that makes us human. In general, humans will not abstain from sex, no matter how many nights you stay up thinking about other people’s private lives, so the best and logical thing to do would be to work with the flow, not against it. We improve sexual education, improve condom distribution, increase funding for family planning, abolish abstinence-only education, have all contraception covered on medical insurance (including birth control and the morning after pill), and rid ourselves of irrational faith and belief without evidence.

Enjoy.

Posted in Health, Law, Religion | 11 Comments »

The benefits of religious faith

Monday, November 26th, 2007

It is clear that uncritical faith, or blind belief in anything without question is dangerous to society. It is and has been the source of violence and death ranging from the Holocaust to the Crusades.

But these beliefs are almost always about what happens to you after death. It would seem that there is no greater fear than simply ceasing to exist once you die. I admit, the idea is frightening to me. It is also not comforting at all to think that a loved one is not going somewhere special to spend eternity.

This is part of the reason why religious faith is so popular I believe. It is soothing and peaceful to think of these souls ascending to a paradise. On the flip side, some people take solace in believing that those who have wronged them will have their souls eternally tortured.

In response to my post, the benefits of atheism, Paul wrote:

I watched my mom die last February. She was basically unresponsive for a day or so. When I called our pastor he came over and talked and prayed with my mom. She perked up. After that she returned to the dying process Tell me in that incident there is no God.

You talked about no evidence or existence of God or the power of Jesus. Strange you would mention those terms. Talk to people who have experienced the power of Jesus or felt the existence of God. I believe they would speak differently.

Prayer has no measurable effect. My sister had a liver transplant a number of years ago. Many people prayed for that surgery. She’s still here.

You enjoy science. But have you ever stopped to really, really think about science. How did science happen? Who created science? How about God?

A very unfortunate comment. I of course have great sympathy for Paul and his loss, as I would anybody who has to suffer the pain of losing someone they love. But his conclusions are so flawed that I almost feel too guilty to point it out.

But this is when it counts. This is where the split between religion and modern reality originates.

Paul says that he has witnessed two instanced in which prayer had a beneficial effect. This, to an uncritical religious individual such as Paul, is absolute proof of prayer’s beneficial and divine effects. And that is precisely why religious faith is so dangerous. It takes almost NOTHING of any merit to convince these people that something is true. No questioning, no critical thinking, no nothing, just straight up blind belief. Extremely unfortunate.

Paul must be made aware of, one way or another, that there is in fact no truth to his claim.

The first known experiment was conducted by Charles Darwin’s cousin Francis Galton. In England, every Sunday, Galton knew that enormous hordes of people were in churches praying for the health of the royal family, therefor, there should be some measurable effect on their health on Sundays. He found no such correlation.

In 2006, a much more scientific and reliable study was supported by Rusell Stannard, one of three religious scientists in Britain. He was funded by the Templeton foundation to find out if praying for sick patients improved their health.

The patients were randomly divided into two groups, the control group and the test group. The control group received no prayers and the test group did. To have any test be conclusive or scientific, it needs to be double blind, so neither the patients, the caregivers, or the doctors knew who was being prayed for and who wasn’t. People who were doing the praying were given the first name and the last initial of the people they were supposed to pray for. Dr. Herbert Benson was leading the group, spending $2.4 million and was quoted in a press release, “believing that evidence for the efficacy of intercessory prayer in medicinal settings is mounting”. Nice unbiased researcher!

The team monitored 1802 patients at six hospitals who were receiving identical coronary bypass surgery. The patients were then divided into three groups, group 1 received prayers and didn’t know it, group 2 received no prayers, and group 3 received prayers and were aware of it. Obviously, group 3 tests for psychosomatics, or, the power of the placebo effect.

Three churches were charged with the act of praying. One in Minnesota, one in Massachusetts, and one in Missouri. Every one praying was told to pray “for a successful surgery with a quick, healthy recovery and no complications”.

And the results? Published in the American Heart Journal in April of 2006, the study concluded that there were no differenced between groups 1 and 2. Of course, there was a difference between group 3 and the other two groups, but it isn’t what you think. People who knew they were being prayed for suffered more complications than those who did not. The experimenters suggested that this was due to ‘performance anxiety’ of those who knew they were being prayed for.

As you can see, Paul continues to argue as someone blind and immune to logic and reality, as most religiously devout people do. There seems to be nothing that can penetrate their schizophrenia because the belief grows to be too strong. If you are used to convincing yourself or being convinced that something is true with no evidence, than it becomes very easy to ignore truths with evidence. These people are lost in their magical worlds where humans can walk on water, omnipotent beings interfere with the lives of some and not others for mysterious reasons, and man was invented by an intelligence less than 10,000 years ago.

Enjoy.

Posted in Health, Religion, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Religious people afraid are immune to all diseases

Tuesday, August 1st, 2006

Well… according to their beliefs, they are just immune to the bird flu, and every disease that originated in a mammal like AIDS. Why? Because religious people are smart enough to not believe in evolution… whats the basis of evolution? Random mutation… how do viruses jump from birds to humans? Random mutation.

July 31 (Bloomberg) -- Scientists failed in multiple attempts to make a more contagious form of the H5N1 bird flu, suggesting the virus may have to undergo massive change to cause a human pandemic.

After mixing genes from human and bird influenzas in a way researchers have projected might lead to a pandemic, the virus remained hard to spread said researchers led by Taronna Maines, a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientist. The study was conducted on ferrets, which are at least as susceptible to flu as people, the scientists said in a report released today.

Aww, too bad Bush, no pandemic for you to make money off of, no fear for you to evoke like you did with 9/11. Well, we’re far from out of the woods, bird flu is still a threat, but like any disease, the virus will need to ‘evolve’ more in order to infect humans, so religious people are safe.

But then why do religious people like Bush run around screaming about the bird flu in humans when they don’t believe in random mutation? Ah yes, inherent contradiction in religion/creationism number 142.
So do creationists believe in random mutation but not evolution? I remember someone (obviously someone who hasn’t gotten their religion down yet) trying to say that everything is true except for the level of evolution where one species changes to another. Well if that isn’t the dumbest thing to hit the market since a bicycle with no seat. There aren’t different types of evolution, its all one fluid thing, from natural selection to speciation. Get it? Got it? Good.

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Posted in Health | 2 Comments »

Why drug companies like it when you’re sick

Thursday, July 13th, 2006

Is it just me, or is the prescription medication world blowing up out of control. I don’t remember seeing so many goddamned commercials for meds. Its insane! Not to mention all the crap that ends up there like natural supplements and penis enhancements (sorry guys, but if you have a small penis, there is no magic to make it better).

So I wonder, why would someone want to make so much money off of the suffering of others? Maybe thats not the way to look at it. Maybe, they’re making money off of the relief of others. I think it works both ways. If people weren’t sick and suffering, then they would have no costumers, but people are going to be sick and suffering anyway, so why not make money off of it and help some people out… right?

I wish I could say I believed all drug companies were as virtuous. If a cure for a disease is discovered, drug companies would lose some of their companies, so wouldn’t it be in their best interest that some cures are never found? I’m stretching it, but I’m just exploring some ‘what ifs’.

3-in-1 HIV pill is licensed in US

HIV pills

A once-a-day HIV treatment combining three drugs in one pill, has been licensed for the first time by the US Food and Drug Administration.

Atripla, made by Bristol-Myers-Squibb and Gilead Sciences, contains efavirenz, tenofovir and emtricitabine got fast-track approval.

It is expected to be licensed in Europe next year.

HIV experts said patients were increasingly demanding combined treatments.

The collaboration between the two drug companies will mean patients can take one drug a day.

Merck, which holds the rights to efavirenz, has also been involved.

Collaboration hope

The number of pills people with HIV have to take each day has been reduced in recent years.

But making it as easy as possible for people to stick to their drug regimen is important; both for the patient themselves, and to prevent the emergence of drug-resistant strains of the virus which can develop when people fail to take all their medication.

However, Atripla will still be expensive, costing more than $1,000 a month.


 

That seems pretty goddamned expensive. Is combining all these pills really something that is going to help the patient? Or is it something that makes the drug companies more money. I would think the latter is more likely. I’m sure there is a minor convenience increase to the costumer, but its trivial to how much more money the drug companies will make.

I know there is a limited time a drug company can keep its drug from becoming generic, but I still think its too long. Drug companies have gotten so out of hand that they could actually hold patents to natural biological functions in your human body! I’m pretty sure I posted about that earlier (I can’t find it).

Companies usually specialize in the production of either innovator or generic drugs. But now, in order to better compete in the market, corporations specializing in the production of the innovator drugs, may purchase or create a subsidiary that produce and market generic drugs for which their competition holds the patents.

Thats a good way to corner the market. The goal of a lot of citizens in this country is to make money. Money makes everything go ’round. Sometimes, I feel like I can’t even put morality before anything else unless I could afford to do so. Its almost like virtues come at a market price these days. Wouldn’t you say?

These drug companies do have a very aggressive marketing strategy that I think is borderline immoral at times. Consider this example:

Drop in on any intensive care unit and the scene looks like controlled chaos. Physicians and nurses move in and out of patients’ rooms, a transport team pushes a gurney with a new admission along the corridor and technicians ready portable respiratory equipment. Mingling with these caregivers are members of another group whose presence has become all too common, and controversial— pharmaceutical sales representatives (PSR). They might be waiting for a lull to buttonhole a resident or a nurse practitioner, or setting up a company-sponsored lunch in the unit’s break room. They have one primary objective: to persuade those who write medication orders to use their company’s products.

While this ritual gets played out in hospitals and doctors’ offices throughout the country, this freewheeling relationship between the medical community and the industry that spends billions of dollars in direct marketing to presribers has come under closer scrutiny. Now, Hopkins Hospital has joined the growing trend, adopting a policy to bring tighter restrictions on drug companies’ interactions with health care professionals.

“In too many cases, the behavior of drug sales reps around the institution was getting out of hand,” explains Beryl Rosenstein, Hospital vice president for medical affairs. “It was time to come up with a comprehensive policy that brought some control over this industry activity. This is new territory for us.”

I don’t know about you, but if one of those guys came in and tried to bug my mom while she was in the ICU, or the doctor trying to sell drugs… I wouldn’t be happy. I understand advertising, I know that they are sharks, but this is people lives for god’s sake. $18.5 billion was spent in 2002 promoting to health care workers. Only $3 billion was spent advertising to consumers. So I guess we can see where their big monies lay. I still think the constant ads on television, and full color page ads in magazines is too much. its mind numbing. Often are there competing medications for the same thing. Take the male urinary condition, where there are currently two add campaigns occurring for two separate drugs. Ask your doctor about this, ask your doctor about that.

I very rarely see a doctor, but when I do, I never have an opportunity to ask him about taking a specific medication, I suppose thats why the advertise to health care workers.

I just doesn’t seem right that the whole brand name and generic thing happens. The patient’s health, quality of life, active decrease of suffering should be first, not making money. I don’t think this should be a money making situation. You shouldn’t make money off of the easing of suffering. Doesn’t every human have the right to being taken care of? I guess not. We’ve gotten to the point where money even decides who gets to feel better and who doesn’t. Is this right?

I really believe that these drug companies have no shame.

A recent lawsuit settlement that will return millions of dollars to cancer patients who were illegally overcharged for the drug Lupron may signal a turning point in the battle for affordable prescription drugs.

Of late, lawsuits brought by the states to challenge restrictions on importing lower-cost drugs from Canada have hogged the headlines. But some litigators are pursuing a different strategy—they’re challenging drug industry practices that keep American prices high.

Its true, we can import drugs from Europe and Canada very cheaply, but that may not be a long run solution. Finding a way to get rid of this ridiculousness domestically is the answer I believe. Soon, we’ll be importing all of our drugs and American drug companies will go out of business with their high prices and corrupt moralities.


For months now, seniors across the country have been climbing aboard buses and heading off to Canada to buy cheap prescription drugs. And now Illinois’ governor is defying the federal government’s ban on buying medications outside the U.S.

Good for them. The drug companies know that the sick don’t have the option of not buying drugs, especially if its a new drug and there are no generic brands out yet. Of course, by the time a generic comes out, the drug companies will have the next big thing, costing Americans an arm and a leg trying to stay healthy. If you discovered the cure for cancer, would you offer it for free or sell the information? Would it be up to you?

Enjoy.

whereIstand Tags

Posted in Health | 2 Comments »

What a smelly response

Wednesday, April 5th, 2006

Some dumb shit Smelly said:

The reason health insurance is so high is because of people that abuse care, like yourself.  If you have the flu you don’t need to go to the doctor.

First of all, I said in my post the following:


The reason health insurance is so high is because of people that abuse care, like yourself.  If you have the flu you don’t need to go to the doctor.

I believe WIS comments should be reserved for those who can read. Secondly… abuse care? Are you kidding? I never saw a doctor my entire life (except for yearly check-ups) until I went to college, where the only times I saw a doctor were for my broken hand, sleep apnea, and an appendicitis. Smelly’s assertion is pure ridiculousness, what a fuck-up!

Clark got it right:

Damn, that’s kind of harsh. The guy’s sick and he wants some medical attention, he’s not asking you to live a socialist utopia. Jesus, it sure would suck to be able to go to a doctor whenever I needed to.

One can actually die from a high fever. If the flu is bad enough, most people with health insurance end up going to a doctor.

And I’d gladly pay more taxes for a government that spent that money more wisely.

Your claims of MisterE abusing the system, at least based on this post, are absolutely unfounded, as are your claims regarding his lack of motivation.

Self-righteousness is soooo 2003.

Sorry for re-quoting the entire comment, but its dead on. Sure there are some people who head to the emergency room when they shouldn’t, but thats because they aren’t properly educated, nor are they doctors. You can’t expect to be an expert on every disease. And Clark is right, a high fever can cause brain damage and/or death… brain damage… is that what happened to Smelly?

You know whats funny? Smelly says I should have not gotten sick if only I had been exercising and eating healthy… first of all, I take Tae Kwon Do 4 days a week, and I am a vegetarian… god, smelly presumes all these incorrect things, what a fool. I’m straight up insulting smelly because his comment was a completely unfounded, un substantiated, poorly thought-out, unintelligent thing to say, one of the worst I have ever seen. What a waste of internet space. Sorry to be so harsh, but jesus christ, read his comment, its like reading a note written by a mentally retarded bully in the 5th grade.

I took the job that doesn’t provide health care because the job is important to me and my career. Its not everyday a guy fresh out of college like me gets a job producing a PBS television series.

Its not easy for me to get myself to a free clinic where they have endless lines, and a good chance I wouldn’t be seen, especially since I could barely walk given how dizzy I was from the high fever. Emergency room bills are expensive, sure they would treat me, but then they would bill me, and I don’t have that kind of money.

I don’t blame the government for my health or my financial situation, what I do blame them for is being stingy when it comes to providing health care. Smelly suggests that poor people choose to be poor… an extremely short-sighted thing to say.

whereIstand Tags

Posted in Health | 4 Comments »

Sick Again

Wednesday, April 5th, 2006

I don’t know how it happened, but only after 2 weeks of having a terrible flu, I got it again! I don’t know what the hell is going on. I wake up Monday morning with extreme flu symptoms, and I want to die.

Again, I must express my frustration of my health situation. I can’t afford health insurance. The cheapest plan I could find was about 170 dollars a month, which is outrageous for me. My job doesn’t have a health plan either for me, and I doubt they will for a while. And, I don’t make enough money to afford a 170 dollar a month plan.

I looked into doctors, and they want to charge about 225 dollars for an office visit. So what the hell?

If in fact I do have the flu I know there is nothing a doctor can do, but my concern is that I have something else because of the strange reemergence of symptoms.

From USA Today:

The number of U.S. residents without health insurance rose at the fastest clip in a decade last year, hitting 43.6 million, a development expected to increase pressure on lawmakers to take strong action to ease the problem.

No secret there, I know I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. Just appreciate your health insurance if you have it, because being without it is kind of scary.

From the Washington post.

If the Republican-controlled Congress enacted President Bush’s entire health care agenda, as many as 10 million people who lack health insurance would be covered at a cost of $102 billion over the next decade, according to his campaign aides.

But when the Bush-Cheney team was asked to provide documentation, the hard data fell far short of the claims, a gap supported by several independent analyses.

Projections by the Congressional Budget Office, the Treasury Department, academics and the campaign’s Web site suggest that under the best circumstances, Bush’s plans for health care would extend coverage to no more than 6 million people over the next decade and possibly as few as 2 million.

Sure, they want to say they will get us health insurance, but I don’t see how, and I personally don’t feel like they really care. I’m poor, and don’t plan on contributing to the republican party ever, therefor, I’m not worth saving, like the black people in New Orleans.

If I lived in France, I could see a doctor for free, no matter what my financial status. How superior is that?

whereIstand Tags

Posted in Health | 4 Comments »

The Goddamned Flu

Thursday, March 16th, 2006

So if you’ve noticed, I haven’t posted anything in a little bit… thats because I had the flu. It was so bad, I wanted to die. Lying in bed, trying to sleep, but I can’t because I keep hallucinating, trying not to throw up… it was a mess. But when I first came down with the symptoms, I didn’t know it was the flu… in fact, if I hadn’t already had my appendix removed, I would have thought it was appendicitis.

What really bothered me was that no matter what could have been happening to me, I couldn’t have gone to see a doctor, or gone to the emergency room. I don’t have health insurance, and I don’t have any money. So I would have never been able to afford to go to the emergency room. I would have had to just lay at home in bed and die. I couldn’t afford hospital bills.

So I would chose to just wait it out and hope nothing was seriously wrong. Fortunately, it was just a bad flu virus, but it could have been worse.

I don’t need to tell you that this is at the heart of many of the problems with our health care system. I would have just been another victim of the republicans and their cold war pentagon budget.

I know that there is nothing a doctor or anybody can do about a flu virus (I was pre-med you know), so spare me that argument. It is a matter of fact that if I had health insurance, or money, I could have gone to see a doctor on sunday, and been reassured that it really was just a flu virus. You never know when your condition is hospital worthy. Are rich people or people with good jobs the only ones who are worthy of care? I work for a non-profit, we make no money, so they can’t afford benefits, I’m screwed that way.

When it comes time to work on healthcare reform, this is what needs to be the driving force. The fact that people can’t afford access to the health resources that the rich cronies of Bush can. Not to mention the need for benefits for all employees of any kind.

Anyway, I’m still sick, so I’m done for now.

whereIstand Tags

Posted in Health | 3 Comments »

That is the source of the problem

Monday, March 6th, 2006

Jacki writes:

If you really place such a great value on someone else’s life, why not promote research that might yield productive advances in medical science so that people do not continue to suffer from terminal disease.

Yes, I couldn’t agree more. It is so frustrating when conservatives argue against abortion, then for the death penalty, then against suicide and euthanasia and all that. They take each argument separately and give different opinions about each, but ignore the super string that connects them together.

If I suffer from depression and wish to terminate my life, so be it.  Why do others who are motivated by factors like religion and "faith" – ideas that mean nothing to me- determine whether my life has any merit.

This is also something I have been trying to say for a long time. These conservatives wish to run your life for you. They want you to follow their religion, and let it dictate your life. They say they believe in freedom of religion, but what they really believe is freedom of their religion.

This is my main problem with christianity. Inherent almost in the religious teachings these days is the need to force it onto others. This is probably one of the most horrible things you could do. I mean… I would feel pretty bad to if I were brainwashed into believing in Jesus and stuff, but no need to take it out on others! It is perfectly okay if Jhwhicker and Adam believe abortion is bad, or that the death penalty is good, or that euthanasia is bad… and they should have every right to decide how it effects them personally. But they do not, and should never have the right to decide how others react to it with regards to their own personal feelings and life. Sure, if asking someone to end your pain and suffering were to harm others, I would be against it as well. But it doesn’t harm a soul. Sure it may upset your friends and family, and the jesus, but its your decision to make. I chose to move to new york, my friends were really pissed, but I was free to make that decision myself. They never see me, so it is kind of like I am dead to them… no? Somehow not I suppose.

Social conservative is basically this. Force others to follow your beliefs. I don’t care how you slice it. You pursue policy that forces women to give up the right to be in control of their own body, then you are forcing others to follow in your own beliefs. You pursue policy that forces people to not be able to chose to die because they don’t want to live, then you are forcing others to believe what you believe. When are the christians gonna learn that they didn’t get it right, and that being insecure about it and over compensating for being wrong isn’t going to solve their problem.

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Posted in Health | 2 Comments »

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