Medicine

It Is Good For You

What is medicine? Is it something which should help you to get better when you are ill? Is it something you can rely on to improve your health? Apparently medicine is any substance used for the treatment or prevention of disease, according to the Chambers Dictionary (Chambers Harrap Publishers 1993). It doesn't say anything about it being beneficial or even a cure.

So maybe I should not have been so surprised when I saw the last copy of New Scientist (New Scientist, 30.11.2019. Vol.244 No. 3258) coming through the door the last Friday of November. The front cover caught my eye straight away. There it read "Why the medicine you take could actually be bad for your health", the words draped around a display of pills and tablets. My curiosity was triggered. 

On Page 34 to 39 I found the cover article written by Jessica Hamzelou, the New Scientists reporter who covers health and medicine. According to the cover story of this issue more and more medications are being rushed to market after limited testing.  It stated that drugs are approved based on preliminary findings, or authorised for a particular use, then widely prescribed for something else. It was mentioned in the article that some approved drugs turn out not to work or may be even worse than doing nothing. 

According to the article the US process of approving drugs is viewed worldwide as the "gold standard" and when the FDA has granted accelerated approval the drugs can then be "fast-track" approved everywhere else worldwide. Furthermore it stated that in the 1970's it took the FDA an average of 35 months to get a drug through the review process. Today it takes less than 1 year to get a drug through the approval process, New Scientist states in the article. The reasons given in the article are that this is due to public demand to have quicker access to breakthrough medicines or drugs that address an unmet medical need for people with life threatening diseases or life-limiting conditions. The author of the article carries on by stating that, despite virtuous goals, many drugs that are being hurried through are neither of the above. Jessica Hamzelou mentions the accelerated approval of a drug that encouraged the growth of eye lashes in 2008.

She stated that faster drug approval became common place not only in the US but also in Europe, and with it came lower standards, so that a new drug might not need to prove that it prevents heart attacks but only to lower blood pressure.  On top of that, new drugs which are similar to existing one are often approved on surrogate markers, the article states. This suggests that as a consequence, drugs with no proper testing of the side effects are used for conditions that they are actually not tested on, side effects and benefits for the patient and the survival rate and quality of life will only show with time. Jessica Hamzelou cites Vinay Prasad, an oncologist at Oregon Health and Science University, saying: "It's very costly, it has real side effects and it doesn't let you live longer", about Afinitor, a drug used in the treatment of metastatic breast cancer. It was also mentioned that 45% of FDAs' funding comes from user fees, i.e. drug companies, and it mentions an amount of $1.5 billion. New scientist contacted both agencies, the FDA and EMA, its European equivalant, about the conflict of interest.

In the article it says that doctors would rather prescribe a drug which might do damage to their patients, or even result in death, than do nothing. It states in the article that this happen on account of fear that even a more dangerous drug might be prescribed as an alternative. Once a drug is approved it is very difficult to remove it from the market, according to the article. It seems that physicians who receive financial benefits from drug companies are more likely to prescribe the drugs of that company, even if the benefit is as small as a $13 meal. At the end of the article you are advised to take your health into your own hands by asking your doctor how new the drug is that you are going to get, if the medicine was approved for your condition and how likely is it that the drug is going to work. You should ask how the prescribed drug compares with other drugs and look for studies on your prescribed drug yourself.

There is only one thing for me to say: "In Homoeopathy you always get the medicine matched exactly to your person. Homoeopathy is a very individual medicine, given to your needs."

If you want to know more about Homoeopathy and how it can help you contact me on 07813 195468.

The cover of  Vol 244, No. 3258 of New Scientist by Getty images