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Daily DigestMeetings
The Drury High School Council meets Tuesday, Jan 13, at 6:30 in the conference room. Agenda items include AYP, school grant, laptop initiative and PowerSchool updates. |
Steve Decker cleans up in front of BankNorth on Wednesday.
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More Snow
The Berkshires received several inches of snow this morning, but not enough to close schools, unlike yesterday's sleety mess. Temperatures will drop into the 20s this afternoon. A few more snow showers are expected through the weekend.
We have reports that the roads are very slippery to take care in the evening commute. |
Duff'em If You've Got'em
 North Adams Regional Hospital went smoke-free Monday — so did all its sister sites, from Sweet Brook to Northern Berkshire Family Practice to the Women's Exchange. No ashtrays, no smoking: No butts about it. |
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Like to Write?
 iBerkshires accepts submissions about local events, news and opinion pieces. There are openings for freelance work, too, for qualified candidates. E-mail tdaniels@iberkshires.com to find out more. |
Wanted: Eagle Eyes
 MassWildlife's annual eagle count runs Dec. 31 to Jan. 14. Anyone sighting one of the regal birds in Massachusetts is asked to participate.
Send date, time, location and town of eagle sightings, number of birds, whether juvenile or adult and observer's contact information to Mass.wildlife@state.ma.us. |
RegionWhat's PlayingSales FliersColumnists | Independent Investor
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Obama TransitionOther StuffMars Rovers Mark 5 Years
 Spirit and Opportunity have been trekking the red planet for half a decade. Spirit hit the 5-year mark on Sunday; Opportunity will on Jan. 24. |
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Go to Health!: Promoting Illness to Market TreatmentBy Peter May - June 07, 2008
iBerkshires Columnist
 | | Peter May |
Back in the 1970s Henry Gladsen, a Merck pharmaceutical executive, lamented about Merck's limited market. Their drugs, "unlike gum, could only be sold to sick people." His dream was to "sell to everyone."
There were several ways to expand the market: have more sick people, expand diagnoses to include more "healthy" people, brand and market new "diseases" for healthy people, medicalize normal life, target market younger and younger people, and transition people from acute to chronic drug use — cradle to grave to drugs for everyone.
In this country and, increasingly around the world, his vision is being realized.
Expanding diagnoses result from changes in medical guidelines and definitions to allow for expanding use of new drugs and new uses for older drugs, a veritable bonanza for drug companies. For example, in 2001, a panel of medical doctors, many with financial ties to multiple drug companies, created new guidelines for cholesterol levels that overnight increased the number of Americans who "need" statins from 13 million to 36 million.
While the science shows that statins do lower cholesterol, there is no evidence that lowering a single risk factor, cholesterol, significantly lowers morbidity or mortality associated with heart disease. The evidence clearly shows that exercise and diet are FAR more important.
An article in Reuters Business Insight, "Healthcare: The Lifestyle Drugs Outlook to 2008," heralded great promise for the future of "corporate sponsored creation of diseases." Branding new diseases (i.e.: restless leg syndrome, erectile dysfunction) and medicalizing normal life (i.e.: hair loss, menopause, aging) are very effective strategies used by pharmaceutical marketing firms to sell sickness, and the drugs to treat them, to "healthy" people.
Their goal is to create a rock-solid mental and emotional bond between the conditions and their drugs in both doctors and patients (i.e.: think ADD equals Ritalin). Their tools include direct-to-consumer television drug ads (spending $10 million dollars per day in the U.S. with a 6:1 return on investment), corporate-funded "public awareness" campaigns and "patient advocacy" groups (i.e.: the American Heart Association) to promote drug use, PR broadcast as medical "news," corporate-sponsored continuing education programs for doctors, endless visits by gift-bearing drug reps to doctors' offices, relentless political lobbying and campaign contributions, building new, corporate-named wings on hallowed medical institutions, etc. — anything and everything it takes to sell more drugs.
Frightfully, they have convinced us to drug our kids, often as soon as birth. The fastest-growing market for the pharmaceutical companies is younger Americans, with the most prescribed drugs being Ritalin for boys and antidepressants for girls.
Look at these recent stunning headlines: "Chronic Medication Nation: Research Finds Chronic Health Problems Now Afflict More Than Half of All Americans," "Younger Adults Show Steepest Rise in Chronic Medication Use." Their marketing goal, the transitioning from acute to chronic medication use, is being realized.
Isn't it self-evident that chronic lifetime use of a drug isn't fixing any health problem? If it did, you wouldn't need the drug.
America, with only 5 percent of the world's population, consumes 60 percent of all drugs at a rate of 25 million pills per hour and more each year. How could anyone believe or defend this as effective care?
We have more sick and dying people each year. In fact, our society, culture and lifestyles all promote illness to the extent that this generation of youth is the first in American history with a shorter life expectancy than their parents.
Rates of chronic diseases, such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, depression, etc., are skyrocketing. You don't "catch" any of these diseases nor are they genetically programmed to strike. For the most part, they are lifestyle diseases that can be prevented and, largely, reversed.
Meanwhile, more and more people are dying on the drugs for the diseases they "treat"; i.e., more and more people are dying with lowered blood pressure and cholesterol, etc. Doctors say, "the treatment was a success, but the patient died."
Sadly, not only are the drugs not working, they are distracting us from doing the things we can do to achieve greater health.
I have never met a patient who couldn't name three things they knew they could do to make themselves healthier. Almost all say the same things: eat better, get more exercise, and control stress. These are all lifestyle choices, and health is mostly a matter of choice, not chance.
Peter May is a doctor of chiropractic and a local resident with a practice in North Adams. He writes a monthly column on health. |
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