Disease Mongering

"Driving the annual double-digit growth in the legal drug supply are a band of specialist "healthcare" PR companies working for behemoths such as Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck and Astra Zeneca. Heading the healthcare PR league table are Edelman, Ruder Finn and Chandler Chicco Agency in the US and Medical Action Communications, Shire Health Group and Meditech Media in the UK.

"Medical education" includes cultivating and deploying sponsored "key opinion leaders" such as doctors. Patient groups too can be created or wooed to assist with "disease awareness campaigns" or provide emotionally charged testimony in favor of speedy regulatory approval of new drugs.

Other lucrative revenue streams for healthcare PR companies can include organizing events such as medical conferences that provide a platform for well-trained "product champions" to announce promising results of drug research. Such results can be reported by medical journalists--who can be hired by PR firms--in medical journals that they can create for their clients."

Link

Video: Alison Bass, Journalist and Paxil Whistleblower, Gives a Talk

Visit Alison Bass at her site here.
Now comes news that Paxil is being touted to help cancer sufferers think more clearly. But chemo cancer therapy itself can cause brain fog, as we have seen, and if cancer is a fungus, this therapy is wrong.
What do YOU think?

SSRI Discontinution at Wikipedia

Synaptic/SSRI cartoon above is a spoof.
We'll place this information on "Discontinution syndrome" in our Friends column as well.

Dr. Abram Hoffer Dies, Age 91

All those who have benefited from Dr. Hoffer's knowledge will be sad to learn that the great man has died, age 91....

The International Society for Orthomolecular Medicine gives tribute here.

Canada's GLOBE AND MAIL has an obituary here.

Here Hoffer writes of his own youth and early experiences as a physician. Link



Thank you, Dr. Hoffer.

Vioxx: A Mercky Story

"After paying out almost $5 billion in the US, Merck is defending a class action in Australia where a journal that never was came to light. Meanwhile in the UK victims see no prospect of compensation - writes Prof. Peter Saunders"

There are about 10,000 people in the United Kingdom who believe they are due compensation for damages they suffered while on Merck's Vioxx. These persons cannot get legal aid and if they lose they will have to pay Merck’s costs. Merck has deep pockets so the company has effectively been handed a default victory by the British government. However, in Australia, 1000 Vioxx users are bringing a class action to trial, and the outcome there may be quite different.
Link

Blowback: Agent Orange in Canada

Excerpt from Blowback: A Canadian History of Agent Orange and the War at Home
at link

TED Talks: Elizabeth Gilbert on Nurturing Creativity

We like Elizabeth Gilbert, and wish to take her thoughts a step further - to discuss protective effects of proper nutrition on the brain of the young and the creative. Much self-destructive behavior stems from problems caused by poor nutrition. Video at link
Relevant article - Orthomolecular Nutrition to the Rescue