nutrition-should-the-public-be-concerned

Should the Public be Concerned about Supplements?

Due to a recent series of articles on in the media concerning "alternative therapies", some positive and some negative, I felt compelled to even out the playing field when it comes to research and safety! The scientific community would like to lead you to believe that their motives are to prevent the public from being injured from taking supplements and herbal medicines that are unproven. According to Dr. Phil B. Fontanarosa, a senior editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association, quote "some of these therapies have shown to be harmful!" Before the American Medical Association criticizes the safety of natural treatments, I suggest they should be more concerned about the safety of the drugs that are manufactured by pharmaceutical companies that they prescribe to their patients.
I believe that the pharmaceutical industry’s motives to criticize natural health care has been influenced by the loss of their income to their “new competition.” What I find of interest in the above mentioned article in the JAMA is that they state that "women and college-educated individuals are more favorably inclined to alternative therapies." Keep in mind that "natural medicine" is not alternative medicine, natural medicine
is TRADITIONAL medicine. Natural medicine has been around for thousands of years, in fact approximately 60% of modern medicines come from some form of plant derivative. Under most circumstances it has been difficult to patent a botanical plant medicine. Pharmaceutical companies "had been" reluctant to invest money into a medicine that couldn’t be patented. Times are changing, with the mass movement toward herbal and traditional healthcare, expect to see a surge of pharmaceutical companies wanting a piece of the action. Yes they are already selling them and have been for a number of years.
It’s important to remember, health care is one of the largest businesses in this country and as a business it is one of the most abused.
Thanks to the Internet, the average citizen now has the ability to investigate their options before making a decision concerning their health. If you are concerned about the “side-effects associated with natural supplements, then key in any of the prescription medications that you want to find out about into any of the Search Engines on your computer? Prescription medication has been wonderful, but they are not the only options.
In a recent article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, it was stated that "Americans logged about 629 million visits to alternative care providers, compared to 386 million visits to primary care doctors." Is the public so foolish to waste their money on alternative methods of treatment and supplements that don’t work, or is it that they are frustrated with the only two options they presently are getting, pharmaceuticals and surgery?
I believe that one of the main reasons that the AMA and the "scientific community" is finally beginning to investigate natural medicine is because of "MONEY." If they were so concerned about the publics safety from vitamins, minerals and herbal medicine, then why haven't they removed from the market all of the medicines that they prescribe that have been proven to be harmful? Supplements and herbal have been around for years, why weren’t concerned about them earlier. Allow me to share a few of the facts that they have made public about their track record.

According to Robert J. Temple, M.D., Director, Office of Drug Evaluation I, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, FDA, Dr. Temple discussed the Drug Efficacy Study (DESI), a legally mandated review of drugs required by the Kefauver-Harris amendments to the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. Over 3,400 separate drug products were reviewed. The results indicated that 40 percent of these drugs had no effect and 60 percent of the claims were not supported by scientific studies. “And they claim that natural medicine doesn't work and there are no studies to support their use?" Health care is about money, our economy runs on money and when someone else is getting into THEIR wallet, it gets ugly because health care is the most abused of all businesses.
In 1989, in Prevention magazine, Dr. Eugene Robin, M.D. stated that over 1/3 of all health care is unnecessary. The reason that the public has shifted to traditional therapies is because they can't afford conventional medicine. The next time you have to buy your prescription medication you will know what I am talking about!
It gets BETTER! According to an editorial in the British Journal of Medicine, entitled 'Where is the Wisdom? The Poverty of Medical Evidence' quoted one of the experts who has researched and penetrated the myth of scientific health care during the past 20 years. David Eddy, Professor of Health Policy and Management, Duke University in North Carolina acknowledges:

1) Only about 15% of medical interventions are supported by valid scientific evidence.
2) One reason is that "only 1% of articles in medical journals are scientifically sound."
3) Another is that "many treatments have never been assessed at all."

Dr. Eddy is one of the most respected advisors to the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research(AHCPR), the U.S. Federal agency established in December 1989 to assist in the development and maintenance of national health practice guidelines. Dr. Eddy is a cardiothoracic surgeon in Stanford, California. He became seriously concerned at the lack of evidence to support the effectiveness of what he and his colleagues were doing.

After reading some of the most recent articles published in major newspapers, it appears that the American Medical Association is concerned about the safety and efficacy of alternative treatments such as chiropractic, herbal remedies and vitamins and minerals. I am not aware of anyone who has died from taking too much vitamin A or from taking any supplement. Not to say that a child, after eating a bottle of an iron supplement wouldn't experience some serious side effects and possible death. I know what would happen if that same child swallowed a bottle of Tylenol, aspirin or ibuprofen! I also know what would happen if a child drank liquid dish soap, one of the most toxic home cleaning products in most peoples homes? If the American Medical Association was so concerned about preventing health problems and the safety of public, why haven't they been working towards prevention? Think about how many products in a drug store mention the word prevention on their label.

Now lets examine the pharmaceutical industry’s tract record! These statistics are from the April 15, 1998 vol. 279, No. 15 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association: Incidence of Adverse Drug Reactions in Hospital Patients. According to this journal article, more than 2 million Americans become seriously ill every year because of toxic reactions to CORRECTLY prescribed medicines taken properly and 106,000 people die every year from those reactions. This high number makes drug side effects at least the sixth, and perhaps even the fourth, most common cause of death in this country!