Medical Industrial Complex

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achillea

achillea

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"The American public has no idea how politics secretly control the practice of medicine. If a doctor dares to introduce a natural, less costly method, no matter how safe or effective, Organized American Medicine can target this doctor for license revocation using fear tactics and legal maneuverings. Why do holistic therapies threaten medicine? (Firstly) They involve a major change in scientific thought. (Secondly) They imply that current methods are inadequate, and, (Thirdly) they threaten huge profits ... "
James P. Carter, M.D., Ph.D. 4
American Physician
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Author: "Racketeering in Medicine"
 
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So basically the drugs don't work, they actually tend to make us less healthy, and we pay more fore them... Sounds like the America I know and love!
 
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Basically the role of the government is to put monopoly on industries to delicate for private ownership. Its to bad they do a way worse job on it then any private company ever would. Heck the government is essentially the most corrupt business every made! On top of that, if you don't pay them their cut every year, then they can destroy your life in front of you at gun point.

They sound more like a corrupt gang, than a legitimate governing body.
 
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achillea

achillea

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Medical journal editor admits “science has taken a turn towards darkness”
Posted on March 21, 2018 |
COMMENT OF DR. RICHARD HORTON, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OF THE LANCET

The following commentary was published in Britain’s oldest and most prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, in April, 2015.

The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness. As one participant put it, “poor methods get results”. The Academy of Medical Sciences, Medical Research Council, and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council have now put their reputational weight behind an investigation into these questionable research practices. The apparent endemicity of bad research behaviour is alarming. In their quest for telling a compelling story, scientists too often sculpt data to fit their preferred theory of the world. Or they retrofit hypotheses to fit their data. Journal editors deserve their fair share of criticism too. We aid and abet the worst behaviours. Our acquiescence to the impact factor fuels an unhealthy competition to win a place in a select few journals. Our love of “significance” pollutes the literature with many a statistical fairy-tale. We reject important confirmations. Journals are not the only miscreants. Universities are in a perpetual struggle for money and talent, endpoints that foster reductive metrics, such as high-impact publication. National assessment procedures, such as the Research Excellence Framework, incentivise bad practices. And individual scientists, including their most senior leaders, do little to alter a research culture that occasionally veers close to misconduct.

Can bad scientific practices be fixed? Part of the problem is that no-one is incentivised to be right. Instead, scientists are incentivised to be productive and innovative. Would a Hippocratic Oath for science help? Certainly don’t add more layers of research red tape. Instead of changing incentives, perhaps one could remove incentives altogether. Or insist on replicability statements in grant applications and research papers. Or emphasise collaboration, not competition. Or insist on preregistration of protocols. Or reward better pre and post publication peer review. Or improve research training and mentorship. Or implement the recommendations from our Series on increasing research value, published last year. One of the most convincing proposals came from outside the biomedical community. Tony Weidberg is a Professor of Particle Physics at Oxford. Following several high-profile errors, the particle physics community now invests great effort into intensive checking and rechecking of data prior to publication. By filtering results through independent working groups, physicists are encouraged to criticise. Good criticism is rewarded. The goal is a reliable result, and the incentives for scientists are aligned around this goal. Weidberg worried we set the bar for results in biomedicine far too low. In particle physics, significance is set at 5 sigma—a p value of 3 × 10–7 or 1 in 3·5 million (if the result is not true, this is the probability that the data would have been as extreme as they are). The conclusion of the symposium was that something must be done. Indeed, all seemed to agree that it was within our power to do that something. But as to precisely what to do or how to do it, there were no firm answers. Those who have the power to act seem to think somebody else should act first. And every positive action (eg, funding well-powered replications) has a counterargument (science will become less creative). The good news is that science is beginning to take some of its worst failings very seriously. The bad news is that nobody is ready to take the first step to clean up the system.
Richard Horton
[email protected]
The Lancet, Vol 385, p 1380, April 11, 2015
 

yerrag

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The conclusion of the symposium was that something must be done. Indeed, all seemed to agree that it was within our power to do that something. But as to precisely what to do or how to do it, there were no firm answers. Those who have the power to act seem to think somebody else should act first. And every positive action (eg, funding well-powered replications) has a counterargument (science will become less creative). The good news is that science is beginning to take some of its worst failings very seriously. The bad news is that nobody is ready to take the first step to clean up the system.
I think it's because most people are still swayed not by the power of reason or that of a good argument, because they're still unable or unwilling to listen, and with a gap of knowledge that results, people prefer the safety of having experts. Scientific studies have the stamp of science, and with that an inherent credibility, and the profit motivation has ended up gaming this system of trust, by polluting it with deception. Corporations are keen to manufacture experts that don't question nor vet these studies, and give these experts an aura of respectability, replete with titles, as long as they don't question the veracity of these studies. People, in search of experts, are led by propaganda (TV, newspapers, Google, and Wikipedia) and by titles (MD) into accepting conventional wisdom, an unwise act, and into a wrong view of human physiology. Having accomplished this wholesale act of brainwashing, corporations reap profits by driving entire populations into disease, and profit from giving solutions that only further the downward spiral of human health. With each downward spiral, health becomes more and more elusive as costs of staying alive become more usurious. In no uncertain terms the individual is subjugated to the corporation and its profit machinery.
 

yerrag

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the web site seems a little woo woo but the article is telling and sources quoted

Goldman Sachs: Curing Cancer is 'NOT a Sustainable Business Model'
Remember Peter Lynch, the famous mutual fund maanger of Fidelity Magellan fame? He likes pharmaceutical drug companies because they don't sell cures, but sell products that manage conditions, and that means recurring revenue.

Public corporations are driven to make us keep needing their products. We have to have the motor to drive ourselves to expiate ourselves of being needy of their products. We have to deprogram ourselves of their programming.
 
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achillea

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Centuries ago it was not unusual for entire naval expeditions to be wiped out by scurvy. Between 1600 and 1800 the casuaty list of the British Navy alone was was over 1 million sailors.

In the winter of 1535, when the French explorer, Jacques Cartier found his ships frozen in the ice off the St Lawrence River, scurvy began to take its deadly toll. Out of the crew of 110, twenty five already had died, and most of the others were so ill they weren't expected to recover.
And then a friendly Indian showed them the simple remedy, tree bark and needles from the white pine- both rich in ascorbic acid or vitamin C- were stirred into a drink which produced immediate improvement and swift recovery.

Upon returning to Europe, Cartier reported this incident to the medical authorities. But they were amused by such " witch doctor cures of ignorant savages" and did nothing to follow it up.

Yes, the cure for scurvy was known. But because of scientific arrogance, it took over two hundred years and cost hundreds of thousands of lives before the medical experts began to accept and apply this knowledge.

Finally, in 1747, John Lind, a young surgeons mate in the British Navy discovered that oranges and lemons produced relief from scurvy and recommended the Royal navy include citrus fruits in the stores of all its' ships. And yet, it still took 48 more years before his recommendation was put into effect. When it was, of course, the British were able to surpass all other sea faring nations, and the Limeys, so called because they carried limes aboard ship, soon became the rulers of the Seven Seas.

It is no exaggeration to say that the greatness of te British Empire in large measure was the direct result of overcoming scientific prejudice against vitamin therapy.

Quoted from A World Witout Cancer by G Edward Griffin
 

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Centuries ago it was not unusual for entire naval expeditions to be wiped out by scurvy. Between 1600 and 1800 the casuaty list of the British Navy alone was was over 1 million sailors.

In the winter of 1535, when the French explorer, Jacques Cartier found his ships frozen in the ice off the St Lawrence River, scurvy began to take its deadly toll. Out of the crew of 110, twenty five already had died, and most of the others were so ill they weren't expected to recover.
And then a friendly Indian showed them the simple remedy, tree bark and needles from the white pine- both rich in ascorbic acid or vitamin C- were stirred into a drink which produced immediate improvement and swift recovery.

Upon returning to Europe, Cartier reported this incident to the medical authorities. But they were amused by such " witch doctor cures of ignorant savages" and did nothing to follow it up.

Yes, the cure for scurvy was known. But because of scientific arrogance, it took over two hundred years and cost hundreds of thousands of lives before the medical experts began to accept and apply this knowledge.

Finally, in 1747, John Lind, a young surgeons mate in the British Navy discovered that oranges and lemons produced relief from scurvy and recommended the Royal navy include citrus fruits in the stores of all its' ships. And yet, it still took 48 more years before his recommendation was put into effect. When it was, of course, the British were able to surpass all other sea faring nations, and the Limeys, so called because they carried limes aboard ship, soon became the rulers of the Seven Seas.

It is no exaggeration to say that the greatness of te British Empire in large measure was the direct result of overcoming scientific prejudice against vitamin therapy.

Quoted from A World Witout Cancer by G Edward Griffin
Great to read @achillea. We would all do well to keep that story in mind when confronted with medical arrogance to this very day. Little has changed and it seems even vitamin C is still under appreciated.
 

yerrag

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