How Drug Companies Deceive Doctors

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"Zeus" <info How Drug Companies Deceive DoctorsMon, 14 Nov 2005 17:38:10 -0000 HealthFX You have permission to publish this article electronically or inprint, free of charge, as long as the bylines are included. Thisarticle is courtesy of Health Myths Exposed, Box 31729 Dept. 802,Santa Fe NM 87595-1729. Phone: (505) 310-2454. Contact:service. A courtesy copy of your publication would begreatly appreciated. Editing is available upon contacting author. How Drug Companies Deceive Doctors By Shane Ellison, M.Sc. Health Myths Exposed © 2005 Following doctor's orders has become synonymous with danger. Everyyear, FDA approved drugs kill twice as many people as the total numberof U.S. deaths from the Vietnam War.[1] Death by medicine flourishesbecause deceit, not science, governs a doctor's prescribing habits. As an ex-drug chemist, I witnessed this first-hand. This deceit comes in many forms. Medical ghostwriting and checkbookscience are the most prominent. Doctors rely on peer-reviewed medical journals to learn aboutprescription drugs. These journals include the Lancet, BritishMedical Journal, New England Journal of Medicine and the Journal ofthe American Medical Association. It is assumed that theseprofessional journals offer the hard science behind any given drug. This assumption is wrong. Medical journals can't be trusted thanks tomedical ghost writing. Medical ghostwriting is the practice of hiring PhD's to crank out drugreports that hype benefits and hide negative side effects. Oncecomplete, drug companies recruit doctor's to put their name on thereport as authors. These reports are then published in the abovementioned medical journals.[2] The carrot for this deceitful practiceis money and prestige. Ghostwriters can receive up to $20,000 perreport. Doctors receive prestige from having been published. Ultimately, patients get bad drugs disguised as good medicine. As deplorable as medical ghostwriting sounds, it is more common thanyou think. The world's most influential medical journal, the NewEngland Journal of Medicine, has admitted that 50% of their drugarticles are ghostwritten. The editor of the British Journal of Medicine has acknowledged thatmedical ghostwriting has become a serious problem for his publication:"We are being hoodwinked by the drug companies. The articles come inwith doctors' names on them and we often find some of them have littleor no idea about what they have written."[3] Consider the testimony from deputy editor of The Journal of theAmerican Medical Association: "This [journal articles] is all aboutbypassing science. Medicine is becoming a sort of Cloud Cuckoo Land,where doctors don't know what papers they can trust in the journals,and the public doesn't want to believe."[4] Other weapons of mass deception exist – checkbook science. As definedby Diana Zuckerman, PhD, checkbook science is research intended not toexpand knowledge or to benefit humanity, but instead to sell drugs. It has stolen the very soul of University research, scientific method,and the patients who serve as human subjects.[5] Drug companies use checkbook science to sponsor their own drugresearch via the halls of academia and government institutions. Moneyis used to design their own studies, interpret the results, and stuffnegative data under the drug-rug. The drug-rug is a behemoth rug. Ithas to be. A myriad of negative drug data exists. Like medical ghostwriting, checkbook science is more common than youthink. A third of academic professors have personal financial ties todrug makers.[6] Called the "Stealth Merger" by the LA Times, topscientists at the National Institutes of Health also collect paychecksand stock options from the drug industry.[7] This has been going onfor over 20 years.[8] Known as the Bayh-Dole Act, U.S law was amendedin 1980 to allow for these flagrant conflicts of interest.4 This calculated deceit is scandalous. Hopefully the line at thepharmaceutical trough gets shorter as this scandal becomes public. Though, drug makers have an insurance policy for this –Direct-to-Consumer advertising. The oft repeated "ask your doctor"ensures that the herd instinctively embraces drugs, drugs and moredrugs. Understanding medical ghost writing and checkbook science explains whymedical doctors have been hypnotized into drug worship – they only seethe positive. It also explains why modern medicine is more deadly andlucrative than war – the danger has been silenced with the pen and money. Drug companies do not take responsibility for the wonton prescriptiondrug deceit. Instead, victims have been made invisible - dehumanized. They are not recognized as children, or men with significantcontribution to society. Their deaths are simply shrugged off andattributed to sickness or aging. Those who profit from prescription drugs should hold some sort ofrecord for the having the most reckless disregard for human life. Ifthe deceit continues the prescription drug leviathan will silentlykill more people than Napalm dropped on Vietnamese villages. About the Author Shane holds a Master's degree in organic chemistry and has first handexperience in drug design. Specializing in therapeutic nutrition, hehas made it his mission to introduce healthy lifestyle and nutritionhabits to the general public. He is author of Health Myths Exposed. His books and FREE offers can be found at www.healthmyths.net. [1] Approximately 58,000 American's died in Vietnam. FDA approveddrugs kill 106 – 125,000 people per year when used as prescribed. [2] Source: CBC's Marketplace. Aired March 25, 2003. ResearcherColman Jones. [3] http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,6903,1101680,00.html [4] Shannon Brownlee. Doctors Without Borders. Why you can't trustmedical journals anymore. Washington Monthly. April 2003. [5] Zuckerman, D. Hype in health reporting: "checkbook science" buysdistortion of medical news. International Journal of Health Services.2003;33(2). [6] Bekelman, J.E., Li, Y. and Gross, C. P. Scope and impact offinancial conflicts of interest in biomedical research. Journal of theAmerican Medical Association. 289: 454-465. [7] Willman D. Stealth merger: drug companies and government medicalresearch. Los Angeles Times. 2003 Dec 7;:A1, A32-3. [8]http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0404.brownlee.html#byline forwarded byZeus Information ServiceAlternative Views on Healthwww.zeusinfoservice.com