Health satire - More lunacy from Big Pharma and McDonald's

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NTN: Health satire - More lunacy from Big Pharma and McDonald's

Mon, 13 Mar 2006 11:09:03 -0700

 

 

 

NewsTarget Network Insider Alert (www.NewsTarget.com)

HEALTH SATIRE / HUMOR category

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Today, we bring you a health roundup to start your week with a dose

of humor from the ingenious minds in the food and drug industry. It

seems fast food giant McDonald's couldn't figure out how much trans

fat is actually in its french fries.

 

Meanwhile, Big Pharma has scored again by finding yet another way to

pump antidepressants into healthy people: Through your skin!

 

Read the full feature at:

 

http://www.newstarget.com/019310.html

 

 

 

 

March 12 2006

 

Health roundup: The depression patch, McDonald's trans fat goofs and

bottled water (satire)

 

The FDA has now approved a patch for depression. Slap one of these

patches on your skin, and a slow dose of mind-altering drugs is slowly

absorbed into your blood. This approval, of course, comes from the

same federal agency that claims skin care and cosmetic products

containing toxic chemicals aren't dangerous because the skin doesn't

actually absorb anything.

 

Like most drugs, the approval of this patch for depression is based on

the absolutely loony (and scientifically dishonest) idea that

depression is caused by a lack of synthetic chemicals circulating in

the brain. All disease is just a matter of chemical deficiency,

according to Big Pharma and the FDA. And if all Americans just had all

the right chemicals pumped into their bodies (at several thousand

dollars a month in prescription drug costs, by the way), we'd all be

healthy and pain free!

 

The side effects of this drug, of course, are only found in the small

print. These include high blood pressure if you happen to eat anything

containing tyramine, a dietary compound that is incompatible with most

depression drugs. Those foods include cheese and smoked meats. Giving

up cheese depresses a lot of people all by itself, thereby creating

demand for even more depression drugs. Clever gimmick, eh?

 

McDonald's finds more trans fats in french fries

McDonald's has just " discovered " its french fries contain far more

trans fats than previously thought. This is devastating news to

McDonalds customers who, as we know, are spuriously concerned with the

nutritional content of the food they somehow manage to swallow.

 

McDonald's claims that new measurement techniques caused the trans fat

figures to leap by 1/3 to 8 grams of artery-destroying trans fat per

serving of large fries. It makes you wonder about the other

nutritional information McDonald's is about to start printing on its

food wrappers, doesn't it?

 

Then again, it also begs the question: Do people who eat at McDonald's

actually read nutrition labels? And if so, can they possibly

understand them? Apparently McDonald's doesn't. The restaurant chain

is just now figuring out how to measure trans fats -- a technology

that has existed for decades.

 

I'm still glad McDonald's restaurants exist, though. They make great

restroom stops on long highway trips (those big signs are so easy to

spot, even when you think you can't hold it another mile). I haven't

actually purchased anything from McDonald's in the last eight years,

but I have entered their buildings via the side door near the

restrooms. All McDonald's restaurants smell exactly the same, have you

noticed? There's nothing quite like the consistency of factory food

mixed with chemical taste additives.

 

Is bottled water bad for the planet?

Believe it or not, bottled water is now being sharply criticized in

the U.S. by the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental group. While

the group does some great work in many areas, it misses the point on

bottled water: if people weren't buying bottled water in plastic

bottles, they'd be buying soft drinks in aluminum cans anyway. There's

a container garbage problem either way.

 

The group also says that tap water is just as good as bottled water,

which makes me wonder what they're drinking. Sure, tap water is

probably okay if you're a horse (although I would never let my dog

drink it). But unless you enjoy consuming carcinogenic chemicals and

fluorosilicic acid -- a chemical dripped into the water supplies in

many U.S. cities -- then tap water just isn't a safe option.

 

That fluorosilicic acid, by the way, is often scraped off the inside

of coal power plant smokestacks. If it wasn't sold to cities to be

dripped into the water, it would be considered a toxic waste product

regulated by the EPA. Don't believe me? Read this article.

http://www.newstarget.com/001807.html

 

Granted, there are a lot of silly bottled water products on the market

that are over-hyped. Coca-cola's Dasani water is just filtered tap

water with a trace of minerals thrown in. Many " vitamin water "

products are often just colored water with a trace of low-cost

vitamins. Popular sports water products are just water, artificial

colors, salt and a few low-grade minerals. These are rip-off products,

if you ask me.

 

But there are also quality, genuine bottled water products on the

market that I believe are worth every penny. Those would be the ones

from natural mineral springs, like Evian or Aquarius water out of Oregon.

 

 

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