In a comment to today’s post “This product killed my husband of 43 years” reader Roxanne comments:
“You see commercials with a list of side effects longer than my grocery list and I have three teenagers and two adults in the house.
If our products (=supplements from MLM companies, KK) had that many side effects we would really be in deep doo doo.”
Forget side effects for a moment. Given just the number of deaths and injuries from FDA approved drugs each year, why are drug companies (and the FDA who approves them), not in bigger doo doo?
Is our demand for quick fixes to big problems so great we’ll just keep turning a blind eye and pay the price over and over, like the Vioxx population has?
Then sue, collect, and do it again?
Is this a sympton of a bigger national malady?
Yes, our society’s demand for quick fixes to big problems IS great enough that drug companies are not in the expected level of ‘doo-doo’. It is so much easier to take a pill than shift behavior, add exercise, or alter one’s diet — even though the latter might be more effective, cheaper, and less injurious long-term solutions than pharmaceuticals are. Many people don’t want responsibility for their own health, and want their doctors to take care of it for them. Then, pressured for quick fixes, doctors whip out their presciption pads — or give samples of the latest new thing.
Unfortunately, what many nutraceutical companies don’t want to hear is that even their wonderful products do not fully make up for ongoing poor diet, chronic stress, no exercise, and a multitude of other incremental health traumas. Yet, this is the sort of advertising focus one often sees. Take this supplement and it will overcome all the damage you’ve been doing to your body for years. To me this is as false an idea as pharmaceutical companies promote, such as: gee, you can eat the food that gives you heartburn, if you just take this little purple pill first.
My points of view won’t be popular in either camp. 🙂
Be well, everyone — as naturally as possible!
Pam
In short, yes, it is a symptom of a bigger malady.
We’ve got big health problems.
Our kids are the first generation expected to have a shorter life expectency than their parents.
But let’s not beat up on the drug companies. All of us know people who would probably be dead if it weren’t for effective medications on the market.
Who should we blame, then?
Walter Reade (from Wisconsin)
http://www.NetworkingTechTips.com
Walter –
Blaming others has never helped anything I know of. Making it better is what one can do – by educating oneself about things that matter. Assuming one cares and many do not.
Perhaps because health is taken for granted until that wake-up call.
Drugs are great because they’re quick acting. Side effects’ publicity is only now making some people more cautious about over-drugging themselves.
But as Pam notes, supplements aren’t enough either.
It’s about taking some responsibility for your health and doing some reading and listening = then making your decisions about how you will reinvent yourself to be a healthier person.
And only a subset of the population has the mind set to do that.
Still, more and more people are taking responsibility in taking care of their bodies – at least as well as their cars – they’re exercising, eating better, sleeping better, supplementing, etc.
That’s a good thing.