Here's another "glorious" cross-section of science in the service of humanity and its progress (perhaps someone's career), the science that we fund continuously, even if it seems to me that the way to extort money and health they find it very easily.
With infinite disgust,
Barbara
invent diseases
Adolfo Di Bella
http://www.dibellainsieme.org/home.do
1. But as research!
"Pharmaceutical companies have become able to sell commercial empires ... antidepressants, painkillers ... and drugs anticholesterol ... using the same methods used by Coca Cola to sell or the Dash ... sell drugs rather than discovering them, has become the obsession of the pharmaceutical industry. " This is one of the strongest passages of the introduction of the book of Petersen (pagina14).
clear, resounding, an anomaly that has direct meaning to the intensive publicity so sick? This person is considered to be cured or to attract customers? It seems morally licit a similar policy and parallel indifference of the authorities? And then, given that weigh heavily on price, the cost to the national sales promotion expenses of pharmaceutical companies?
These are questions that we all must begin to ask ourselves, to know that we can give confidence to them, their products, to those who prescribe them. Also need to consider another oddity, namely the dual advertising: that given to doctors and that the citizen. An oppressive siege and the U.S. has reached unimaginable levels, and we are getting ready to become one, as is readily apparent in the recent increase in pharmaceutical advertising on our television screens .....
Between 1995 and 2000 the clerks to marketing in the U.S. pharmaceutical companies had grown by 59%, while those involved in research and development of drugs were reduced by 2%: i promotori avevano così raggiunto le 87.210 unità contro le 48.527 dei tecnici. Nel 2004 il boom: sono stati assunti negli Stati Uniti 101.000 informatori farmaceutici che visitano il medico portando una «pioggia di omaggi e denaro contante» (opera citata, pagina 19). E’ ovvio che dal medico ci si aspetta riconoscenza, sotto forma di prescrizione di farmaci. Questa tendenza si era fatta evidente già dal finire degli anni ‘70, ma, come osservò il dottor Steven N. Wiggins, docente di Economia presso un rinomato ateneo americano, «i ricercatori avevano cominciato a perdere la loro influenza all’interno delle grandi società farmaceutiche già alla late sixties. " Pierre Simon, the first academic researcher, head of research at France's Sanofi then said to medical historian David Healy: "At first, the pharmaceutical industry was in the hands of chemists. Now belongs to people who have a master's degree in Business Administration or something like that, people that may run the same way as Renault, Volvo or any other company. You have to see how much money the pharmaceutical industry spends to conduct research on drug-photocopy, whose effectiveness is sometimes less. Let's talk about using 70-90% of all money spent on research for purposes that go beyond innovation. E 'a terrible waste of money. "
But back to the fig leaf of research costs. These are very content - assuming for a moment that you really intend to do scientific research - and lower living costs that include costs of purchasing raw materials, cost of production and packaging, rarely exceed 10% of the total. At this point it is appropriate to elaborate on the nature of marketing and promotional activity. Let's start with ... trifles. The exponents of Tap Pharmaceutical Products - this is just a prime example of widespread systematic costumes - were free of televisions, VCRs, and tickets to Broadway shows to doctors who prescribed their own proprietary . If a doctor was to transfer his own studio, here come with lightning timeliness of the company representatives with a check round, if he wanted to increase their revenue, not to miss the loving offer of free advice, provided by experts who routinely also asked for fees of 25,000 dollars.
tolerance of practices of questionable propriety and legality has also led to a lack of what little hypocritical decency which usually is the makeup of the rogue brand. We refer to many scientific conferences (sic), that look much more at trade fairs and conferences in that village saga: not that we lack, wandering around the premises of these coach's scientific intelligentsia, not be wrapped by ACRI smoke or roast pork sautéed sweet aroma of melted cotton candy, and harangue the loose tongue praises the virtues of the last non-stick pan or a futuristic Potato peeler. This is not some new things. Already in the early fifties a university professor, a friend of Professor Luigi Di Bella, referring to the environment observed in a conference, he wrote indignantly "... Pharmaceutical companies are pressing to put their stalls. "
But, stands apart, thousands of doctors and academics poppies, once saved conveniences with fleeting appearances in conference centers, day bask in the sun scientificissime tropical beaches, devoting himself with ecstatic evening tasting of fresh oysters and pink lobster washed down with vintage French champagne, then to restore the exhausted jaws resting, alone or with companions Congress, beautiful suites in the hotel five-star, big heart and total amount spent by the even more capable pharmaceutical industry portfolios. This is current practice, not forcibly episodic generalized. Do you have any questions or doubts? Dirimiamoli entrusting us with one of the many episodes suffrage, taken at random.
Miami Beach, 2004: held a training conference of dermatology. Participants can enjoy the ocean view from the windows of a luxury hotel overlooking the South Beach. The leaflets handed to conference-wetting states
"To begin with, you will have the opportunity to photograph you with many exotic parrots. During the reception, an illusionist will run through the crowd, surprising the guests with his amazing tricks, while a group of acrobats will leave you breathless with an absolutely amazing show! You can serve a rich buffet with local food and cocktails, served on the notes of a typical beach and orchestra of his songs. Of course, the dance floor is available. "
would fill more books pages examples and daunting - mind you - no leaks or evidence derived from simple sporadic, but absolute rank documents. During the proceedings of a special commission to the U.S. Senate were verbalized shameful episodes and generalized. just those made by the operator of American Home Products, a large pharmaceutical company in New Jersey, who had recently received approval of its product, Inderal LA, photocopied version of a drug developed decades ago. doctors who prescribe the Inderal to fifty patients, to complete a modulate provided to them by American HP and immediately obtain a free flight of American Airlines to any city in the country. La Roche, not to be outdone, offered $ 1,200 to doctors who prescribed the Rocephin at least 20 patients, while Sandoz was sending $ 100 checks to accept just any doctor reading an article a couple of pages where you magnify the results its own drug for the treatment of psoriasis (turns out ineffective and extremely toxic).
relationships with TV broadcasters and the press are described in the minutes of a special committee, first chaired by Senator Kennedy. For the dribble but platonic controls the FDA, drug companies provided to television footage to promote their products, cleverly presented as they had been made by journalists of the broadcasters. Let the floor to the Petersen: "In the clips of the movies appeared often polished medical-talking, grateful patients and developed a complex computer graphics. The scripts distributed along with the movies contained suggestions for journalists to study on how to present the news, what questions to ask and how to conclude the service to make it appear as a true fact. "
add that we Italians - now reduced to mime / imitation of foreign customs - we are going to adopt this style of advertising, which is infecting other categories of producers. They begin to appear yoghurt which decrease by 43% (not 40% or 45 %...) constipation, or mouthwashes that in one month fell by 31% (much more incisivo di un prosaico 30%) la carie, e così via. Hanno imparato come far cantare la stonata sirena delle statistiche che, per cifre spezzate, appaiono molto più scientifiche, frutto di meticolosissime indagini: più o meno sulla falsariga di quelle delle virtuali guarigioni dal cancro.
Non siamo giunti comunque al vero cuore del problema. Fin qui abbiamo passato in rassegna esempi di malcostume, scorrettezza, assenza di etica professionale: che ci sono stati, ci sono e ci saranno sempre. La gravità inaudita, eversiva, riguarda questa Grande Piovra che allunga i suoi viscidi tentacoli dovunque, obnubila con la nuvola nera del suo secreto, avvelena, corrompe, dissolve ogni argine eretto a difesa della salute e of civilization. not manic exaggeration, but clear and concrete evidence these lines originate.
Marcia Angell, "A recent survey found that about two-thirds of academic medical centers with substantial holdings in companies that sponsor research within the same institution. A field investigation of the Medical College has found that two thirds of the professors had their duties to pharmaceutical companies and that three-fifths had received from these personal positions. "
M. Petersen: "The tragedy lies not in drugs, but in marketing and unprecedented power these companies currently hold on medical practice."
R. Moynihan: "Pharmaceutical companies have generously funded ... hospitals, university medical schools, medical associations, government agencies and virtually any organization they wish to side."
And this is not enough: "Given that drug companies claim as a condition for grant funding, to be widely involved in all aspects of the research they sponsor, it is easy for them to introduce forgeries intended to bring up their medicines better and safer than they are. Before 1980 was given to university researchers a total autonomy in the conduct of the work, but now the drug companies employ often their employees and their agents in the design studies, test, write the work, and decide whether and in what form to publish the results . Sometimes researchers procure medical schools are little more than unskilled workers, so the enrollment of patients and collection of data follows the guidelines of the company. In view of such a control and conflicts of interest that permeate the research, it is no wonder that the negative results of studies sponsored by pharmaceutical companies (and published in scientific journals for their own benefit), are not much Part disclosed, while the publication of positive studies is re in other jobs as soon as varied in form, or which are presented as positive and negative . For example, control over 74 clinical studies with antidepressants, has revealed that 37 out of 38 positive results have been published, but 36 of the 37 negative or have been hidden or published by pretending to be positive. It is not uncommon for a paper published secondary focus attention on the effect seems more favorable. "
The dramatic summary of the situation can be traced in his opening speech held by Dr. Erling Refsum, a member of Nomura International, in which he said inter alia: "The major pharmaceutical companies are based now finance. What they do has nothing to do with research, but revolves around the calculation of earnings per share and to satisfy the expectations of shareholders. Discovering new drugs is not interested in these companies, because for them what they are really selling is not the slightest importance. The important thing is to earn ' (Life Sciences, University of Michigan, February 8, 2002. The video of the speech is available on www.zli.bus.umich.edu / events_programs / featured_event.asp). Even more explicit
the lapidary verdict issued during an interview in 2003 by Alex Hittle, an analyst at AG Edwards' Runs a joke that you risk two possible disasters, when making clinical trials. The first is to kill people, the second heal " (International Herald Tribune, March 1, 2003). Here
presented the much-advertised and dogmatized EBM (Evidence-Based Medicine). The obvious and indisputable conclusions of this exasperated and exasperating colonization will draw in the closing of this writing, dejected wax that seals a comprehensive review ever carried out by the media, especially our own, without beating about the bush, distractions and deficiencies code of silence.
Conclusion: Because the price of the drug costs only marginally affect the living, in so far as marketing and penetration prevalent in every social and institutional fabric, we taxpayers are forced to pay the forced subsidization of corruption!
How Petersen observes, "While patients are left with empty pockets, drug manufacturers swimming in gold."
2. Inventing disease
"Even the dogs barking when Prozac is administered to the moon too." As the prologue does not seem bad. But, aside from drugs, we can see that there is a function of the body or body part on which it has generously dispensed the imagination of rapacious traders pills. Fantasia, in fact, carrying pouch and a bit 'musty, as the Italians, less naive and more critical of Americans, we tend - if we are good - to smile, the laughter with some seasoning toscaneggiante salacious jokes. The trouble is that when you charge any health problems, it is overvalued or undervalued, the critical (and the humor) of any person not tarnish and makes all of these potential prey hawks that glide over us, slow and patient - you know - ready to focus on the first sign of discomfort, the first face that twists his mouth and dived on our health and our wallets.
Since the absurdity (and sometimes ridiculous) of certain neo-diagnosis is difficult to disguise, we resort to a ploy to secure grip, effective when certain classifications are grandiose misfires: acronyms. Papal Pope, here is the review of Petersen : "To invent new diseases or exaggerating the existing businesses through high-sounding names Jam them acronyms" . But if these are taken dall'ammericano ... even better. Sa arcane, knows that important, you know real ... If a person listens to a simple art critic (more merciful veil) a crust magnify scarred by signs inconclusive - one of those solemn rubbish at a price that disfigure the walls of houses and contemporary art galleries (and one chimpanzee succeed in probably better to paint, ... sorry ... not worse than the divine) - between a buzzword and one will be convinced of some kind of cryptic hidden values \u200b\u200bin the rectangle of canvas brutalized. You must admit that similar nonsense recited by some hieratic character from immaculate white coat and just stretched, slick and well combed by skilled makeup artists, who shot a series of casual neopatologie with impeccable pronunciation, is likely to grip the public more gullible, almost frightened even the impulse to ask "What is' this stuff?".
So let us be serious and start the carousel.
In 2003, Vince Parry, an expert on pharmaceutical brands, wrote in a scientific journal that the ability to create new disease had touched "... levels of sophistication not seen before." is not a question of a new design, but only aggravation of the trends in the early days of industrialism pharmaceuticals.
- Bad breath. Alias: bad breath erected condition. We are in the early twenties, when the pharmaceutical giant Warner-Lambert this is designed to increase sales of its own medicine, obviously ineffective in solving a problem that, once cured dental hygiene, or refusing to scramble your liver, perhaps disappear: the Listerine. Result: The Warner manages to sell a quantity of Listerine 40 times the ante halitosis! It was also created a slogan, a symbol of time, which apparently took hold, particularly on American women: "Message for 5 million women in search of her husband as your breath today?". A simple example, but valid to complete, even historically, this review. But now we continue with current events.
- GERD. Want to know what the hell is this? E 'stands for gastroesophageal reflux syndrome. That way, an important thing. Removed the trappings comes down to heartburn. But to say they are suffering from gastro-esophageal reflux syndrome is another thing I plebeian heartburn. And wow, there di mezzo l’autorevolezza del malato! Ed il problema, che un coscienzioso medico di famiglia risolverebbe con un opportuno regime dietetico e un po’ di bicarbonato, si trasforma in un caso da indagare con carrettate di analisi, -s copìe varie, indagini di ogni genere . Inutili, quando non potenzialmente dannose, e costose: per le casse dello Stato, la collettività ed il paziente dal ruttino allo zolfo. Ma remunerative per altri.
Autori ben più autorevoli di noi la pensano alla stessa maniera: «... pillole, iniezioni o interventi chirurgici possono anche provocare più danni della malattia stessa. Persino gli esami… con aghi, endoscopie, TAC e radiazioni possono danneggiare la salute». E’ always considered the frequency with which they occur, in particular, colonoscopies, sigmoidoscope, gastroscopy, moreover, with unmotivated, frequent (and dangerous) biopsies? But the symptomatology and physical examination, where are they? For decency, avoid revealing.
We now return to the genesis of GERD. Acronym that is due to an accountant. Needless to goggle it is so. Paul Girolami, Glaxo had entered and had made a career as an accountant, becoming director in 1980 . At the exit of Zantac, well known and popular anti-ulcer product, Girolami considered that the Americans are keen consumers of pizza (their pizza ... of course), chips fries, hot dogs, fried chicken, and other assorted junk food-splitting stomach, thus transforming the heartburn and acidity of the stomach in an acute or chronic and present as a drug specifically designed to treat Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease could fill d 'gold Glaxo. A statistical research, commissioned the Gallup company, revealed that 44% of the U.S. population each month accused heartburn: without wasting time was launched an advertising campaign titled "Heartburn across America"! Girolami did not like doing things halfway, so Glaxo hired because the actress Nancy Walker says that after untold hardships caused by his acid reflux had resolved the problem with Zantac . Glaxo executives also did more: they created The Institute for Digestive Health, in order to encapsulate the spawning trade under the guise of an institution presented as an authoritative and independent scientific and academic institution. At the edge of this offensive, supported by resources that evoke the Guadalcanal campaign, a scion of the Gerd. One academics paid by Glaxo, Donald O. Castell, chief of gastroenterology, told the New York Times in 1989 that the pharmaceutical company had given $ 15,000 to conduct a study: it is worth deepening. The study was to recruit a dozen runners, to eat their cornflakes, milk, una banana e succo d’arancia, seguìti da una compressa di Zantac, e mandarli a correre. Ebbene, il farmaco somministrato preventivamente scongiurava il... riflusso del corridore, neopatologia marcata anch’essa Glaxo. La sensazionale notizia venne diffusa in tutto il mondo grazie ad un’agenzia ingaggiata allo scopo, la Ketchum Communications.
Glaxo divenne la più grossa casa farmaceutica britannica, la regina Elisabetta nominò baronetto Girolami, e la stessa Glaxo, grata e commossa, commissionò una statua in bronzo (tutta in bronzo, non solo il viso) ad uno scultore di fama: l’effigie di Sir Paul Girolami troneggia oggi nel quartier generale della società. Sic transit gloria mundi.
- DE. A two-letter acronym is especially incisive . Come on development: Erectile Dysfunction! A physiological problem for men of a certain age, pathological when it occurs early. The causes - you know - may be many and, as we should always do this before venturing to prescribe any medication, should clear them with precision, but not limited to the embarrassing symptoms. But usually we are content with a few quick description, made with downcast eyes, to diagnose ED and, following carefully the guidelines, prescribing block-buster (blockbuster) to that Member. We will look further than this category of products and their retroterra economico.
- PMMD. Qui voliamo verso l’empireo : siamo di fronte alla sindrome premestruale. Che cos’è? Tutte le donne (ed i loro partner), sanno bene come i disturbi che precedono ed accompagnano il flusso mestruale, dal menarca alla menopausa, siano antipatici, alterino l’umore ed incrementino l’irritabilità. E’ un fenomeno fisiologico, prima ancora che psicologico, le cui cause sono state individuate da tempo e dovrebbero essere conosciute da qualsiasi studente di medicina. Ma la fisiologia è nemica del profitto delle vendite: tale considerazione ha portato (anche) a coniare il PMMD.
Già negli anni sessanta si era iniziato a parlare di SPM (Premenstrual syndrome), wanting to bring together a number of psychological and physical symptoms (including water retention) shared by many women, not wanting to force the meaning in a disease for which churn out the appropriate medicines. It had appeared to tell the truth, a baroque plotting platitudes (LLPDD: the late luteal phase dysphoric disorder), but, beyond depressing mediocrity of offering a medical terminology a ploy to appear authoritative and well-educated, had not gone.
early 2000, a campaign of what are called informative alerted millions of women against premenstrual dysphoric disorder. The average bite agreed to take the bait or the marketing of Prozac package coquettish, with pink and lavender capsules and the name of art Sarafem: specialties presented as a cure for this new disease. The sole purpose of promoting science ... the marketing department of Ely Lilly also commissioned television commercials to advertising companies experienced in the launch of brands of coffee, household appliances, cars, phones. You want an essay? One such spot takes a woman, in a state of nervousness, trying to leave the shopping cart from the confusion of others. At this point a voiceover: "Do you think it should be simple mood swings due to the cycle? This could be the disturbance premenstrual dysphoric. "
R. Moynihan and A. Cassels dig deeper into the motivations that led to PMMD. The truth is that at the end of '98 was about to expire patent of fluoxetine (Prozac's active ingredient), with the inevitable emergence of cheaper generics. Lilly then organized a roundtable in Washington, also members of the FDA, and went on the offensive evoked.
We Europeans, perhaps because for centuries we have seen all the colors, we are less sensitive to this crap, and sometimes the medical institutions of the Old Continent take it into account. In December 2003, supervisors European injunction against the continuation of the Lilly marketing Prozac for premenstrual disorders, stating that it was a "pathology is not well defined." Semel in Licet sanire years.
- FSD. Female sexual dysfunction (Female Sexual Disfunction). Do not ask us light on the concept of FSD: never precisely defined. This latest scientific breakthrough was not the result of a single pharmaceutical company. Perhaps forcing appeared so large to be recommended for use as a midwife of the buffalo an international conference. As, indeed, had done for the DE seen before. Technique already proven a poll (?) States that 46% of women will suffer. In the Blue Room of the Palais des Congrès in Paris, June 30, 2003, in di un sontuoso Congresso Internazionale sulle disfunzioni sessuali, si accese un dibattito sull’argomento, sponsorizzato dalla Pfitzer con «una borsa di studio senza limitazioni ». Siccome non tutti sono disposti a recitare la parte del giullare ed alcuni congressisti ritenevano che la misura fosse ormai colma, alcuni partecipanti respinsero la sola idea «... che esistesse una malattia con questo nome e stavano conducendo una campagna per smascherare il ruolo che secondo loro le case farmaceutiche avevano nella sua invenzione» (Moyhnian e Cassels, Farmaci che ammalano, pagine 227-228). Singolarità: il moderatore del dibattito e due oratori schierati a difesa dell’esistenza e plausibilità della FSD avevano lavorato come consulenti esterni della Pfitzer. In un successivo congresso a Boston, la precisissima e puntigliosa percentuale del 46% si trasformò in una forbice possibilista «tra il 20 ed il 50%», e fu sancito che la nuova definizione dovesse essere adottata negli ambienti medici e psichiatrici. Casuale... la sponsorizzazione del congresso da parte di 8 case farmaceutiche ed il fatto che 18 dei 19 sostenitori della FSD avessero «legami finanziari o di altro tipo con un totale di 22 società» (opera citata pagina 235). L’anno dopo, altro congresso a Boston, sempre sullo stesso tema. Qui un controllo tanto al braccio (alzata di mano quale risposta alla precisa domanda) rivelò che la metà dei partecipanti was yoked to the pharmaceutical industry.
avoid mentioning the many conferences organized everywhere always hitting the same key, some of them - abandoned the caution sacristan - the same venue pfitzer Foundation, and recruitment of auxiliaries of all types: sociologists, opinion, neon lights , associations of journalists and feminists furious against men and the world.
The market would be (and is in part) by huge palatability: patches to testosterone, estrogen-based drugs (very effective cancerofili factors: potential sources and then, further, the next business cancer) drugs. And of course you can not miss the micro business (micro compared to sales of drugs) dall'onorario consisting of gynecologists, psychologists, psychoanalysts and para-psychological various parasites. Someone concisely summarized in a few words the gist : "The pharmaceutical companies are looking for new diseases, based on extensive analysis of the untapped market opportunities, have recognized today or tomorrow promoted as such. The coming years will assist in the creation of increasingly diseases sponsored by pharmaceutical companies "(New England Journal of Medicine, volume 346, pages 524-526). The call seems wiser to Jean Endicott, interviewed by Ray Moynihan: "Do not be fooled by marketing funded by pharmaceutical companies disguised as science or information." In conclusion: the fact that no business still flourishing, but the concept of FSD did flop.
- The overactive bladder. Many readers will not fail to see how the proliferation of this nonsense is due all'inescusabile complicity of the medical profession, particularly in turn fostered not only by the rustle of banknotes sensual, filled with lush ignorance. The nonsense of the moment is created by pharmaceutical giant Pharmacia and supported by a frantic campaign unscrupulous. Already in 1998 the news alert that there was a new epidemic which affected one American in four, "Mysteriously, the services began to occur in the media a few weeks before they arrive in pharmacies a new drug for this disease, a white tablet called 'Detrol'" (work cited, page 27). The beauty is that five years after the president of Pharmacia, Neil Wolf, speaking at the Pharmaceutical Marketing Global Summit (title says it all), you would have bragged about this swindle, swelling with pride as a turkey. The first slide projected bore the title of "Put the 'Detrol' - create a disease." He stated then: "We wanted people to read something about the Reader's Digest and went to the doctor saying I have this problem. "
From which arises the scrap brain bladder overactivity? The genesis is in the slime, slime dripping from the jaws monetary, as the pharmaceutical industry all seem to suffer from that which characterizes undershot bulldog mastinoidi and dogs. Rebuild the logical path of philosophical-pee-syndrome. Incontinence is a prevalent problem in number and limited in the high end of age. That means fewer potential buyers, which means less sales and profits. A quick estimate leads to the conclusion that incontinence is treated with medications and low-priced fruit just 40 million dollars a year, a figure for deaths from hunger and disqualifying for large pharmaceutical company. Then a light bulb lights, high beam, on the cervix of Wolf. must sell the Detrol to twenty million Americans, convincing them that the natural urge to pee is annoying, unpleasant, unnatural. In a word, is a disease . All those who feel the need to urinate 9-10 times a day are - said Wolf - to engage in definable mapping of the toilet, preventive evacuation. Here, tender, caring mother who comes to free Pharmacia neomalati from slavery to pee.
take advantage of this episode of UM (Uric-marketing: they want to deny the right of coining acronyms we?) to shed light on the strategies embodied in the manual-pharmaceutical compendium. In the Pharmaceutical Marketing Congress in 2002, Eric Pauwels, manager of Bayer, moderated a discussion on marketing strategies prior to launch. Congressmen they agreed that it was essential to "... recruit doctors well in advance of months if not years before the alleged date of approval of the drug " . Pauwels said: "How often, on the eve of the launch of a medicine, we had to find someone who spoke?". It was agreed by all it was not necessary or convenient to use big names, but, rather, was preferable to find a list of doctors' ... available to state that the product was better than X Product Y 'then one would have thought to "build their reputation within the scientific community" and make the novel luminaries.
short, transforming this reality known fable in Horace, do you become city mice are mice. It saves as well, because the servants of the province much lower cost than great servants in livery capitals. No worries though, over time, the first shake it stalls on their loins magnanimous academic: they are alone, but only compromise, which can then set the same speed with which they have arisen. Incidentally, the reader is thus able to understand how people obsessively called into play by newspapers or taken leave from the cameras in agonizing uncertainty.
uncertainty that comes from their appearance and it's all about numbers, yes, the number of years in prison to which it is natural to think they have been convicted. These stars of medical ethics and culture are defined (and we beat another acronym) KOL: Key Opinion Leaders, leaders of scientific thought. Keep in mind: KOL! But let's move on.
Pharmacia easily identify a large group of doctors available, they enlisted and makes them participate in two symposia held in London in 1997 and 1999, even paying for the publication in the journal Urology widespread acts of Congress. The company "... covered most, if not all, of the costs of the workshops in London and paid the doctors that there is presence ... . Others were paid to run clinical trials or write articles for medical journals "(work cited, page 43). The first supplement of Urology December 1997 contains 30 articles, mostly written by the company enrolled. One wonders why a well-known and popular science magazine was open to these deceptions. The sad reality is that few are truly independent independent and (in greater or lesser part), many of those owned by multinational drug companies or their affiliates. Examples of British Medical Journal or the New England Journal of Medicine are unfortunately very limited.
We'll soon be the price they would pay for the unwary consumer of Detrol (not) free from this bondage. Recalling a famous line about the Battleship Potemkin fantozziana, such action would be to define a pis ta ... crazy.
- IBS. IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome). Needless to say, this gem, with which we conclude this review (not exhaustive but only representative), comes from a rough perspective mercantile. E’ chiaro che si tratta di mistificazione. Che non sarebbe mai passata ai tempi della grande medicina: quella di Murri, Albertoni, Lussana, Moscati, Cardarelli, Frugoni, Campanacci. Quando l’ammalato si visitava non soltanto, ma prima di tutto, con dita, occhi, orecchi; i sintomi erano considerati segni di malattie, non malattie ; la mente del medico elaborava, cucendo formule chimiche con nozioni di fisiologia, biologia, biofisica; e la prescrizione nasceva da un profondo processo di logica e di cultura applicata, non dal seguito servile e rinunciatario di linee guida. Chi avesse parlato ad uno qualsiasi dei (veri) luminari citati di IBS, DE, FSD, sarebbe stato preso a calci nel sedere o afferrato by the collar and dragged to the exit.
Again, the usual, tired script. Given that many people suffer from stomach pain, diarrhea or constipation problems, and these symptoms are bound to a new disease. A kind of still life, shrouded in a fog symbolist De Chirico, where you bring along household items, fruits, vegetables and a mannequin with her head bowed. Just find a nice frame, put a couple of signatures in the right corner, and here have a new disease. Disturbing (not unusual) the instrument of the launch of ready-made drugs: an article in Lancet, published in London a few months before the launch of the new Potemkin. Needless to search on ties of the authors of the article and Glaxo: "In medicine a positive article in The Lancet is gold, so this was good news for GSK (GlaxoSmithKline), the manufacturer of the drug" (work cited, page 206 ). The Gold Rush leads to the conclusion that the drug (Lotronex) can be worth billions of dollars, and then have to pull out of the hat plush usual statistics: IBS affects no less than one in five people who, in a nutshell, it means 45 million patients in the United States.
The wonder - we forgive the intrusion - that is, considering the millions of Americans who suffer from acidity, bladder problems, sexual, psicologici, digestivi, motori, eccetera, si arriva alla considerazione che su 300 milioni di abitanti ci sono almeno un miliardo e mezzo di malati. E poi uno non deve credere nei miracoli della scienza!
L'unica quisquilia è che il farmaco provoca, in non pochi casi, costipazione acuta e tenace, nonché la cosiddetta colite ischemica. Le feci si trasformano in sassi appuntiti che perforano le pareti dell’intestino, con conseguenti emorragie e setticemie non di rado letali. Gli incredibili tira-e-molla tra GSK ed alleati cavalieri mascherati, esponenti comprati della FDA, altri fuori mercato, il solito rompiscatole del BMJ (British Medical Journal), comitati di pazienti in realtà Glaxo dummies, we will discuss them later, when we talk dell'opinabilissima U.S. government authority and independence of the institution. The drug is suspended, then reinstated, then again criticized riassolto ...; a long saga, accompanied by remorse of the Lancet, though late, and the entry into the field, in this mayhem accompanied by biting and barking of Novartis with its Zelnorm. To demonstrate how iatrogenic constipation, bowel perforation, bleeding and death that are not considered trifles, the competitor of GSK vows denied the existence of IBS, giving a spot: "abdominal discomfort or pain? Swelling? Constipation? It 's time to talk with your doctor IBS '(advertising Novartis 2002).
E 'hardly necessary to note that this cluster of symptoms can depend on (and dependent) from causes as varied and often very distant. It 'simply outrageous and blinds (some would say criminal severe censor) to put together signs arising from various diseases or disorders and make a temporary illness. This may be an enlarged liver, colitis, overuse of antibiotics, changes in intestinal flora, fermentation of the summer, intestinal viruses, faulty eating habits, lifestyles prejudicial, and so on. Most of the time just put them on a diet, assumere disinfettanti intestinali, fermenti lattici, farmaci per aiutare la decongestione epatica, vitamine. Come al solito, prevale la meccanica ed acefala connessione sintomo-diagnosi, pseudodiagnosi-linea guida, linea guida-farmaci, farmaci-soldi. E la qualità della vita del singolo, già compromessa da alimenti carenti di sali, vitamine o da ritmi di vita errati ed imposti, peggiora, invece di migliorare, con l’assunzione di farmaci impropri e magari dannosi, ma che producono utili diretti ed utili indiretti: questi ultimi quando il malcapitato - come prassi frequente - sarà costretto ad assumere altri farmaci per combattere le malattie provocate da quelli consigliatigli. In un’autogerminazione di irrazionalità e disonestà which sometimes only end with the death of the healthy become sick. And they say that perpetual motion does not exist!
The reader who has patiently followed so far, could, while continuing to read with interest, muttering at the editor's of these lines: "All right, we understand that diseases are invented to make money. But enough examples. What do you do, thorough anthology of invented disease? ". Dear reader, please continue to follow with patience, because the good (ie bad) is yet to come. In the sense that we have not addressed these issues with the spirit of a superficial journalist, who rubs his hands at the thought of wow and wonder, magari caricando i termini e colorando la realtà.
Dietro quanto abbiamo esposto c’è - cosa più importante di ogni altra - la salute e la vita nostra e dei nostri cari, certo; ma c’è il punto chiave, anzi, la chiave stessa che apre un portone sigillato in ogni modo, spalancato il quale si presenta devastante, raccapricciante, evidente il DISASTRO multiforme della nostra epoca. C’è la dimostrazione indiscutibile dell’asservimento dell’uomo a clan spuntati rigogliosi, soprattutto negli ultimi decenni, veri Fleurs du Mal della nostra contemporaneità; c’è la osannata, propagandata e surrettiziamente imposta filosofia che ripete con cadenza ossessiva come slogan i sacri words freedom and democracy to hide the stench of moral decay, but also intellectual, never in human history registratasi . A decomposition that now has no boundaries, you enter the front door, you take away the children, you subtract the opportunity to understand and judge, turning from a man in gear, from individual to serial number, from man to animal programmed pulse .
The authors we have mentioned, and others, though deserving of gratitude and esteem, there does not seem to seize the far more important aspect of this discussion: the base of this malpractice, the reason, the real cause, and therefore possible remedies. Here, in short, there is di mezzo solo la truffa e la menzogna farmaceutica: paradossalmente, sarebbe il meno. Qui si arriva al ganglio vitale di tutta la società, specie occidentale o sotto influenza occidentale, degli ultimi sessant’anni.
L’umanità è realmente oppressa ed espropriata di ogni vera libertà, speriamo non in modo irreversibile, solo quando è convinta di vivere in un’epoca di civiltà e progresso. Il tiranno più oppressivo non è quello che viene identificato come tale, quello che ha una faccia ed un nome e può essere detronizzato: il vero despota non ha volto. Non è uno, né è un direttorio. L’oppressore del nostro tempo si serve di uomini, ma è an acronym. A sort of moloch made by a company, entity organized and do not necessarily identifiable that human creature is transformed into an autonomous entity, as the statue comes to life and property from inanimate start blink, breathe, walk , horrid automaton that can destroy and devour those who have forged to achieve their interests. If there are obscure or raving, dear reader, Sorry about that, but please follow us again. It is a cunning tactic to capture your attention, but only a willingness to share with fellow human beings, as brothers, not one that merits special or personal gifts, but life events have allowed us to see. E we are convinced that, as bitter and shocking, it was a privilege that fate has given us. The important thing in life is not so much serenity, but understand, know, understand and want to know, otherwise it would consume unnecessary extras and their years as chapter registrar, not men.
A short address issues even more disturbing and eloquent: the alienating world of drugs, the drugs block-busters, the exploitation of children, the numbers of the business, the infiltration in the institutions of each country. Before the bell of the Orwellian Big Brother house and come to the lair of the spider webs.
Mentereale
http://www.dibellainsieme.org/home.do
1. But as research!
"Pharmaceutical companies have become able to sell commercial empires ... antidepressants, painkillers ... and drugs anticholesterol ... using the same methods used by Coca Cola to sell or the Dash ... sell drugs rather than discovering them, has become the obsession of the pharmaceutical industry. " This is one of the strongest passages of the introduction of the book of Petersen (pagina14).
clear, resounding, an anomaly that has direct meaning to the intensive publicity so sick? This person is considered to be cured or to attract customers? It seems morally licit a similar policy and parallel indifference of the authorities? And then, given that weigh heavily on price, the cost to the national sales promotion expenses of pharmaceutical companies?
These are questions that we all must begin to ask ourselves, to know that we can give confidence to them, their products, to those who prescribe them. Also need to consider another oddity, namely the dual advertising: that given to doctors and that the citizen. An oppressive siege and the U.S. has reached unimaginable levels, and we are getting ready to become one, as is readily apparent in the recent increase in pharmaceutical advertising on our television screens .....
Between 1995 and 2000 the clerks to marketing in the U.S. pharmaceutical companies had grown by 59%, while those involved in research and development of drugs were reduced by 2%: i promotori avevano così raggiunto le 87.210 unità contro le 48.527 dei tecnici. Nel 2004 il boom: sono stati assunti negli Stati Uniti 101.000 informatori farmaceutici che visitano il medico portando una «pioggia di omaggi e denaro contante» (opera citata, pagina 19). E’ ovvio che dal medico ci si aspetta riconoscenza, sotto forma di prescrizione di farmaci. Questa tendenza si era fatta evidente già dal finire degli anni ‘70, ma, come osservò il dottor Steven N. Wiggins, docente di Economia presso un rinomato ateneo americano, «i ricercatori avevano cominciato a perdere la loro influenza all’interno delle grandi società farmaceutiche già alla late sixties. " Pierre Simon, the first academic researcher, head of research at France's Sanofi then said to medical historian David Healy: "At first, the pharmaceutical industry was in the hands of chemists. Now belongs to people who have a master's degree in Business Administration or something like that, people that may run the same way as Renault, Volvo or any other company. You have to see how much money the pharmaceutical industry spends to conduct research on drug-photocopy, whose effectiveness is sometimes less. Let's talk about using 70-90% of all money spent on research for purposes that go beyond innovation. E 'a terrible waste of money. "
But back to the fig leaf of research costs. These are very content - assuming for a moment that you really intend to do scientific research - and lower living costs that include costs of purchasing raw materials, cost of production and packaging, rarely exceed 10% of the total. At this point it is appropriate to elaborate on the nature of marketing and promotional activity. Let's start with ... trifles. The exponents of Tap Pharmaceutical Products - this is just a prime example of widespread systematic costumes - were free of televisions, VCRs, and tickets to Broadway shows to doctors who prescribed their own proprietary . If a doctor was to transfer his own studio, here come with lightning timeliness of the company representatives with a check round, if he wanted to increase their revenue, not to miss the loving offer of free advice, provided by experts who routinely also asked for fees of 25,000 dollars.
tolerance of practices of questionable propriety and legality has also led to a lack of what little hypocritical decency which usually is the makeup of the rogue brand. We refer to many scientific conferences (sic), that look much more at trade fairs and conferences in that village saga: not that we lack, wandering around the premises of these coach's scientific intelligentsia, not be wrapped by ACRI smoke or roast pork sautéed sweet aroma of melted cotton candy, and harangue the loose tongue praises the virtues of the last non-stick pan or a futuristic Potato peeler. This is not some new things. Already in the early fifties a university professor, a friend of Professor Luigi Di Bella, referring to the environment observed in a conference, he wrote indignantly "... Pharmaceutical companies are pressing to put their stalls. "
But, stands apart, thousands of doctors and academics poppies, once saved conveniences with fleeting appearances in conference centers, day bask in the sun scientificissime tropical beaches, devoting himself with ecstatic evening tasting of fresh oysters and pink lobster washed down with vintage French champagne, then to restore the exhausted jaws resting, alone or with companions Congress, beautiful suites in the hotel five-star, big heart and total amount spent by the even more capable pharmaceutical industry portfolios. This is current practice, not forcibly episodic generalized. Do you have any questions or doubts? Dirimiamoli entrusting us with one of the many episodes suffrage, taken at random.
Miami Beach, 2004: held a training conference of dermatology. Participants can enjoy the ocean view from the windows of a luxury hotel overlooking the South Beach. The leaflets handed to conference-wetting states
"To begin with, you will have the opportunity to photograph you with many exotic parrots. During the reception, an illusionist will run through the crowd, surprising the guests with his amazing tricks, while a group of acrobats will leave you breathless with an absolutely amazing show! You can serve a rich buffet with local food and cocktails, served on the notes of a typical beach and orchestra of his songs. Of course, the dance floor is available. "
would fill more books pages examples and daunting - mind you - no leaks or evidence derived from simple sporadic, but absolute rank documents. During the proceedings of a special commission to the U.S. Senate were verbalized shameful episodes and generalized. just those made by the operator of American Home Products, a large pharmaceutical company in New Jersey, who had recently received approval of its product, Inderal LA, photocopied version of a drug developed decades ago. doctors who prescribe the Inderal to fifty patients, to complete a modulate provided to them by American HP and immediately obtain a free flight of American Airlines to any city in the country. La Roche, not to be outdone, offered $ 1,200 to doctors who prescribed the Rocephin at least 20 patients, while Sandoz was sending $ 100 checks to accept just any doctor reading an article a couple of pages where you magnify the results its own drug for the treatment of psoriasis (turns out ineffective and extremely toxic).
relationships with TV broadcasters and the press are described in the minutes of a special committee, first chaired by Senator Kennedy. For the dribble but platonic controls the FDA, drug companies provided to television footage to promote their products, cleverly presented as they had been made by journalists of the broadcasters. Let the floor to the Petersen: "In the clips of the movies appeared often polished medical-talking, grateful patients and developed a complex computer graphics. The scripts distributed along with the movies contained suggestions for journalists to study on how to present the news, what questions to ask and how to conclude the service to make it appear as a true fact. "
add that we Italians - now reduced to mime / imitation of foreign customs - we are going to adopt this style of advertising, which is infecting other categories of producers. They begin to appear yoghurt which decrease by 43% (not 40% or 45 %...) constipation, or mouthwashes that in one month fell by 31% (much more incisivo di un prosaico 30%) la carie, e così via. Hanno imparato come far cantare la stonata sirena delle statistiche che, per cifre spezzate, appaiono molto più scientifiche, frutto di meticolosissime indagini: più o meno sulla falsariga di quelle delle virtuali guarigioni dal cancro.
Non siamo giunti comunque al vero cuore del problema. Fin qui abbiamo passato in rassegna esempi di malcostume, scorrettezza, assenza di etica professionale: che ci sono stati, ci sono e ci saranno sempre. La gravità inaudita, eversiva, riguarda questa Grande Piovra che allunga i suoi viscidi tentacoli dovunque, obnubila con la nuvola nera del suo secreto, avvelena, corrompe, dissolve ogni argine eretto a difesa della salute e of civilization. not manic exaggeration, but clear and concrete evidence these lines originate.
Marcia Angell, "A recent survey found that about two-thirds of academic medical centers with substantial holdings in companies that sponsor research within the same institution. A field investigation of the Medical College has found that two thirds of the professors had their duties to pharmaceutical companies and that three-fifths had received from these personal positions. "
M. Petersen: "The tragedy lies not in drugs, but in marketing and unprecedented power these companies currently hold on medical practice."
R. Moynihan: "Pharmaceutical companies have generously funded ... hospitals, university medical schools, medical associations, government agencies and virtually any organization they wish to side."
And this is not enough: "Given that drug companies claim as a condition for grant funding, to be widely involved in all aspects of the research they sponsor, it is easy for them to introduce forgeries intended to bring up their medicines better and safer than they are. Before 1980 was given to university researchers a total autonomy in the conduct of the work, but now the drug companies employ often their employees and their agents in the design studies, test, write the work, and decide whether and in what form to publish the results . Sometimes researchers procure medical schools are little more than unskilled workers, so the enrollment of patients and collection of data follows the guidelines of the company. In view of such a control and conflicts of interest that permeate the research, it is no wonder that the negative results of studies sponsored by pharmaceutical companies (and published in scientific journals for their own benefit), are not much Part disclosed, while the publication of positive studies is re in other jobs as soon as varied in form, or which are presented as positive and negative . For example, control over 74 clinical studies with antidepressants, has revealed that 37 out of 38 positive results have been published, but 36 of the 37 negative or have been hidden or published by pretending to be positive. It is not uncommon for a paper published secondary focus attention on the effect seems more favorable. "
The dramatic summary of the situation can be traced in his opening speech held by Dr. Erling Refsum, a member of Nomura International, in which he said inter alia: "The major pharmaceutical companies are based now finance. What they do has nothing to do with research, but revolves around the calculation of earnings per share and to satisfy the expectations of shareholders. Discovering new drugs is not interested in these companies, because for them what they are really selling is not the slightest importance. The important thing is to earn ' (Life Sciences, University of Michigan, February 8, 2002. The video of the speech is available on www.zli.bus.umich.edu / events_programs / featured_event.asp). Even more explicit
the lapidary verdict issued during an interview in 2003 by Alex Hittle, an analyst at AG Edwards' Runs a joke that you risk two possible disasters, when making clinical trials. The first is to kill people, the second heal " (International Herald Tribune, March 1, 2003). Here
presented the much-advertised and dogmatized EBM (Evidence-Based Medicine). The obvious and indisputable conclusions of this exasperated and exasperating colonization will draw in the closing of this writing, dejected wax that seals a comprehensive review ever carried out by the media, especially our own, without beating about the bush, distractions and deficiencies code of silence.
Conclusion: Because the price of the drug costs only marginally affect the living, in so far as marketing and penetration prevalent in every social and institutional fabric, we taxpayers are forced to pay the forced subsidization of corruption!
How Petersen observes, "While patients are left with empty pockets, drug manufacturers swimming in gold."
2. Inventing disease
"Even the dogs barking when Prozac is administered to the moon too." As the prologue does not seem bad. But, aside from drugs, we can see that there is a function of the body or body part on which it has generously dispensed the imagination of rapacious traders pills. Fantasia, in fact, carrying pouch and a bit 'musty, as the Italians, less naive and more critical of Americans, we tend - if we are good - to smile, the laughter with some seasoning toscaneggiante salacious jokes. The trouble is that when you charge any health problems, it is overvalued or undervalued, the critical (and the humor) of any person not tarnish and makes all of these potential prey hawks that glide over us, slow and patient - you know - ready to focus on the first sign of discomfort, the first face that twists his mouth and dived on our health and our wallets.
Since the absurdity (and sometimes ridiculous) of certain neo-diagnosis is difficult to disguise, we resort to a ploy to secure grip, effective when certain classifications are grandiose misfires: acronyms. Papal Pope, here is the review of Petersen : "To invent new diseases or exaggerating the existing businesses through high-sounding names Jam them acronyms" . But if these are taken dall'ammericano ... even better. Sa arcane, knows that important, you know real ... If a person listens to a simple art critic (more merciful veil) a crust magnify scarred by signs inconclusive - one of those solemn rubbish at a price that disfigure the walls of houses and contemporary art galleries (and one chimpanzee succeed in probably better to paint, ... sorry ... not worse than the divine) - between a buzzword and one will be convinced of some kind of cryptic hidden values \u200b\u200bin the rectangle of canvas brutalized. You must admit that similar nonsense recited by some hieratic character from immaculate white coat and just stretched, slick and well combed by skilled makeup artists, who shot a series of casual neopatologie with impeccable pronunciation, is likely to grip the public more gullible, almost frightened even the impulse to ask "What is' this stuff?".
So let us be serious and start the carousel.
In 2003, Vince Parry, an expert on pharmaceutical brands, wrote in a scientific journal that the ability to create new disease had touched "... levels of sophistication not seen before." is not a question of a new design, but only aggravation of the trends in the early days of industrialism pharmaceuticals.
- Bad breath. Alias: bad breath erected condition. We are in the early twenties, when the pharmaceutical giant Warner-Lambert this is designed to increase sales of its own medicine, obviously ineffective in solving a problem that, once cured dental hygiene, or refusing to scramble your liver, perhaps disappear: the Listerine. Result: The Warner manages to sell a quantity of Listerine 40 times the ante halitosis! It was also created a slogan, a symbol of time, which apparently took hold, particularly on American women: "Message for 5 million women in search of her husband as your breath today?". A simple example, but valid to complete, even historically, this review. But now we continue with current events.
- GERD. Want to know what the hell is this? E 'stands for gastroesophageal reflux syndrome. That way, an important thing. Removed the trappings comes down to heartburn. But to say they are suffering from gastro-esophageal reflux syndrome is another thing I plebeian heartburn. And wow, there di mezzo l’autorevolezza del malato! Ed il problema, che un coscienzioso medico di famiglia risolverebbe con un opportuno regime dietetico e un po’ di bicarbonato, si trasforma in un caso da indagare con carrettate di analisi, -s copìe varie, indagini di ogni genere . Inutili, quando non potenzialmente dannose, e costose: per le casse dello Stato, la collettività ed il paziente dal ruttino allo zolfo. Ma remunerative per altri.
Autori ben più autorevoli di noi la pensano alla stessa maniera: «... pillole, iniezioni o interventi chirurgici possono anche provocare più danni della malattia stessa. Persino gli esami… con aghi, endoscopie, TAC e radiazioni possono danneggiare la salute». E’ always considered the frequency with which they occur, in particular, colonoscopies, sigmoidoscope, gastroscopy, moreover, with unmotivated, frequent (and dangerous) biopsies? But the symptomatology and physical examination, where are they? For decency, avoid revealing.
We now return to the genesis of GERD. Acronym that is due to an accountant. Needless to goggle it is so. Paul Girolami, Glaxo had entered and had made a career as an accountant, becoming director in 1980 . At the exit of Zantac, well known and popular anti-ulcer product, Girolami considered that the Americans are keen consumers of pizza (their pizza ... of course), chips fries, hot dogs, fried chicken, and other assorted junk food-splitting stomach, thus transforming the heartburn and acidity of the stomach in an acute or chronic and present as a drug specifically designed to treat Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease could fill d 'gold Glaxo. A statistical research, commissioned the Gallup company, revealed that 44% of the U.S. population each month accused heartburn: without wasting time was launched an advertising campaign titled "Heartburn across America"! Girolami did not like doing things halfway, so Glaxo hired because the actress Nancy Walker says that after untold hardships caused by his acid reflux had resolved the problem with Zantac . Glaxo executives also did more: they created The Institute for Digestive Health, in order to encapsulate the spawning trade under the guise of an institution presented as an authoritative and independent scientific and academic institution. At the edge of this offensive, supported by resources that evoke the Guadalcanal campaign, a scion of the Gerd. One academics paid by Glaxo, Donald O. Castell, chief of gastroenterology, told the New York Times in 1989 that the pharmaceutical company had given $ 15,000 to conduct a study: it is worth deepening. The study was to recruit a dozen runners, to eat their cornflakes, milk, una banana e succo d’arancia, seguìti da una compressa di Zantac, e mandarli a correre. Ebbene, il farmaco somministrato preventivamente scongiurava il... riflusso del corridore, neopatologia marcata anch’essa Glaxo. La sensazionale notizia venne diffusa in tutto il mondo grazie ad un’agenzia ingaggiata allo scopo, la Ketchum Communications.
Glaxo divenne la più grossa casa farmaceutica britannica, la regina Elisabetta nominò baronetto Girolami, e la stessa Glaxo, grata e commossa, commissionò una statua in bronzo (tutta in bronzo, non solo il viso) ad uno scultore di fama: l’effigie di Sir Paul Girolami troneggia oggi nel quartier generale della società. Sic transit gloria mundi.
- DE. A two-letter acronym is especially incisive . Come on development: Erectile Dysfunction! A physiological problem for men of a certain age, pathological when it occurs early. The causes - you know - may be many and, as we should always do this before venturing to prescribe any medication, should clear them with precision, but not limited to the embarrassing symptoms. But usually we are content with a few quick description, made with downcast eyes, to diagnose ED and, following carefully the guidelines, prescribing block-buster (blockbuster) to that Member. We will look further than this category of products and their retroterra economico.
- PMMD. Qui voliamo verso l’empireo : siamo di fronte alla sindrome premestruale. Che cos’è? Tutte le donne (ed i loro partner), sanno bene come i disturbi che precedono ed accompagnano il flusso mestruale, dal menarca alla menopausa, siano antipatici, alterino l’umore ed incrementino l’irritabilità. E’ un fenomeno fisiologico, prima ancora che psicologico, le cui cause sono state individuate da tempo e dovrebbero essere conosciute da qualsiasi studente di medicina. Ma la fisiologia è nemica del profitto delle vendite: tale considerazione ha portato (anche) a coniare il PMMD.
Già negli anni sessanta si era iniziato a parlare di SPM (Premenstrual syndrome), wanting to bring together a number of psychological and physical symptoms (including water retention) shared by many women, not wanting to force the meaning in a disease for which churn out the appropriate medicines. It had appeared to tell the truth, a baroque plotting platitudes (LLPDD: the late luteal phase dysphoric disorder), but, beyond depressing mediocrity of offering a medical terminology a ploy to appear authoritative and well-educated, had not gone.
early 2000, a campaign of what are called informative alerted millions of women against premenstrual dysphoric disorder. The average bite agreed to take the bait or the marketing of Prozac package coquettish, with pink and lavender capsules and the name of art Sarafem: specialties presented as a cure for this new disease. The sole purpose of promoting science ... the marketing department of Ely Lilly also commissioned television commercials to advertising companies experienced in the launch of brands of coffee, household appliances, cars, phones. You want an essay? One such spot takes a woman, in a state of nervousness, trying to leave the shopping cart from the confusion of others. At this point a voiceover: "Do you think it should be simple mood swings due to the cycle? This could be the disturbance premenstrual dysphoric. "
R. Moynihan and A. Cassels dig deeper into the motivations that led to PMMD. The truth is that at the end of '98 was about to expire patent of fluoxetine (Prozac's active ingredient), with the inevitable emergence of cheaper generics. Lilly then organized a roundtable in Washington, also members of the FDA, and went on the offensive evoked.
We Europeans, perhaps because for centuries we have seen all the colors, we are less sensitive to this crap, and sometimes the medical institutions of the Old Continent take it into account. In December 2003, supervisors European injunction against the continuation of the Lilly marketing Prozac for premenstrual disorders, stating that it was a "pathology is not well defined." Semel in Licet sanire years.
- FSD. Female sexual dysfunction (Female Sexual Disfunction). Do not ask us light on the concept of FSD: never precisely defined. This latest scientific breakthrough was not the result of a single pharmaceutical company. Perhaps forcing appeared so large to be recommended for use as a midwife of the buffalo an international conference. As, indeed, had done for the DE seen before. Technique already proven a poll (?) States that 46% of women will suffer. In the Blue Room of the Palais des Congrès in Paris, June 30, 2003, in di un sontuoso Congresso Internazionale sulle disfunzioni sessuali, si accese un dibattito sull’argomento, sponsorizzato dalla Pfitzer con «una borsa di studio senza limitazioni ». Siccome non tutti sono disposti a recitare la parte del giullare ed alcuni congressisti ritenevano che la misura fosse ormai colma, alcuni partecipanti respinsero la sola idea «... che esistesse una malattia con questo nome e stavano conducendo una campagna per smascherare il ruolo che secondo loro le case farmaceutiche avevano nella sua invenzione» (Moyhnian e Cassels, Farmaci che ammalano, pagine 227-228). Singolarità: il moderatore del dibattito e due oratori schierati a difesa dell’esistenza e plausibilità della FSD avevano lavorato come consulenti esterni della Pfitzer. In un successivo congresso a Boston, la precisissima e puntigliosa percentuale del 46% si trasformò in una forbice possibilista «tra il 20 ed il 50%», e fu sancito che la nuova definizione dovesse essere adottata negli ambienti medici e psichiatrici. Casuale... la sponsorizzazione del congresso da parte di 8 case farmaceutiche ed il fatto che 18 dei 19 sostenitori della FSD avessero «legami finanziari o di altro tipo con un totale di 22 società» (opera citata pagina 235). L’anno dopo, altro congresso a Boston, sempre sullo stesso tema. Qui un controllo tanto al braccio (alzata di mano quale risposta alla precisa domanda) rivelò che la metà dei partecipanti was yoked to the pharmaceutical industry.
avoid mentioning the many conferences organized everywhere always hitting the same key, some of them - abandoned the caution sacristan - the same venue pfitzer Foundation, and recruitment of auxiliaries of all types: sociologists, opinion, neon lights , associations of journalists and feminists furious against men and the world.
The market would be (and is in part) by huge palatability: patches to testosterone, estrogen-based drugs (very effective cancerofili factors: potential sources and then, further, the next business cancer) drugs. And of course you can not miss the micro business (micro compared to sales of drugs) dall'onorario consisting of gynecologists, psychologists, psychoanalysts and para-psychological various parasites. Someone concisely summarized in a few words the gist : "The pharmaceutical companies are looking for new diseases, based on extensive analysis of the untapped market opportunities, have recognized today or tomorrow promoted as such. The coming years will assist in the creation of increasingly diseases sponsored by pharmaceutical companies "(New England Journal of Medicine, volume 346, pages 524-526). The call seems wiser to Jean Endicott, interviewed by Ray Moynihan: "Do not be fooled by marketing funded by pharmaceutical companies disguised as science or information." In conclusion: the fact that no business still flourishing, but the concept of FSD did flop.
- The overactive bladder. Many readers will not fail to see how the proliferation of this nonsense is due all'inescusabile complicity of the medical profession, particularly in turn fostered not only by the rustle of banknotes sensual, filled with lush ignorance. The nonsense of the moment is created by pharmaceutical giant Pharmacia and supported by a frantic campaign unscrupulous. Already in 1998 the news alert that there was a new epidemic which affected one American in four, "Mysteriously, the services began to occur in the media a few weeks before they arrive in pharmacies a new drug for this disease, a white tablet called 'Detrol'" (work cited, page 27). The beauty is that five years after the president of Pharmacia, Neil Wolf, speaking at the Pharmaceutical Marketing Global Summit (title says it all), you would have bragged about this swindle, swelling with pride as a turkey. The first slide projected bore the title of "Put the 'Detrol' - create a disease." He stated then: "We wanted people to read something about the Reader's Digest and went to the doctor saying I have this problem. "
From which arises the scrap brain bladder overactivity? The genesis is in the slime, slime dripping from the jaws monetary, as the pharmaceutical industry all seem to suffer from that which characterizes undershot bulldog mastinoidi and dogs. Rebuild the logical path of philosophical-pee-syndrome. Incontinence is a prevalent problem in number and limited in the high end of age. That means fewer potential buyers, which means less sales and profits. A quick estimate leads to the conclusion that incontinence is treated with medications and low-priced fruit just 40 million dollars a year, a figure for deaths from hunger and disqualifying for large pharmaceutical company. Then a light bulb lights, high beam, on the cervix of Wolf. must sell the Detrol to twenty million Americans, convincing them that the natural urge to pee is annoying, unpleasant, unnatural. In a word, is a disease . All those who feel the need to urinate 9-10 times a day are - said Wolf - to engage in definable mapping of the toilet, preventive evacuation. Here, tender, caring mother who comes to free Pharmacia neomalati from slavery to pee.
take advantage of this episode of UM (Uric-marketing: they want to deny the right of coining acronyms we?) to shed light on the strategies embodied in the manual-pharmaceutical compendium. In the Pharmaceutical Marketing Congress in 2002, Eric Pauwels, manager of Bayer, moderated a discussion on marketing strategies prior to launch. Congressmen they agreed that it was essential to "... recruit doctors well in advance of months if not years before the alleged date of approval of the drug " . Pauwels said: "How often, on the eve of the launch of a medicine, we had to find someone who spoke?". It was agreed by all it was not necessary or convenient to use big names, but, rather, was preferable to find a list of doctors' ... available to state that the product was better than X Product Y 'then one would have thought to "build their reputation within the scientific community" and make the novel luminaries.
short, transforming this reality known fable in Horace, do you become city mice are mice. It saves as well, because the servants of the province much lower cost than great servants in livery capitals. No worries though, over time, the first shake it stalls on their loins magnanimous academic: they are alone, but only compromise, which can then set the same speed with which they have arisen. Incidentally, the reader is thus able to understand how people obsessively called into play by newspapers or taken leave from the cameras in agonizing uncertainty.
uncertainty that comes from their appearance and it's all about numbers, yes, the number of years in prison to which it is natural to think they have been convicted. These stars of medical ethics and culture are defined (and we beat another acronym) KOL: Key Opinion Leaders, leaders of scientific thought. Keep in mind: KOL! But let's move on.
Pharmacia easily identify a large group of doctors available, they enlisted and makes them participate in two symposia held in London in 1997 and 1999, even paying for the publication in the journal Urology widespread acts of Congress. The company "... covered most, if not all, of the costs of the workshops in London and paid the doctors that there is presence ... . Others were paid to run clinical trials or write articles for medical journals "(work cited, page 43). The first supplement of Urology December 1997 contains 30 articles, mostly written by the company enrolled. One wonders why a well-known and popular science magazine was open to these deceptions. The sad reality is that few are truly independent independent and (in greater or lesser part), many of those owned by multinational drug companies or their affiliates. Examples of British Medical Journal or the New England Journal of Medicine are unfortunately very limited.
We'll soon be the price they would pay for the unwary consumer of Detrol (not) free from this bondage. Recalling a famous line about the Battleship Potemkin fantozziana, such action would be to define a pis ta ... crazy.
- IBS. IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome). Needless to say, this gem, with which we conclude this review (not exhaustive but only representative), comes from a rough perspective mercantile. E’ chiaro che si tratta di mistificazione. Che non sarebbe mai passata ai tempi della grande medicina: quella di Murri, Albertoni, Lussana, Moscati, Cardarelli, Frugoni, Campanacci. Quando l’ammalato si visitava non soltanto, ma prima di tutto, con dita, occhi, orecchi; i sintomi erano considerati segni di malattie, non malattie ; la mente del medico elaborava, cucendo formule chimiche con nozioni di fisiologia, biologia, biofisica; e la prescrizione nasceva da un profondo processo di logica e di cultura applicata, non dal seguito servile e rinunciatario di linee guida. Chi avesse parlato ad uno qualsiasi dei (veri) luminari citati di IBS, DE, FSD, sarebbe stato preso a calci nel sedere o afferrato by the collar and dragged to the exit.
Again, the usual, tired script. Given that many people suffer from stomach pain, diarrhea or constipation problems, and these symptoms are bound to a new disease. A kind of still life, shrouded in a fog symbolist De Chirico, where you bring along household items, fruits, vegetables and a mannequin with her head bowed. Just find a nice frame, put a couple of signatures in the right corner, and here have a new disease. Disturbing (not unusual) the instrument of the launch of ready-made drugs: an article in Lancet, published in London a few months before the launch of the new Potemkin. Needless to search on ties of the authors of the article and Glaxo: "In medicine a positive article in The Lancet is gold, so this was good news for GSK (GlaxoSmithKline), the manufacturer of the drug" (work cited, page 206 ). The Gold Rush leads to the conclusion that the drug (Lotronex) can be worth billions of dollars, and then have to pull out of the hat plush usual statistics: IBS affects no less than one in five people who, in a nutshell, it means 45 million patients in the United States.
The wonder - we forgive the intrusion - that is, considering the millions of Americans who suffer from acidity, bladder problems, sexual, psicologici, digestivi, motori, eccetera, si arriva alla considerazione che su 300 milioni di abitanti ci sono almeno un miliardo e mezzo di malati. E poi uno non deve credere nei miracoli della scienza!
L'unica quisquilia è che il farmaco provoca, in non pochi casi, costipazione acuta e tenace, nonché la cosiddetta colite ischemica. Le feci si trasformano in sassi appuntiti che perforano le pareti dell’intestino, con conseguenti emorragie e setticemie non di rado letali. Gli incredibili tira-e-molla tra GSK ed alleati cavalieri mascherati, esponenti comprati della FDA, altri fuori mercato, il solito rompiscatole del BMJ (British Medical Journal), comitati di pazienti in realtà Glaxo dummies, we will discuss them later, when we talk dell'opinabilissima U.S. government authority and independence of the institution. The drug is suspended, then reinstated, then again criticized riassolto ...; a long saga, accompanied by remorse of the Lancet, though late, and the entry into the field, in this mayhem accompanied by biting and barking of Novartis with its Zelnorm. To demonstrate how iatrogenic constipation, bowel perforation, bleeding and death that are not considered trifles, the competitor of GSK vows denied the existence of IBS, giving a spot: "abdominal discomfort or pain? Swelling? Constipation? It 's time to talk with your doctor IBS '(advertising Novartis 2002).
E 'hardly necessary to note that this cluster of symptoms can depend on (and dependent) from causes as varied and often very distant. It 'simply outrageous and blinds (some would say criminal severe censor) to put together signs arising from various diseases or disorders and make a temporary illness. This may be an enlarged liver, colitis, overuse of antibiotics, changes in intestinal flora, fermentation of the summer, intestinal viruses, faulty eating habits, lifestyles prejudicial, and so on. Most of the time just put them on a diet, assumere disinfettanti intestinali, fermenti lattici, farmaci per aiutare la decongestione epatica, vitamine. Come al solito, prevale la meccanica ed acefala connessione sintomo-diagnosi, pseudodiagnosi-linea guida, linea guida-farmaci, farmaci-soldi. E la qualità della vita del singolo, già compromessa da alimenti carenti di sali, vitamine o da ritmi di vita errati ed imposti, peggiora, invece di migliorare, con l’assunzione di farmaci impropri e magari dannosi, ma che producono utili diretti ed utili indiretti: questi ultimi quando il malcapitato - come prassi frequente - sarà costretto ad assumere altri farmaci per combattere le malattie provocate da quelli consigliatigli. In un’autogerminazione di irrazionalità e disonestà which sometimes only end with the death of the healthy become sick. And they say that perpetual motion does not exist!
The reader who has patiently followed so far, could, while continuing to read with interest, muttering at the editor's of these lines: "All right, we understand that diseases are invented to make money. But enough examples. What do you do, thorough anthology of invented disease? ". Dear reader, please continue to follow with patience, because the good (ie bad) is yet to come. In the sense that we have not addressed these issues with the spirit of a superficial journalist, who rubs his hands at the thought of wow and wonder, magari caricando i termini e colorando la realtà.
Dietro quanto abbiamo esposto c’è - cosa più importante di ogni altra - la salute e la vita nostra e dei nostri cari, certo; ma c’è il punto chiave, anzi, la chiave stessa che apre un portone sigillato in ogni modo, spalancato il quale si presenta devastante, raccapricciante, evidente il DISASTRO multiforme della nostra epoca. C’è la dimostrazione indiscutibile dell’asservimento dell’uomo a clan spuntati rigogliosi, soprattutto negli ultimi decenni, veri Fleurs du Mal della nostra contemporaneità; c’è la osannata, propagandata e surrettiziamente imposta filosofia che ripete con cadenza ossessiva come slogan i sacri words freedom and democracy to hide the stench of moral decay, but also intellectual, never in human history registratasi . A decomposition that now has no boundaries, you enter the front door, you take away the children, you subtract the opportunity to understand and judge, turning from a man in gear, from individual to serial number, from man to animal programmed pulse .
The authors we have mentioned, and others, though deserving of gratitude and esteem, there does not seem to seize the far more important aspect of this discussion: the base of this malpractice, the reason, the real cause, and therefore possible remedies. Here, in short, there is di mezzo solo la truffa e la menzogna farmaceutica: paradossalmente, sarebbe il meno. Qui si arriva al ganglio vitale di tutta la società, specie occidentale o sotto influenza occidentale, degli ultimi sessant’anni.
L’umanità è realmente oppressa ed espropriata di ogni vera libertà, speriamo non in modo irreversibile, solo quando è convinta di vivere in un’epoca di civiltà e progresso. Il tiranno più oppressivo non è quello che viene identificato come tale, quello che ha una faccia ed un nome e può essere detronizzato: il vero despota non ha volto. Non è uno, né è un direttorio. L’oppressore del nostro tempo si serve di uomini, ma è an acronym. A sort of moloch made by a company, entity organized and do not necessarily identifiable that human creature is transformed into an autonomous entity, as the statue comes to life and property from inanimate start blink, breathe, walk , horrid automaton that can destroy and devour those who have forged to achieve their interests. If there are obscure or raving, dear reader, Sorry about that, but please follow us again. It is a cunning tactic to capture your attention, but only a willingness to share with fellow human beings, as brothers, not one that merits special or personal gifts, but life events have allowed us to see. E we are convinced that, as bitter and shocking, it was a privilege that fate has given us. The important thing in life is not so much serenity, but understand, know, understand and want to know, otherwise it would consume unnecessary extras and their years as chapter registrar, not men.
A short address issues even more disturbing and eloquent: the alienating world of drugs, the drugs block-busters, the exploitation of children, the numbers of the business, the infiltration in the institutions of each country. Before the bell of the Orwellian Big Brother house and come to the lair of the spider webs.
Mentereale
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