Recently I was having lunch with my mom after one of her doctor's appointments and like always she was consulting with me. Now just so you know off the top - I am not a doctor. I am one of those people with years of experience in pharmacies, health food stores, medical research and clinical diagnostics but I am no doctor. I vacillate between recognition of their years of intensive study and therefore remarkable knowledge of the body and their easily bought (no, too harsh), influenced choices when it comes to prescriptives.

Now back to my mom. She's got a whole host of problems which I won't get into but in addition to her previous drug regimen she now needs an additional drug for cholesterol and a different blood pressure drug. The doctor was actually paying attention that day (I mean this literally - she lost nearly 50 pounds which was more than 20% of her body weight and he didn't notice before). So, he went to their stores and brought out a bunch of samples. One of them was a new drug and he explained that it wasn't available as a generic. And a second one was an old drug.

This all confused my mom and maybe this is weird to you too. Drug companies pay millions to develop new drugs. For that money, they've got the FDA in their pockets such that there will be patent protection for the production of the drug for anywhere from 10 to 20 years. So no generics can be legally made and sold. After I related this to mom, I said that that was why he had mentioned the 'new' drug and was concerned about her being able to afford it.

With regards to the old drug - I told her that most doctors are 'encouraged' to promote new drugs so that big Pharma can make money. Old drugs make them nothing. And if you've seen The Fugitive you'll remember that doctors are 'courted' by drug companies. They sponsor

conferences and meetings all over the world to not only help the dissemination of medical information but also as self-promotion. The kind of Old Boys' Club mentality that it would be great to eliminate but given the state of politics (and especially special interest's groups hold on political cojones) is unlikely to happen any time soon.

And speaking of the negatives of Big Pharma, I was recently asked about vaccinations with respect to my own kiddos. The old argument of vaccines causing autism came up and I had to remind the person I was speaking to that we (in Canada) do not get the same vaccine formulations that other countries do. Our regulations are different and an across the board comparison is not accurate. That stated though, another issue I have with big Pharma is how they have vaccination drives for batches of vaccine that are about to expire. The next time you see a push for a vaccine that should have been delivered en masse already (like an influenza vaccine push after January) it may be due to someone noticing that huge numbers of units are going to be thrown out if they don't get out the door.

This isn't to say that vaccine campaigns are always suspect. The recent ones for Mumps Measles Rubella and Varicella or Diptheria, Pertussis (acellular, a) and Tetanus are valid and should be seriously considered by all parents. It used to be that a child could not attend any public school until all vaccinations were up to date. Now things are definitely different. With the recent decline in compliance, herd immunity is down and most all of these are making comebacks in the developed world.

I know this is diverging but I thought I'd include a few pix of what these bad-boys can do.

In order: Measles - identified by cough, runny nose and red eyes - fever in excess of 39C/102F, rash and sometimes spots inside the mouth. Complicated by diarrhea, pneumonia, encephalitis (swelling in the brain), corneal ulceration/ scarring which would lead to vision problems to blindness. Oh yeah and a fever of 40C can mess up the brain forever.

Mumps - noticeable and painful swelling of the parotid (salivary glands) and testes (also painful for adolescents or adult males that can in rare cases lead to infertility), fever and headache.
Both have recently been enormous problems in the western world with outbreaks dominating diagnostics in many countries.

Rubella - a personal favorite of mine because a schoolmate had it 6 times in 2 years. (And to this day she's mad at me for giving her scarlet fever. sheesh.) Also has a rash, swollen glands, joint pain, headache and conjunctivitis. Mostly a danger to pregnant women as it causes spontaneous abortion and congenital rubella syndrome (heart, brain, eye and ear defects which are permanent, low birth weight, prematurity, anaemia, hepatitis, "blueberry muffin skin lesions" and low platelet levels or thrombocytopenia which causes wound healing problems.)
 

Varicella - perhaps better known as herpes / chicken pox / shingles. The pic above is shingles because just about everyone knows what Chicken Pox looks like. They're vaccinating for this because of the increased risk for serious Staph and Strep infections of the lesions.
To note in the shingles pic - the rash is only on half of the body. Usually front and back and there can be limb involvement. This rash is painful in 80-odd% of cases. Really Painful.

Diptheria is one I won't forget seeing as my mom had it as a small child. It causes sore throat (inflamed neck = bull neck), usually low but in rarer cases high fever, adherent pseudomembrane which may require medical intervention to maintain breathing and can lead to heart problems and death. (My mom was sent home to die 3 times.)

Pertussis, also known as Whooping Cough. This one is quite common in the north of Canada and causes a type of cough that is so persistent that the person doesn't get much time to breathe - hence the whoop. Technically called a paroxysmal cough. It is so severe that it can cause eye hemorrhages, rib fractures, incontinence, hernia, fainting, inspiration of vomitting and even vertebral artery dissection. If that didn't spell it out - hey, it's serious!

Tetanus. This one got some press recently when Selma Hayek teemed up with Pampers to distribute vaccines to the third world. This bacteria is of the same parent group that includes botulism (yes, botox), gangrene and an overwhelming intestinal infection known as C.diff. Tetanus causes the muscles of the body to contract (opposite of botulism). It's painful - very painful. Think of a muscle spasm that you may have had in your leg or back and multiply it by all the voluntary muscles of the body. In the industrialized world the fatality rate is about 11% but elsewhere it's more like 50-75%. High fevers, sweating, increased heart rate and blood pressure go with it - but that's no surprise given the muscle contractions. Lockjaw is also a common first sign.

So vaccines in general good.
Big Pharma not always good. I think of them like any big business of today (or say the Catholic Church of the dark ages) with so much power - it's easy to be corrupted. And if a church can justify killing thousands if not millions what can a corporation justify doing?

This may sound weird but after my mom's trouble with ulcers you'd think that it would be natural to check my dad for the bacteria that causes 90% of all ulcers: Helicobacter pylori. I wrote a blog about this a few months ago and included info about how this little factoid was discovered - and how it resulted in a Nobel Prize for Dr. Warren.

Nearly ever since the advent of Viagra, there has been a search for a female counterpart. (For a recap on how Viagra saw the light of day - check out The Viagra Story.) Don't get me wrong, many women find Viagra works well to improve their sex life. The drug companies need a new compound to market to women. Since Viagra is so well-known as a treatment for men, there needs to be a separate drug for women. This is just marketing. So which behemoth drug company has come closest to the finish line - Boehringer Ingelheim with their new Little Pink Pill Flibanserin (and I do hope they come up with a more catchy name). Not surprisingly, this drug is not trying to physically 'up' women's sexual responsiveness. Instead it is geared toward the psychological aspects of sexuality.

Boehringer Ingerheim doesn't even claim to have any expertise or interest in this area of research. Here's a pic from their website:

Nowhere on this list is anything to do with emotional issues. The only area that comes close to brain function alteration for the purpose of emotional enhancement is Parkinson's - and it's not close enough for my blood.

Here comes the question - does the medical community know enough about how the brain works to play around with it? And for sex? Really. How many reports have their been that antidepressants led to suicides? Or how about the rampant use of Ritalin. If your kiddo is not paying attention to you or to school - give them a pill. Ritalin is a central nervous system stimulant similar to amphetamines targeting the dopamine neurotransmitter in a manner similar to cocaine. The side effects are numerous: Short-term effects can include nervousness and insomnia, loss of appetite, nausea and vomiting, dizziness, palpitations, headaches, changes in heart rate and blood pressure (usually elevation of both, but occasionally depression), skin rashes and itching, abdominal pain, weight loss, and digestive problems, toxic psychosis, psychotic episodes, drug dependence syndrome, and severe depression upon withdrawal. (Taken from a webpage of Partnership for a Drug-Free America.) How are these Side Effects better than a kid who has trouble focusing? Let's face it - kids don't pay close attention. They just don't. And what's more - with time, they get over it. But somehow we've bought into the idea that it's not only OK but necessary to mess with the developing brains of our children. How do we know that we won't be permanently altering the course of their natural development? And here's the rub - is there any way for us to know this with certainty?

And so I question, do we really know enough about the brain and it's changes with not only puberty and early development (as is the question with Ritalin) but with the hormonal cycling of female brains (and yes the hormonal cycling triggers do also come from the brain) and menopause / peri-menopause? It seems as though we haven't figured out how best to handle the hormonal changes of menopause - and now we're going to further complicate matters by mucking with women's brains on top of things.

In a time when a large proportion of the population and even the medical profession is rediscovering the efficacy of natural approaches why are we being bombarded by these 'medical interventions'? Pharmaceuticals are big business. They're so big they can force compliance of governing bodies like the FDA and they can also lure physicians into prescribing drugs when they could be exploring the nature of the problem. If you think I'm off my rocker - do you know someone who is taking 1 or more drugs to counteract the side effects of another drug their taking? Or perhaps you remember the Vioxx scandal - the NSAID that caused heart attacks?

So yes there will be a Little Pink Pill - backed heavily by Boehringer-Ingerheim with the help of their paid researchers and marketing team - don't believe it - check out Sex, Brain, Body. They even produced a special panel with 6 of 8 specialists supported directly by them. And in the field of research it may as well read - owned by Boehringer. But like big oil - it's up to the consumer to make as many alternate choices as possible and put pressure on our elected officials to ensure that our Best Interests are being addressed - not big business's.