Every time we take a pill, or take a vaccine, we put our faith and trust in the conventional medical establishment. It is not wise to do so, for a variety of reasons.
After spending over 12 year practising homeopathy I became very familiar with consulting patients who had contracted serious illness as a result of taking pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines. Taking drugs can break down our immune system, increase our vulnerability to serious illness, and lead directly to diseases of all kinds.
Conventional medicine may call these "drug side effects", but the reality is that they are more serious than this. An "adverse drug reaction" is another common euphemism used that may imply something slightly more serious. But really, until it is accepted that pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines can, and do cause disease, the seriousness of taking prescribed drugs will continue to be underestimated - both by the conventional medical establishment and by over-trusting patients.
Most chronic disease is known to be a "side effect" of taking pharmaceutical drugs. I have written extensively about this in my "Iatrogenic Disease" E-Book (freely available on the internet). The book focuses on over 70 serious chronic illnesses, all of which have risen, some exponentially, during the last 80 years or more, alongside ever-increasing levels of prescription drug taking. For each of these diseases the drugs known to cause them are listed. In the main the evidence for this has been taken from conventional medical literature.
In other words, our doctors know (or they should know) that the drugs they prescribe to patients can cause serious illness and disease. Unfortunately, patients are rarely told this. Indeed, they are usually told that pharmaceutical drugs are "safe and effective", or "well tolerated", or some such reassuring phrase.
So what do patients do when they develop serious 'side effects', or 'adverse reactions', or when they fall seriously ill with a disease that has been caused by taking pharmaceutical drugs?
Most patients are unaware of the link
Most patients, however badly they may be harmed by a drug, or drug combination, do not make the drug-illness/disease link; unless, perhaps, the 'side effect' is instantaneous. It is more usual for any 'new' illness to be seen as a misfortunate, an unconnected adversity, a demonstration that our health is breaking down. The possible association with any previously taken prescription drug is not made. The result is that more pharmaceutical drugs (and thus more potential 'side effects') are prescribed to treat the new condition.
Ultimately, patients can find that they are taking a cocktail of drugs, each one causing a 'side effect', without any acknowledgement that the poly-pharmacy to which they are being subjected has anything to do with it. Indeed, most patients (and most doctors?) believe that the drugs are keeping them well, that they would be sicker if they stopped taking them.
In the main patients do not realise they have suffered iatrogenic (doctor-induced) harm. They are kept in the dark. Doctors do not routinely report patient harm to drug regulators (as they are obliged to do in most countries). So the lack of reporting allows drug regulators to say that patient harm caused by a drug is "rare", or "uncommon".
Sources of Information: what patients are told about the cause of illness
Whenever conventional medicine writes about the cause of a disease they will often mention many possibilities; including some of the most implausible, contradictory and bizarre connections. We drink too much coffee; or not enough. It is all down to our genes. We go to bed too late; or too early. We have too much. or too little of this, or that vitamin. We do too much exercise, or not enough. It may even be caused by eating burnt toast (yes, really)!
Some of these causes of illness may be perfectly legitimate. However, medical 'science' will usually ignore the role of pharmaceutical drugs/vaccines, even when the link is known, and acknowledged within conventional medical literature. This is NOT legitimate!
For instance, there is ample evidence that pharmaceutical drugs can cause dementia. Indeed, there are few pharmaceutical drugs that do not have 'side effects' such as "confusion", or "disorientation", or "memory loss", alongside other known features of dementia. Yet medical science can deny this: I wrote about this in November 2024 after reading an article on the 'preventability' of dementia. One way of preventing dementia would involve understanding the causal role of pharmaceutical drugs: but as usual this was not mentioned.
These drug/disease links are often, if not usually discounted or ignored. Indeed they are often denied (consider, for example, the 'controversial' issue of childhood vaccines/ autism link).
So the causal relationship between pharmaceutical drugs and chronic illness is rarely discussed. The potential link is seldom mentioned by the main sources patients get their information.
- Conventional medical authorities (who offer the treatment) do not talk to patient about the issues.
- Governments, who pay for the treatment, are happy to fund treatments that cause patient harm, and thus the need for more expensive treatment.
- And the mainstream media, who might be expected to investigate and report on behalf of their readers/listeners/viewers, are content to restrict themselves to the pharmaceutical narrative.
The Yellow Card Reporting System.
There have been attempts to ensure that patients are informed about the link between illness, disease and pharmaceutical drugs, and to create systems that protect patients from drug harm. After the Thalidomide tragedy of the 1970's most countries introduced, or revamped their reporting systems, requiring doctors (and eventually patients) to report drug harm to the national drug regulator. For instance, in Britain this is called the "Yellow Card Reporting System". The Yellow Card system, and similar systems elsewhere, were designed to "make medicine and medical devices safer". They were designed to warn drug regulators about 'problem drugs' that were causing serious patient harm. This is what the UK's drug regulator, the MHRA, tells us about its Yellow Card system.
"Anyone can report an issue with a medicine, vaccine, medical device, blood product or e-cigarette to the Yellow Card scheme. The Yellow Card scheme is run by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), which safeguards medical products quality and efficacy in the United Kingdom. Reporting makes a big difference. Your Yellow Card report plays a key part in keeping others safe. Your experience can ensure that all healthcare products can continue their positive impact on peoples’ lives, by helping the MHRA identify new safety issues as early as possible.
Yet the system does not work. Research, now widely accepted, has regularly found that only between 1% to 10% of serious adverse drug reactions are ever reported.
And patient harm is reported to drug regulators such reports are often dismissed, discounted or quietly ignored. So even when doctors or patients do report serious adverse drug reactions the medical authorities do not seem to take them seriously enough to take action. For instance, reports of the patient harm caused by Covid-19 vaccines have produced absolutely no action by regulators around the world. My conclusion has long been that there is no effective system in existence that protects patients from pharmaceutical drug and vaccine harm.
I have written extensively about the inadequacy of drug regulators on this blog. The sole reason for their existence is to protect patients from the harm caused by medical treatment. In this they have failed, totally; and they continue to fail for three main reasons.
- The conventional medical establishment is not keen on opennes, honesty and transparency, particularly about drug and vaccine 'side effects' as this reflects badly on them. Nor is it good for business. So the medical establishment prefers to keep patients in ignorance rather than to risk their reputation.
- Conventional medicine rarely has any effective (or safe) treatment for drug-related chronic diseases. So to admit causing a disease, and then to have no treatment for it, is doubly damaging.
- And the pharmaceutical industry has effectively 'captured' drug regulatory agencies around the world. (i) They are all largely/mainly funded by the drug companies. (ii) In the main they are staffed by people with strong professional (and financial) links to the drugs industry, and whose main interest appears to be to safeguard the profits of pharmaceutical companies rather than the safety of patients.
So patients harmed by pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines are not protected, either by their doctors, or by the regulatory agencies that have been established to do so. So where do patients go to get redress?
There is, of course, always litigation. Yet to reach the stage when patients can think of claiming compensation for the drug-induced injuries takes a great deal of knowledge, perseverance, determination - and lots of money! Only a handful of damaged patient will ever be able to get this far.
And even those who do so will soon realise that their fight for justice has only just begun! With many drugs (especially vaccines), governments has given pharmaceutical drug companies immunity from prosecution. In other words, drug companies have been given a government licence to harm, a real 'license to kill'! So patients have to take on either the might of national governments, of the pharmaceutical industry, often combined. The cost of doing so is prohibitive for most people. And even when groups decide to do so they often have to fight years against obfuscation, delay and denial.
This has sometimes been achieved, not least in the USA. But even when court action is successful (a list of some of the more important cases against drug companies can be found here), pharmaceutical companies are invariable sentenced to fines and compensation that are dwarfed by their profits; fines that one company executive once described as 'pocket money'.
One of the problems patient groups face is that when Law Courts consider patient damage claims they usually consider them on the basis of 'medical science'. They do this on the basis that science is 'objective'; and more reliable than the subjective evidence of patients. Rarely do they consider that medical 'science' is bought and paid for by the pharmaceutical companies, not least in the drug testing that led to the approval of regulatory agencies. Medical science is as 'captured' as drug regulators.
In addition, the patient has to prove that their illness was due to the drug rather than a multitude of other factors; they have to prove it was the drug or vaccines, and not their diet, or their exercise regime, or their stress levels - or even eating too much burnt toast - that caused the illness.
Then, it is sometimes necessary to prove the level and seriousness of the injury or disease suffered. For instance, patients who have been harmed by medical treatment sometimes have to prove that they have suffered 50% or 60% disability in order to qualify for compensation.
What should the patient do?
Most patients will give up, and to do so is only natural when faced with such inflexible and self-interested vested interests.
So ultimately, I suggest that everyone one of us should be making a clear and firm decision. Do we take the risk of taking pharmaceutical drugs? Or not? On the basis that patient harm is possible when taking pharmaceutical 'medicine', and that redress is so difficult to obtain, there is only one answer. We should decline the offer.
Yet if we do refuse to take the drugs on offer, what do we do instead? Refusing to take harmful drugs is one thing. Having the knowledge, and the access to safer, more effective natural medical therapies is another.