Michael Jackson died of a drugs overdose. His personal doctor, Conrad Murray, has been convicted of manslaughter. It is a tragic case. The death of a man revered by many. And the conviction of a conventional doctor for failing to care for him properly.
Yet it was a tragedy waiting to happen, and which probably happens many thousand times each year, is less well-publicised circumstances.
On the one hand, we have a man who believes that his problems can be solved by conventional medical (ConMed) drugs, and as he takes more of them, demands more.
On the other hand, we have a ConMed doctor who also believes that pharmaceutical drugs are helpful, and that his training enables him to control their side-effects - or, as I prefer to call them - disease-inducing-effects, or DIEs.
So develops a situation where the patient is giving a cocktail of drugs, including Propofal, Loracepam, Medazalin and Valium - and he dies. All because he wanted to sleep.
Did Jackson know the possible consequences? Did Murray tell him? Or were they both playing with fire?
What we have to remember is that Big Pharma drugs are now the biggest single killer in the USA. So this incident, high-profile as it has been, is not alone.
