Aspirin. That nice, harmless painkiller?

I wrote about Aspirin in my e-book, "The Failure of Conventional Medicine", in which I outlined why, after spending so much on health care during the last 60+ years we seem to be getting sicker rather than better. In this piece I wrote the following:

          ".... like all NSAID drugs, aspirin is associated with side-effects such as stomach ulcers, disruption of the blood clotting system, and asthma attacks in susceptible people. And aspirin is far more dangerous than we have been told. A WDDTY report dated 18th October 2007 claims that aspirin kills 20,000 people in the USA every year, whilst another 100,000 end up in hospital as a result of taking the drug".

Since writing this, I have to admit that I seem to have got things very wrong! Aspirin is now known to be much more dangerous than I realised at the time. The dangers of Aspirin go far beyond the Gastro-Intestinal diseases it causes.

Aspirin was first patented as a drug in 1889, so in over 120 years, the conventional medical establishment appears to have been quite unaware of the dangers of Aspirin, or quite unprepared to tell us about them, although at the same time quite prepared to tell us that aspirin was 'safe', and could be taken routinely for any number of health reasons.

In August 2011, the magazine WDDTY (What doctor's don't tell you) reported that although Aspirin is supposed to prevent heart disease (and many millions of patients are taking a daily aspirin to do so, on the advice of their doctors), all NSAID drugs, including aspirin, actually become a killer for patients who already have a heart condition. The article reported on research done at the University of Florida, published in the American Journal of Medicine, which showed that patients taking aspirin regularly increased their risk of dying by 47%.

Research in Australia has linked Aspirin with age-related macular degeneration. Perhaps this is not surprising, given the number of older people who have been encouraged to take aspirin, routinely, over recent decades. But note that the researchers could not quite bring themselves to prove a 'causal' relationship! This probably means two things. First, patients won't be told until a 'causal relationship' has been completely demonstrated. And in the meantime, doctors will continue to give it to us despite the risks!

Note that doctors in the UK have already been told about the doubling of the risk of contracting the condition, but that their advice is to continue prescribing it:

          " ...'any decision to stop aspirin therapy is complex and should be individualised', noting that the risk 'should be balanced with the significant morbidity and mortality of sub-optimally treated cardiovascular disease'. Overall they felt there was insufficient evidence to recommend changing practice, except in patients with strong risk factors for neovascular age-related macular degeneration".

So all is well within the world of the conventional medical establishment! Carry on, they say, despite the risk.

So do our doctors tell us about the risk? Well, at least WDDTY have done so. In their report on research done at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine, they say that the risk increases the longer patients take aspirin, and that "those who have taken the drug regularly for 10 years or longer are at the highest risk" emphasising the the drug can cause many kinds of eye problems, up to, and including, blindness.

See also the following articles on Aspirin, Eyesight and Blindness.
Taking aspirin regularly causes severe degenerative eye disorders
Taking aspirin as few times as once a week triples risk of blindness

So what about all the evidence that suggest aspirin does such wonderful things for our health? For example, does it not reduce cancer risk? WDDTY have again suggested that this is another piece of ConMed hype. It reports on an article published in The Lancet that examined the evidence of aspirin's 'cancer-protecting' role, which found that the study was a re-analysis of about 90 previously published studies - which conveniently managed to exclude several major US trials that had failed to find "any protective effect from aspirin".

The situation is actually worse than this, as described in this article which indicates that not only will aspirin not prevent cancer, it will actually cause it. The author reminds us that the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, in 2004, found that daily aspirin intake "is linked to a significantly increased risk of developing cancer". Indeed, the article goes on to remind us of the overall dangers of aspirin, namely:

          "Regular use of aspirin is linked to heart attack, stroke, intestinal bleeding, organ damage, and death".

The conclusion that can be reached is that the ConMed Establishment is willing to discount, or to ignore, the overwhelming evidence that aspirin consumption is dangerous; and that it is able, and willing to use and manipulate 'medical science' in order to highlight any marginal, or indeed bogus benefits that can be found in drugs.

We are dealing with Big Business interests here, not in a health service that puts patient interests first and foremost.

Similar claims have been made for Aspirin in relation to it preventative role in treating Dementia. 'The Healthier Life' have examined these claims, and came to this conclusion:

          "In a new study, research gave memory tests to hundreds of older subject with high risk of heart disease. Five years later, they gave the same tests. Subject who took low-dose aspirin tended to score a bit hight than those who didn't use the therapy. Okay. Slightly better memory. That's good. But even the researchers admit ... "There were no differences in dementia rates in the two groups".

So this is not a ringing endorsement of aspirin as an effective treatment of dementia. But any marginally positive news is used by the ConMed Establishment to hype its drugs. So despite the risks to our hearts, our eyes, and our stomachs, older people are given a drug in the hope that it might, just, have a marginal effect on our brains.

Great marketing. Lousy medicine!

Aspirin is a NSAID painkiller. In the next few days I will be continuing with a series of blog on painkillers that implicates these drugs with far wider damage to human health.

The Failure of Conventional Medicine

Conventional medicine is failing because it is both ineffective and highly dangerous for patients. 

Yet, the public are not being given the evidence of this catastrophic failure. Governments, National Health Services throughout the world, doctors, and perhaps most alarmingly of all, the mainstream media, are failing to tell us about the gross failings of the ConMed Establishment, and of Big Pharma drugs in particular.

Each week, this blog will collect together a series of articles from the internet that demonstrate this failure, and the underlying reason for an increasing number of people looking for non-drug medical therapies that are both safer and more effective.

Big Pharma drugs - the new epidemic sweeping across America (and Europe too)?
Did you know, for instance, that Big Pharma prescription drugs now kill more people than illegal drugs? Indeed, pharmaceutical drugs have become the biggest single cause of death in the USA.

Fresh doubts over flu vaccines
Click on this link if you did not know about the increasing doubts about the safety and effectiveness of flu vaccine we are all being exorted to take. No such doubts have been seen in the mainstream media - we have just been told of the benefits of the vaccine? Did you know, for example, that whilst doctor's might be recommending you to have the vaccine, doctor's themselves, in huge numbers, are refusing to have one?

Show us the evidence for the flu jab.
In fact, doctors are even asking the government, who are criticising them, to provide them with the evidence that the flu vaccine is effective.

Flu vaccines effective in 1.5% cases - not 60% as we have been told
The concern about the effectiveness of the flu vaccine is shown in this 'shock vaccine study'! A shock, of course, only if you have not discovered the truth about ConMed, and the length's Big Pharma will go to sell their drugs.

Flu? There is a better defence
And why aren't we all being told that there are better, safer, more effective alternatives to flu vaccines?

20 Vaccine 'Trivia' Facts
Of course, vaccines have never been safe. No vaccine. Is this right? Have a look at this article from Vactruth, which outlines just 20 examples when vaccines have proven to be either useless, dangerous, or both. Vactruth is one of the foremost websites investigating the dangers of vaccines, and seeking to educate a misinformed public.

US Government Agency has known all along how dangerous vaccines are
Or perhaps look at this, from Tim Bolen's website, frightening evidence that government agencies know about the dangers of vaccines, but haven't been prepared to tell us.

Vaccines and the increasing rate of Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma Cancer
This sort of negative evidence about vaccines, though, is coming out all the time though - so we don't have to look at the history of vaccine cover-ups in order to know that they are linked with patient harm, and the increasing rate of diseases of all kinds.

Healthy babies given dangerous and unnecessary drugs
Or, how often are we told about Big Pharma giving us drugs when we do not need them? And it would appear that not even healthy babies are not safe.

ADHD Drugs are a common source of drug reaction.
Of course, children are more susceptible to the disease-inducing-effects of drugs, and this link states that ADHD medication cause substantial adverse reactions in children.

NHS Breast Screening programme under review
And it is not just drugs that are a problem. What about useless tests that lead to taking toxic drugs - unnecessarily? Well, the BBC did report on this (26th October 2011). But the point it not just that the test is 'being questioned' but that lot's of women, who did not need treatment for breast cancer, received it - despite its toxicity and dangers.  Of course, in their reporting, the BBC did not focus on this, or inform us about the dangers (and sheer nastiness) of ConMed cancer treatment.

Pfizer pays $14.5 million to settle Detrol off-label suit
So do Big Pharma tell us that their drugs are dangerous? Of course not, they are in business to make money by selling drugs. Big Pharma companies are regularly paying out $millions of dollars in compensation for the dangerous drugs they provide for patients. In some parts of the more litigious world, they abound. And if you want more - here is another example (there are many, many more). My question is - shouldn't patients be told before they are harmed by such drugs?  But again, we rarely, if ever, hear about these dangers.

So why the cover-up? By government? By government health agencies? By the NHS? By our doctors? And above all, by the mainstream media? Why do we not hear about these compensation payments? And, indeed, who pays to set up these cover-up's?

On BBC Radio, on 25th October 2011, I heard a programme discussing the cost of treatment for Macular Degeneration. One treatment, they said, was cheaper, but it had 'side-effects'. However, not once did the programme tell the listeners what the 'side-effects' of this drug (Avastin) were!

The BBC, like most of the mainstream media, does this all the time - it salutes new wonder drugs - but never tells us about the damage drugs do to us. The question is - why? Who is controlling the BBC? Here are a couple of articles on the subject that the BBC certainly did not use.

Can using Avastin for Macular Degeneration cause blindness?
So Avastin can cause blindness? Yes, a drug used for a condition that can cause blindness is actually being treated by a drug that causes blindness! Somehow, this does not seem to be a good deal - at any price! This is especially so as Avastin has also been associated with causing fatal brain inflammation!

Macular Degeneration affects nearly 15 million Americans leading patients to seek alternative healthcare solutions
Nor, of course, did the BBC say anything about alternative treatments. This article states that there are 15 million people with Macular Degeneration in the USA alone - and that many people are seeking alternative therapy. The article focuses on Acupuncture - but homeopathy, and many other therapies, are a safer alternative to Avastin.