Loosening the Grip of Pharmaceutical Medicine on our Health Services

When we seek out health services, in most countries of the world, we will almost inevitably get some form of pharmaceutical, drug-based medicine, delivered by medical staff who are totally committed to the idea that drugs and vaccines will (i) maintain our health, and (ii) return us to health when sick. This is certainly so in Britain, where the NHS now provides pharmaceutical medicine with a complete monopoly.

For a growing number of people this is unsatisfactory. It is not conducive to health freedom and patient choice where each individual ican choose the medical treatment we wish to have. Even if the NHS was dominated by Homeopathy, or Ayuveda, or any other natural therapy, it would be the same - not everyone wants to use the same medical treatment - and most people would like to know about the options available to them, their safety, and their effectiveness.

The basis on which a medical monopoly that has been awarded to pharmaceutical medicine is the subject of an article by the Alliance for Natural Health, which is a supporter of informed choice in the provision of health services. The article, Loosening Big Pharma's Grip on our Health, asked whether there needed to be more or less regulation of health services in response to this market dominance of a single medical system. It discussed the 'rigged' market in health, it made a distinction between Government and Market regulation, and looked at the costs of Big Pharmas current monopoly. It is a thoughtful article that ANH asks to be widely circulated - so I have reproduced the article in full here.

    "Drugs made by one of the largest and most profitable industries in the world - with 80 years of experience behind it - appear to have had little impact on curbing spiraling rates of chronic disease. Healthcare systems are at breaking point and most governments and politicians seem to studiously avoid pointing out what seems so obvious to so many of us.

Mainstream medical systems rely heavily on expensive, often dangerous, drugs to treat symptoms rather than targeting the underlying causes of disease. This pill-for-an ill, drug dominated model that’s driven by crony capitalism comes at a massive cost to both individuals and society.

At the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH), we’re dedicated to challenging this broken system and advocating for a healthcare approach based on sound principles and ethics, rooted in prevention, natural health options, and the freedom to make informed choices. It is our hope that a new political landscape that is supportive of natural health will unfold, at least in the US, when the Trump-Vance Administration takes the reins in 2025, with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in an influential role.

Pharmaceuticals are tightly regulated. But for whose benefit?

A rigged market in healthcare

While markets are often criticised for being profit-driven, they also provide a powerful regulatory mechanism. When markets are free, competition ensures that businesses, regardless of their motivations, must consider the needs of their customers and employees. Selfish business owners can’t thrive unless they deliver real value. In a truly free market, a company that ignores its customers’ needs or disregards safety concerns will ultimately fail. But for this self-regulating system to work, it must operate independently—without interference that protects bad actors.

The healthcare industry does not operate in a free market, but rather in one that is highly regulated, the regulations having been carefully tailored to Big Pharma’s interests, not those of citizens. The result is that Big Pharma enjoys a protected monopoly that it has built over decades through its revolving doors with government agencies, notably the FDA. In a system where the rules of the game are rigged in favor of FDA-approved drugs, it’s no wonder that natural health options—like dietary supplements, lifestyle changes, and preventive care—are marginalised. Instead of being held accountable by market forces, Big Pharma thrives on government interventions that limit competition and create massive profit margins.

Government Regulation vs. Market Regulation

Many assume that government regulation is necessary to protect public health and safety, but regulations often fall short. Ponder this: If drugs require regulation to ensure their safety, effectiveness and quality—these being the three pillars of drug regulation—how come properly prescribed drugs are the third leading cause of death after heart disease and cancer, and that most drugs don’t work in most people? With Big Pharma’s tentacles so deep into regulatory agencies, transparency so compromised that crucial data are routinely hidden from public view, and conflicts of interest rampant in ways that sway judgment, objectivity and the opportunity to work in patients’ best interests, should we really expect Big Pharma to be the trusted custodian of our health?  

Consider that nearly half of the FDA’s budget comes from the drug industry in the form of user fees—the money Big Pharma pays the FDA for drug approval. Then there’s the revolving door between Big Pharma and the FDA, where many FDA officials use their time at the agency as a stepping stone to more lucrative employment in the sector they are meant to oversee. Is it any wonder that the FDA has repeatedly attacked and undermined the natural health sector?

Clearly, Big Pharma’s monopoly power comes not from free-market success but from political protectionism. Without government intervention propping up its control, Big Pharma wouldn’t stand a chance against natural health alternatives. These alternatives include inexpensive nutrients and herbs delivered as supplements that build resilience and prevent disease, and changes to conventional dietary and lifestyle norms that are plunging huge numbers ever deeper into metabolic disease. A sick child is the most precious asset to Big Pharma which can then hope for a lifetime’s worth of income from that individual.

The industry profits when people are chronically ill, relying on drugs to manage conditions rather than resolving them. Statins and the latest skinny jab, semaglutide (trade names Ozempic and Wegovy), are examples of long burn wins for Big Pharma.

In a true free market, these pharmaceutical monopolies would be exposed to competition from safer, preventive options, ultimately benefiting public health.

Big Pharma’s Monopoly and Its Costs

The cash flow made possible by monopolies allows pharmaceutical companies to influence politicians and medical societies, as well as steer the direction of medical research. The end result is a healthcare system where patients and practitioners alike are funneled into a drug-dependent approach, ignoring or actively discouraging preventive solutions that could improve quality of life and reduce healthcare costs.

Imagine a world where governments stopped propping up these monopolies. A natural health solution like diet, exercise, or a range of dietary supplements that could become the preferred choice over expensive, side-effect-laden drugs. Consumers could choose health solutions that are more in line with their personal values, budgets, and well-being goals. Commercial speech wouldn’t be constrained in ways that prevent companies from providing truthful information to the public. Big Pharma’s reliance on government regulation and monopoly pricing would collapse, and the market would then do what it does best: encourage quality and innovation by responding directly to consumers’ needs. Like nature, the fittest or best products would flourish in the marketplace, the ineffective ones would fail, and companies that sold products that were dangerous, if the risks were not adequately communicated, could be sued—rather than being protected by government or law (in the case of vaccines) as they are today.

Backroom deals are rarely for the benefit of patients and the public.

A New Approach for True Health Freedom

ANH believes that natural health freedom is only possible in a system where government power doesn’t create or sustain monopolies. People deserve access to preventive healthcare options that aren’t crowded out by a system that prioritises profit over wellness. A free market in healthcare would pave the way for greater transparency, accountability, and choice, empowering individuals to take charge of their health with natural and preventive options.

Ending Big Pharma’s monopoly on our health isn’t a matter of simply “deregulating”; it’s about ending the crony capitalism that keeps monopolies alive. Removing these artificial supports would allow for real competition in healthcare, enabling natural health options to thrive, lowering healthcare costs, and improving outcomes.

The healthcare revolution we need isn’t a top-down, regulatory-heavy approach. It’s a move toward real freedom, with health freedom being central. That’s because our health—for most people anyway (even if it isn’t always recognised until it’s lost)—is our most important asset. With a free market, individuals and patients have access to the health solutions of their choice, free from interference by captured government agencies and the media.

At ANH, we’re fighting to protect this freedom and support for health systems where disease prevention, natural health choices and unalienable rights are not only respected, but facilitated and encouraged. The endgame? Human vitality and flourishing."

 

Perhaps more than any other organisation of which I am aware, the ANH adopts the most intelligent and considered approach to the important concepts of health freedom and patient choice. I recommend that everyone supports them in their work.

 

Pharmaceutical Medicine - a Faustian Deal?

Is Conventional (or Pharmaceutical medicine) a Faustian bargain? The legend of Doctor Faustus arises from German folk law, Faust making an agreement to surrender his soul to an evil spirit (The Devil, Satan or Mephistopheles) in exchange for otherwise unattainable knowledge, and magical powers, that provided him with access to all the world’s pleasures. In the bargain Faust recognises the evil of the bargainer but goes along with the deal anyway. Faustian bargains always end in tragedy because what is surrendered (the soul, or good health and well-being) is ultimately far more valuable than what has been obtained (worldly pleasures, or short-term health benefits).

Pharmaceutical drug treatment provides minor, short-term health benefits; but the cumulative adverse drug reactions usually leads to the patient having to take more and more, or stronger (more toxic) drugs in order to cope with the side effects of previous treatments. I have written about two such patient who entered, unknowingly, into such a deal.

• Ronald, a patient getting to the end of a long journey through pain and painkilling drugs, ending up in chronic pain, and Tramadol.
  

• Janet, a patient getting to the end of the long journey through pain and painkilling drugs, ending up in chronic pain, Amitriptyline - and dementia. 

Both Ronald and Janet can be seen to have traded their long-term health and well-being in exchange for some temporary relief from pain, leading to chronic health outcomes. One drug leads to another drug which leads to another. They all cause 'side effects' more serious than the original condition. The Faustian deal was not a good, long-term deal for either of them. There are so many other similar examples. Any one of us can find them amongst our own family, friends, and acquaintances.

Conventional medicine offers these Faustian packages all the time. When anyone enters a doctor's surgery, or a hospital, and accepts a pharmaceutical drug the deal is made. 

• The patient is usually told that the drug, or drugs, are 'safe', and he/she is too often feeling too ill to check; or they implicitly trust their doctor. 
• For his/her part the doctor is usually less than transparent. They are aware of the limited, short-term benefits of the drugs they prescribe, as well as the serious longer-term adverse reactions they can cause; but this knowledge is usually not shared.

In all these Faustian medical deals, the doctors are fully aware of the nature and possible consequences of the deal, but the patient is not, and rarely associates their declining health with the drugs they are taking.

There have been two main outcomes:

1. It is the reason for the staggering increase in chronic disease, particularly since the 1950's, when we began our love affair (our Faustian deal) with pharmaceutical drugs, and began to believe without question the propaganda of the drug companies, whose message to us continues to be that their drugs were winning the war against illness and disease. Any cursory examination into our health, and the rise and rise of chronic disease during the last 70 years, demonstrates clearly that this is not so. 
2. Faustian health packages are also the fundamental reason for the ongoing crisis in national health services around the world, including the UK's NHS. The last 70 years has seen an astronomical increase in pharmaceutical drug taking, Faustian deals that ensured that patients like Ronald and Janet got sicker, in need of increasing amounts of medical intervention. The current NHS crisis, both in funding, waiting lists and staff morale, is being blamed on the Covid-19 pandemic. My blog, during the last 12 years, has clearly shown that the current crisis is an ongoing crisis that has been worsening over the years.

Indeed, the Covid-19 pandemic can be seen as yet another Faustian deal - a manufactured virus, an exaggerated crisis, the adoption of panic public health measure (masks, lockdown, et al) - responses that not only failed but actually made matters worse. Then, of course, there was the long wait for vaccines that were supposed to save us, but did not work - they neither prevented the virus, or stopped its transmission. And their side effects have yet to be recognised by the conventional medical establishment, for obvious reasons.

The devil, once again, refused to reveal what the Covid-19 package was doing to Doctor Faustus! And Satan continues to do his best to ensure that he does not find out!

So when you are offered a Faustian medical deal, please make sure you refuse it! 

Instead, discover what good diet, exercise, and safe natural medical therapies can do for you instead.

Social Prescribing. Is Conventional Medicine Losing Confidence in Pharmaceutical Medicine?

I have always equated 'Conventional Medicine' with 'Pharmaceutical Medicine' - for good reason. There has never been any good reason to do otherwise. The two are indistinguishable, certainly within most national health services around the world, and certainly within the British NHS. Go to see your doctor, or go to hospital, and the chances are you will be treated with a pharmaceutical drug, or vaccine. 

Yet are they now diverging? Just ever so slightly?

The reason for asking this question is an article published in the GP magazine, "Pulse" on 7th February 2022, "Will Covid signal the end of the road for over-medicalisation".

            "Social prescribing, also sometimes known as community referral, is a means of enabling health professionals to refer people to a range of local, non-clinical services. The referrals generally, but not exclusively, come from professionals working in primary care settings, for example, GPs or practice nurses."

Over medicalising? Does this mean that too many pharmaceutical drugs are being prescribed?

Social prescribing? Is the suggestion that doctors will actually prescribe "a range of local, non-clinical services" rather than the wonder pharmaceutical drugs they have been prescribing for decades?

The Pulse article continues....

        "Recognising that people’s health and wellbeing are determined mostly by a range of social, economic and environmental factors, social prescribing seeks to address people’s needs in a holistic way. It also aims to support individuals to take greater control of their own health."

No suggestion here that health can be found in a bottle of pharmaceutical pills! I wrote about social prescribing two years ago, in February 2020, when the UK's NHS were suggesting a greater use of "Talking Therapies" for depression and other mental health issues. More talking therapies, and less use of drugs? Was this, I asked, a tacit admission that pharmaceutical drugs were not the 'wonder drugs' we have been promised by conventional medicine for the last 100 years? Was this actually an admission that pharmaceutical drugs just do not work, that they caused more harm than good?

After all, if the drugs were really so wonderful, so effective, so safe, why would conventional medicine want to recommend using anything else?

The Pulse article recommended "a range of activities that are typically provided by voluntary and community sector organisations". Several examples were given, including volunteering, arts activities, group learning, gardening, befriending, cookery, healthy eating advice and a range of sports. 

Not a pharmaceutical drug anywhere to be seen!

Yet, social prescribing was described as capable of supporting many people "with a wide range of social, emotional or practical needs, and many schemes are focused on improving mental health and physical wellbeing". 

Support, without pharmaceutical drugs! An admission that would surely never have been made a few years ago - when the drug companies were busy telling us that medical science would in some future utopia be capable of transforming our lives, and our experience of illness!

        "Those who could benefit from social prescribing schemes include people with mild or long-term mental health problems, people with complex needs, people who are socially isolated and those with multiple long-term conditions who frequently attend either primary or secondary health care."

This is a large group of people. If they can be helped by social prescribing rather than taking prescription drugs it would mean much less use of pharmaceuticals. Do the drug companies approve of such a suggestion?

Social prescribing is certainly a less harmful, more positive alternative to pharmaceutical drugs, not least in that it recognises the importance to health of social and emotional interaction with other people. But coming from a journal, one of the pillars of conventional medicine, it is not a great endorsement of the treatment it has been handing out to us, in ever-increasing quantities, for the last 100 years.

It is very clearly an admission that the drug treatments conventional medicine has been using have not been successful, that the drugs have not delivered health in the way we have all been promised for so long.

So perhaps I am going to have to be more careful in future about the distinction between conventional and pharmaceutical medicine!

Postscript 29 April 2022

Conventional medicine continues to have a crisis of confidence is pharmaceutical drugs. This time it concerns painkilling drugs.

"GP's should prescribed tailored exercise and weight loss to relieve osteoarthritis" is an article in today's 'Pulse' magazine. It announcers new NICE guidelines for the treatment of osteoarthritis, thereby continuing the trend of conventional medicine moving away (slightly) from pharmaceutical medicine.

            "Updated NICE draft guidance has placed a greater emphasis on exercise and weight loss in patients with osteoarthritis, with use of strong painkillers not advised. GPs should offer tailored therapeutic exercise, such as aerobic activity or muscle strengthening, to all people with the condition as well as consider offering education or behaviour change programmes, NICE said."

It is more specific about the non-use of painkilling drugs.

            "Pharmacological treatments should be used at the lowest effective dose for the shortest possible time and topical NSAIDs should be the first choice for joint pain due to the condition. Paracetamol and glucosamine should not be routinely offered, strong opioids should not be used and weak opioids only used for short-term pain relief and when all other drug treatments are contraindicated, not tolerated or not effective."

Whether this will make any difference of how doctors treat osteoarthritis may be doubtful, but this constitutes yet another admission - that pharmaceutical drugs are not effective in the treatment of osteoarthritis.