One of the things that attracts me most about blogging is that it allows me to shrug off the strictures of my daily editorial duties and wend my way to some elusive point, exploring a few of the marginally relevant paths less traveled along the way. Be patient. I do have a point and I will get there. Eventually.
My job involves attending quite a few forums and seminars on a variety of topics that often seem designed to try the patience of those who simply want to address some problem or other. Case in point: a recent Health Care Access Summit put on by a local foundation that is an integral part of the medical establishment.
I have been dealing with health care issues in almost every issue of my monthly magazine even though it’s plainly beyond the comprehension of even the most astute editor. In the naive hope that it would further my understanding, I accepted an invitation to attend the summit. The term “summit” is, of course, subject to a variety of interpretations. I’m not sure that mine matched that of the perpetrators.
I had just finished an extensive feature on complimentary health care providers and was highly sensitized to their roles in the unfolding drama. Complimentary health care is the politically correct term for chiropractors, naturopaths, acupuncturists and others outside the medical establishment.
Perusing the list of more than 200 attendees at the summit, I was astonished to note that not one complimentary health care practitioner had been invited. So much for the inclusive approach.
One of my journalistic heroes is Hunter Thompson, who not only raised digression to an art form but also put to rest the nonsensical idea that the reporter can be an objective, detached observer. With that in mind, I took the first opportunity to become part of the story I was covering. I impertinently pointed out the lack of representation on the part of complimentary care providers. The lame answer I got: “Well, we couldn’t invite everybody.”
Everybody seemed quite satisfied by that answer, so I quit taking the summit seriously and set off to pursue my own twisted curiosity. After the keynote speeches, the summit broke into a number of workshops, each supposedly dealing with a facet of the health care crisis.
One of them dealt with drugs and the cost thereof. Now, I will freely admit that I studied pharmacology rather seriously, if informally, during the 60s and 70s. I was often accused of having what was then known as “an illegal smile.” Over the years, I learned that drugs were not the answer but only one of many questions.
I did a lot of research for my articles on health care and one of the interesting things I learned was that pharmaceutical companies spend about $30 million a day on advertising. Hey, a million here, a million there, pretty soon you’re talking real money.
One of the terms I heard mentioned often during the workshops was “the purple pill.” I have seen an astounding number of advertisements for this potion given the fact that I watch very little television. Since there was nothing very constructive to do much of the time, I decided to do a little informal market research. I started asking people about the “purple pill.”
One hundred percent of the people I asked had heard of it. Only about one-third could actually associate a brand name with it (Nexium™). Only one, a pharmacist, knew what it was designed to do (treat acid reflux, formerly known as heartburn).
For those of you who haven’t seen the commercials, some of them feature large, broken land masses ponderously moving together under the influence of unseen forces. Strange people in politically correct racial proportions stand atop these masses, looking off into space as if anticipating the Second Coming. What does this have to do with heartburn? Damn if I know, but it seems to have penetrated the American consciousness like nothing since Homer Simpson.
We’re getting dangerously near the point here. The government is wasting bazillions of our tax dollars fighting the wrong drugs. Pot, meth, smack and ecstasy are surely wrecking many lives, but not nearly as many as the perfectly legal drugs that are being pushed by heavy campaign contributors.
The countless legal drugs that are being foisted off on us as cures for all our ills are turning us into a drug-addled society. Don’t like how you’re feeling today? Take a pill. The pill won’t cure what ails you, but you won’t care. Mother’s Little Helper is only a prescription away. And if Doc Jones won’t write the prescription, Doc Smith will. They’ve learned from the pharmaceutical detail men that a pill saves a lot of dreary diagnosis.
Our medical paradigm is based on economics, not healing. You can make a lot more money by treating diseases rather than preventing them. There are a mind-boggling number of legal drugs out there. The FDA can’t even begin to test all the possible combinations. So the pharmaceutical industry relies on experimental animals. You and me.
12:35:48 AM 
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