[HN Gopher] How I Exposed the Biggest Pharma Scandal of Our Life...
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       How I Exposed the Biggest Pharma Scandal of Our Lifetime
        
       Author : fortran77
       Score  : 13 points
       Date   : 2023-08-21 21:20 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.thefp.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.thefp.com)
        
       | darkclouds wrote:
       | >My involvement in the story started simply. An editor asked me
       | to check out a tip that OxyContin, despite its manufacturer's
       | claims, was finding its way onto the streets of small towns
       | throughout Appalachia.
       | 
       | I think its scandalous that medical experts are still not able to
       | quantify pain when visiting a GP.
       | 
       | They dont know if I'm eating a grain rich diet which is high in
       | chromium and thus makes me feel pain more, or consuming large
       | amounts of tryptophan or nicotinic acid/niacin which dulls the
       | nociceptors in the brain. They dont even do a saliva test for the
       | stress hormones!
       | 
       | With GP's not reviewing our diets, can they really claim to be
       | experts, or do they recognise some of their drugs are such blunt
       | instruments, they make sledgehammers look positively appropriate
       | for chiselling Ming dynasty porcelain!
       | 
       | Govts are just legalised drug dealers!
        
         | AtlasBarfed wrote:
         | What is truly scandalous is the medical establishment playing
         | utterly dumb about how they were pushing opiates and similar
         | addictive drugs and pretending a brochure from some drug
         | company (which every highly educated medical professional knows
         | perfectly well isn't a reliable source of information) gave
         | them carte blanche to prescribe.
         | 
         | It really shows how morally bankrupt our medical system is. How
         | many people died while medical professionals took kickbacks and
         | golf trips and steak dinners while rampantly overprescribing
         | this stuff?
         | 
         | There was rampant defrauding of medicaid, huge surges of
         | overdose deaths.
         | 
         | I broke (in seven places) my collarbone about 7 years ago and
         | the number of different people (ambulance EMT, first nurse,
         | doctor, radiologist) who kept offering me painkillers was
         | frankly bizarre. Yes I was in pain, but I was fine with OTC
         | acetominophen and ibuprofen, certainly not in pain to risk a
         | lifelong addiction.
         | 
         | They of course sent me home from surgery with a bottle of the
         | stuff, and I didn't need it. But the weird thing was that I was
         | given some in postsurgery, and there was a bizarre faint desire
         | to use them, such that I felt compelled to get rid of them and
         | not have them in my residence.
         | 
         | The attitude of doctors saying "we didn't know they were
         | addictive" is absolutely outrageous. There were 100,000+ people
         | dying per year of opioids, and who knows if the stats are
         | undercounts. A million Americans may have died from opioid
         | overpresciption. Perhaps opioid deaths replaced heroin deaths.
         | Perhaps heroin deaths were exacerbated by opioid
         | overprescription.
         | 
         | Nevertheless, the medical establishment adopted the same "gee
         | whiz I had no idea that was happening" as the CEO of Purdue
         | Pharma. Except the medical establishment is full of ... medical
         | experts.
         | 
         | It really shows how bankrupt our for-profit medical system is,
         | how you can't take any advice from a doctor without considering
         | how they are being manipulated by drug/device company
         | incentives or insurance company limitations, how their medical
         | opinion is fundamentally compromised.
         | 
         | There is no longer trust.
        
           | codeTired wrote:
           | I had the pleasure of going to a pain clinic. It was filled
           | with patients and filled with young attractive sales reps.
           | Even back then in my 20s I felt uneasy. I then entered the
           | office described that I was having pain for a few months, no
           | more than 3 minutes later I was given a few days supply of
           | cymbalta and a prescription for said drug. 0 warnings about
           | possible side effects and felt like my medical needs were not
           | addressed at all.
           | 
           | This was after they were cracking down on opiates so cymbalta
           | became the next big thing. Now, there are issues coming about
           | those drugs too. I don't think it's as bad as opiates though.
           | 
           | I have learned that many doctors just plainly don't care. I
           | have some in my family and they don't see an issue with
           | getting free shit from sales reps.
        
         | [deleted]
        
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       (page generated 2023-08-21 23:01 UTC)