Angell of Truth

"...conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine."

--Marcia Angell

This quote comes from Angell's January 15th article in the New York Review of Books called "Drug Companies and Doctors: A Story of Corruption." It is significant that she speaks out so blatantly about what has become one of the biggest threats to our country - because she was in fact an editor for a most prestigious medical journal. Her credentials are sound and her scathing assessment of our health industry should be noted.

Read!

In a time when we are perhaps about to move toward a nationalized healthcare system, we must address the collapse of scientific study - particularly with regard to medicine. Because what is very possible, is that the government will have even more to say in how we treat our ailments, and also continue to pad the FDA with members of the pharmaceutical industry. As a country, we are blissfully ignorant of how this system operates, how doctors practice, and how much research studies have become pseudoscience. Bluntly, much of it is a scam, and a lot of doctors are assaulting patients with dangerous snake oil.

I hope people take the time to educate themselves. Doctors have become the new priests in America, and it's time to remove the cloak and demand that the patient and not the wallet is the only thing that matters.