Vitamin, Mineral, and Herb Ban

Proper advice? Are you saying that pharmaceutical intervention is always the correct mode of action?

Read the words, professor. I said proper advice. Meaning advice from a doctor.

Please don't call me a quack. I have medical qualifications, unlike the numerous New-age herbalists and other anti-science charlatans who you trust.

 

Adverse drug reactions are now the fourth biggest killer, after heart disease, cancer and stroke.

The statement is very misleading when used to provide a claim that conventional medicines are more dangerous then herbal medicines. The study in JAMA is taken totally out of context because it is looking at the cause of death of people who are ill enough to need admission to hospital in USA.

http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/279/15/1200


It does show that hospital is a very dangerous place. However, so are the road, most construction sites, farms, factories, kitchens and sport halls.

 

So only doctors are able to give proper advice? Intelligent non-medically qualified indivduals are not able to review medical literature and arrive at a proper conclusion? Oh the arrogance.

Doctor heal thyself.

 

if you want to take the advice of someone who has no qualifications relevant to the subject they are advising about then good luck gary, perhaps your recent medical problems had something to do with that kind of thinking... oh the stupidity.
idiot, educate thyself.

cheers


julian

 

I am saying that people have the right to supplement their diet as they have been doing.

I am unsure what you mean about my injury. I am unsure why you believe such a terrible tragic period of my life is open for you to attack. I was totally disabled. After failings here, I did diagnose myself and arrange treatment in France with a leading professor of neurology. I also helped to set up a web forum for other sufferers of the condition and I personally acted as go between for UK sufferers and arranged 27 operations. The forum has gone on to arrange 500 operations.

I am not an idiot; I am well educated.

 

The doctors are well-educated, too. You still think of them as idiots and crooks.

Would you care to provide a link to the forum you mention?

 

My experience

Having suffered from Cancer and recieved 18months of Chemotherapy, which cured me, I take a personal interest in these matters.

I've wittnessed a very much loved local person, who had cancer and was taking advice from *New-age Healers* loose her life as a direct result of these so called healers. They had convinced her not to take the Chemotherapy offered by the proffesionals, I pleaded with her to reconsider, as my own experience had lead me to a cure......She refused such was her faith in these people. I watched her decline and eventually die, t'was very sad to wittness..........

My honest opinion is that all types of healing are beneficial, but all should be regulated and intergrated. There are too many do gooders and not enough proffesionals in health care. Western medicine has it's place but alternative practices also have their place, so long as they are regulated.

For instance some herb's do help to heal the after effects of prolonged chemotherapy. Why does western medicine not recognise this fact?

Some Docters are indeed crooks, but so are some alternative healers..........How are we supposed to know? On top of which, all humans make mistake's. You take's ya chance...................

Barnie.

 

gary,
as far as i can see the legislation is mainly going to be there to protect people from making ill informed decisions. your going on about global conspiracies is a bit over the top and a similar argument could be levelled at a mythical consortium of alternative medicine purveyors who suddenly see their lucrative market becoming more structured and less profitable, of which you are a willing pawn.
i wasn't attacking the fact that you were ill, i notice that you consulted a neurologist not a psycic surgeon or other 'alternative' medical practicioner to effect your cure. your activities helping others is laudable.
education is not intelligence or wisdom.
cheers


julian

 

Going on the evidence of your complete misinterpretation of the JAMA data, it would appear not.

I heard of a recent case where a child died from diabetes because the parents, who had rejected 'Western' medicine as worthless, treated the diabetes with herbal remedies instead of life-saving insulin.

Rather like Astrology, Herbalism seems all very well as a bit of a harmless lark for people with nothing much wrong with them in the first place, but it must be recognised that there are some problems with it, for example the Kava-kava debacle. If the remedies were tested under proper, scientific prospective clinical trial conditions, and shown to be both safe and effective, then there would be less of a problem with it, although the issue of potential drug interactions would also have to be assessed.

A large proportion of modern pharmaceutical drugs are/were originally derived from plant extracts.

 

I would be all for the new legislation if it were concieved for the reasons you mention i.e. to protect. If governments were really that concerned with our health they would outlaw cigareetes and alcohol.

Remember some conspiracy theories are true or have the ring of truth. Let's examine the facts: the pharmaceutical cartel does lobby governmen. Pharmaceutical and defence lobbies are the two most powerful lobbies. Any fool can realise that the Iraq war was about oil interests; why can you not accept that all is not what it seems with this motion?

Of course I consulted a surgeon. i had a mechanical problem. I have also chased away shark oil salesmen who sought to prey on the venerabilities of my forum members. Mechanical entrapments require surgical intervention.

Many people believe that supplementation improves their quality of life or improves their symptoms. I believe I should have the right to continue buying cod liver, zinc, vitamin C, and B-complex. Let's face it, people are not dying from supplementation.

I am also intelligent and wise.

 

The tobacco/alcohol argument is nonsensical because these products are not marketed as being good for the health. Having said that, there is some evidence to suggest that moderate red wine consumption reduces cardiovascular risks.

To extend your argument a little further, Mr Bumboy, what about the 5000 road deaths annually? Should we ban roads too?

 

I have learnt in recent months (WMD dossier etc) that misrepresentation and bluff can often win arguments.

The thing is Doc, you bring up these isolated anecdotal cases and expect me to change my beliefs. Of course there are muppets out there doomed to forever make the wrong choices.

Like I said, I am less interested in herbs; I am more interested in vitamins and minerals. I too believe that more studies need to be done. The problem is that the supplement industry is unable to meet the costs of the kind of tests being proposed; so they are damned if they do and damned if they don't.

Why are we regulating and restricting availability of supplements? Do we really need protecting? Is supplement abuse really an issue? Why can we not have choice? What part has the pharma lobby played in the legislation? Can this activity be considered lawful? I believe we are witnessing further fascist blurring of industry and state.

I do believe that pharma companies are seeking to destroy competition. I do believe that pharmaceutical companies would rather a patient was treated and not cured. Business is war. Lobbies exist for a reason.

 

What about the UK's 1st largest killer of adult males under 35: suicide. Should we ban society?

I just want to take my cod liver, vitamin C, and b-complex. I want you to recognise that supplementation can be a good thing. I have benefitted from nutritional supplementation, and so have others. There is research to indicate that supplement regimes can be useful and that deficiencies do exist in the general population. Rath and Linus are not the only medically trained doctors involved with vitamin experimentation.

I just want choice.

 

Yes, but even vitamin supplements can be dangerous in the wrong circumstances: vitamin A in pregnancy, for example, causes birth defects.

Excessive calcium and iron are also potentially toxic. Magnesium salts will give you diarrhoea....etc.

Unless you have a gut disorder, or a terrible diet, these things are simply not necessary, and you are just wasting your money.

 

Surely better education is key here?

Do I not have the right to waste my money? Linford took nutritional supplements. Most premier league footbal players take supplements. I am an athlete, why am I not allowed to supplement?

 

gary,
from what i read of the documentation (and i freely admit i only skimmed it) health suppliments like those you describe would be little effected as they could still be suplied but not in ludicrously high multiples of the RDA - 3 or 4 times rda strength max was quoted i believe. if this is the case then surely there is no problem. at present i take a 1 a day suppliment, cod liver oil (a high strength one but if i want to maintain the same level post legislation i'll just take more capsules), l-glutamine and l-carnitine. with the last 2 i'm not sure whether they'll be available post legislation but to be honest they aren;t really doing much for me that i can tell so if they get outlawed i'll not mind much.
if i'm wrong then fair enough but if it's just the ludicrously high strength doses that are being regulated then this seems to make sense with a clampdown on quackery rather than a pharmaco conspiracy.
cheers


julian

 

Most professional athletes are taking performance-enhancing drugs as well. Linford himself was busted, was he not? Footballers are not generally noted for their intelligence, nor their knowledge about nutrition.

Yes I suppose people have the right to spend their money how they like. It's just that I (speaking as a person whose roots are/were in the working-class, but whose education & job has catapulted me into the middle-class) am totally fed up with the middle-class, Guardian-reading, lentil-munching view of doctors vs New-Age healers. And I don't relish picking up the pieces when it all goes horribly wrong. And I read the Telegraph. So there.

 

My Dad suffers from arthritis, and he believes that his daily cod liver tablets help his condition a hell of a lot. He says that he would be in a great deal of pain without them, and i am pretty sure that its been proven that it does have benefit. So what I want to know is, why ban things like this? Fair enough there are some things about which little is known, and perhaps its for the best that they are outlawed, but who knows.

At the end of the day, we are all adults, and people should be allowed to choose for themselves what they do. Banning things just isnt the answer, people will get them elsewhere anyway.

I admit for a lot of things, pharmaceutical drugs are definitely better, hell I take lots of them every day and they all help with my various annoying symptoms, but I see no benefit to banning fairly proven things such as Cod liver oil or vitamins.

 

http://www.nelh.nhs.uk/hth/codliveroil.asp

There does seems to be a lot of interest in fish oil for arthritis. Knee jerk responses without careful thinking is not really helpful.

What we need is more good research. For example, is the effects dose dependent. How much is required before real benefit kicks in? What is in the fish oil that is beneficial? If it is definatelly proven, should we add it into common food like bread in society that don't eat fish a lot?

What is really interesting is why do we need to take costly supplements if the manufacturers who sale them are reluctant to contribute money to prove it is really useful in the first place and safe. Actually, it does seems to sounds a bit like expensive audiophile cables, doesn't it?

 

Tones,

So we have something in common after all! Novartis is one of the legacy companies of our newly formed company. Do you have connections with any Syngenta people in Basel?

Cheers, Robbo