Dangerous but legal? how????

[JaneP]

The thing about it CAUSING M.S. is what is misleading. It causes M.S. like symptoms. I know someone who, after they stopped drinking that diet soda had their mood and their muscle control get better! There is also a story mentioned by Kevin Tredeau in his books about a lady who's symptoms were so severe ...darn what's the name.....I think they're from opium-like drugs -starts with a V I think.... was hardly helping. After she stopped drinking that trash, within A WEEK she started walking again! After I seen the outcome of my fly experiment (see above in 1 of my notes) I wouldn't touch the garbage again for anything! I mean, go out in a farm pasture and see what flies will sit on -but they won't touch aspartame! Even the biggest skeptics would have to admit that says at least SOMETHING about the stuff!

 

[masterjen]

I think what all this boils down to is RESEARCH. If we all research carefully performed scientific studies covering BOTH sides of the aspartame story, we are in a good position to make our own decisions. And not everyone's decision regarding consuming it will be the same.

 

[JaneP]

Problem there is, it's obviously VERY easy to twist studies into whatever they want with enough $ (to put it bluntly). Same as the drug companies so often. Sad, but think about it....if you have something that is making you & your stockholders rich beyond their wildest dreams & suddenly someone comes along with information that may threaten your profits or even your business, wouldn't you do everything you could to safeguard it? (How many times have dangerous side effects been released only AFTER patents expire? ...Much more than we're often told). You'd think things would be different when it comes to profits Vs. health in this Country! You'll never get the research needed on these kinds of things that is truly fair and unbiased because of lobbying efforts. (Look at how long safety issues of tobacco & cigs. were hidden & flat out LIED about in Congress, to the FDA, etc.!) Granted to me, it's not the tobacco in its RAW, UNPROCESSED state, but more so the chemicals and what-not used in manufacturing -similar to the stuff dumped in fast "food" ...but that's another story). Sad & sick to say the least, but what I've heard older people say about $ buying anything in this Country seems to be true -even when it comes to truth about people's health & lives. Until we get some younger blood in Congress in this Country that haven't had time to snuggle up to lobbying groups & special interest nothing's going to get done decent.

 

[epileric]

The thing about it CAUSING M.S. is what is misleading. It causes M.S. like symptoms. I know someone who, after they stopped drinking that diet soda had their mood and their muscle control get better! There is also a story mentioned by Kevin Tredeau in his books about a lady who's symptoms were so severe

First of all, there is no reason to think that aspartame causes MS. My dad had MS & he never ingested aspartame in his life (it was illegal in Canada then). Also, just because your friends symptoms went away doesn’t mean it was the lack of aspartame that caused it. It would be more likely to be the caffeine in the cola that caused it (yes, it is in diet colas) as well as many other things from being placebo effect to better eating & sleeping to what people call “Regression to the mean” meaning that it’s just part of his health cycle .

Kevin Trudeau has been discussed here previously http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com/forums/f40/natural-cures-they-dont-want-you-know-about-610/. Also Trudeau has been arrested for fraud. That alone makes his claims questionable but let’s look at the rest of the stuff he says.

• He thinks you should get 15 colonics in 30 days. Ewww! Sounds like somebody spent some time at the Battle Creek Sanitarium.
• He claims wearing white clothing is a cure for depression, especially if you bounce on a trampoline for ten minutes a day while wearing it.[5]
• He recommends a practice called sungazing which is, literally, staring directly at the sun around sunrise or sunset, and claims many diseases have been "cured" this way (it also cures away your eyesight, pesky thing that it is).
• If you do everything on a long, complex to-do list he claims you will never get sick again. This way he is covered — if somebody does get sick he can just say you didn't do everything on the list, which would be true because nobody would have the time nor means to do all those things.

The insanity goes too far
Trudeau also preaches the Illuminati conspiracy theory and claims to be a former member of the organisation. He also runs a website, MeetIlluminatiMembers.com, where he sells 'memberships' to the Illuminati with an initiation fee of only $1000. Seriously[6]. He then requires monthly payments of $150 once the individual has become an Illuminati member. Trudeau claims that individuals who join his secret society will have access to powerful people who all escaped the Illuminati (hence the title of his website), and thus will be able to learn all the secrets of gaining wealth and power themselves. How wonderful! Conspiracy theorist Mark Dice (whose work we usually don't endorse) did a reasonably good job in exposing Trudeau on his website and in his book, The Illuminati Facts And Fiction[7].
• He thinks you should get 15 colonics in 30 days. Ewww! Sounds like somebody spent some time at the Battle Creek Sanitarium.
• He claims wearing white clothing is a cure for depression, especially if you bounce on a trampoline for ten minutes a day while wearing it.[5]
• He recommends a practice called sungazing which is, literally, staring directly at the sun around sunrise or sunset, and claims many diseases have been "cured" this way (it also cures away your eyesight, pesky thing that it is).
• If you do everything on a long, complex to-do list he claims you will never get sick again. This way he is covered — if somebody does get sick he can just say you didn't do everything on the list, which would be true because nobody would have the time nor means to do all those things.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Kevin_Trudeau#Batshit_insanity

He is an amazing marketer though

Kevin Trudeau pioneered a fascinating multimedia technique. He used an infomercial to sell a glossy book which, in an interesting twist, turns out to be mainly a teaser/advertisement for his pay website. Thus he transcends the need for any actual product - everything is marketing. You pay to receive more advertising. Wanna bet that the main content of his pay website is advertisements for his next book?
Those who have signed up for his pay website report that they charge your credit card monthly while making it deliberately difficult to contact them requesting to unsubscribe, with such requests often ignored or taking several months to process. Thus the poor unfortunates who made the misstep of giving their credit card number to a convicted felon who pled guilty to credit card fraud are left with the choice of either going through the long process of contesting several months' charges on their credit card, or just sucking up the loss.

It’s facts like this that make me laugh when he claims how the medical system is only concerned with money. With behaviour like that I would not trust a word he says. He also seems to spend more time attacking “the system” & making claims of conspiracies but usually avoids giving justification to his own claims as most con artists do.

Problem there is, it's obviously VERY easy to twist studies into whatever they want with enough $ (to put it bluntly). Same as the drug companies so often. Sad, but think about it....if you have something that is making you & your stockholders rich beyond their wildest dreams & suddenly someone comes along with information that may threaten your profits or even your business, wouldn't you do everything you could to safeguard it? (How many times have dangerous side effects been released only AFTER patents expire? ...Much more than we're often told). You'd think things would be different when it comes to profits Vs. health in this Country! You'll never get the research needed on these kinds of things that is truly fair and unbiased because of lobbying efforts. (Look at how long safety issues of tobacco & cigs. were hidden & flat out LIED about in Congress, to the FDA, etc.!) Granted to me, it's not the tobacco in its RAW, UNPROCESSED state, but more so the chemicals and what-not used in manufacturing -similar to the stuff dumped in fast "food" ...but that's another story). Sad & sick to say the least, but what I've heard older people say about $ buying anything in this Country seems to be true -even when it comes to truth about people's health & lives. Until we get some younger blood in Congress in this Country that haven't had time to snuggle up to lobbying groups & special interest nothing's going to get done decent.

I don’t think a study is that easy to twist. If someone does a study then other professionals can re-do the study & see if it’s valid. However, you’re saying that we should ignore studies that were done and listen to people that have no studies (or proof) at all, just tons of anecdotal evidence & unverifiable stories. I’m not saying that the laws regulating pharmaceuticals don’t need to be revamped and more strict, but that doesn’t mean that we should put our faith in claims that have no proof at all.
I would suggest you check out the AllTrialsRegistered which is trying to get all scientific studies registered so that nobody can pretend it never happened. You might also want to sign the petition. Check out Ben Goldacre who is one of the main people responsible for the All Trials Registered campaign. He gives a good understanding of how misinformation is spread & how it needs to be addressed.
Could you give an example of a drug that didn’t release side-effects until after the patents expired? Obviously some long term effects might be discovered afterwards but it any drug that claims to cure has to have side-effects because of the changes caused in the body. You’re saying something is happening that we’re not told about so how do you (or whoever told you) know about this? It does sound like a conspiracy theory typical of what Trudeau or Mercola would say though.
I have to agree that the tobacco industry were very good at deceiving the public & FDA but you have to realize that tobacco, very much like supplements did not fall under the category of a pharmaceutical so they went through much less scrutiny. It is for that reason that I believe both pharmaceuticals & supplements should be audited more strictly. I realise that many con artists and conspiracy theorists claim that money & lobby groups are the epitome of evil but you have to realise that the supplement & “health” lobby are very strong too and are just as focused on profit and much of that profit comes from demonising the competition (pharmaceutical and medical companies).

As Americans search for new ways to lose weight, build muscle and increase their energy levels, some have turned to this fast-growing industry for answers. Falling under the purview of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, many of this category’s over-the-counter products are classified as food rather than drugs. This means nutritional and dietary supplements face far less regulation by the Food and Drug Administration and are more readily available to consumers.

For many years, Democratic legislators tried to pass a bill that would require supplements to be regulated as if they were prescription drugs. But key players in the industry have continued to oppose efforts to replace the DSHEA, contending that increased regulation would limit consumers’ access to dietary supplements at a time when the U.S. population is rapidly aging and the health care system is already spread too thin.

In 2009, the industry pushed for a role in health care reform, specifically advocating for the Dietary Supplement Tax Fairness Act of 2009, which would allow dietary supplements to be considered deductible medical expenses. It did not pass.

Skepticism of manufacturers’ claims of the health value of certain supplements increased after the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine found popular supplements such as St. John’s wort and echinacea to have no significant benefits. In 2004, lawmakers began taking a closer look at the industry as a whole when ephedra, an ingredient in many dietary supplements, was linked to athlete fatalities at the professional, college and even high school levels. Ephedra was banned in 2004 and remains illegal in the United States.

The industry’s federal campaign contributions fell precipitously after the 2000 election cycle, in part because of the ban on unlimited “soft” money contributions to national political parties. Recently, however, the industry has increased its contributions, spending more than $1.5 million in the 2012 election cycle. From 2008 to 2012 a majority of the contributions have gone to the Republican party, a new trend for the industry, which has traditionally given more money to the Democrats.

The industry has stepped up its lobbying efforts in recent years. Top lobbyists include Herbalife International, the Coalition to Preserve DSHEA and the Council for Responsible Nutrition. Major players in the industry, such as the Coalition to Preserve DSHEA, support legislation that would allow participating households to buy nutritional supplements with food stamps.

http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/background.php?cycle=2014&ind=H4600

 

[JaneP]

Well, there are people who will not believe anything unless they are literally holding it in their own hand (and then some of those will even question whether or not what they are holding is actually the real item or just a replica) ....I know several people like that & they drive me up the wall. Then there are those who will expand their field of vision in the world (realm?) of possibilities which many times (as I and many others) have witnessed on many occasions. People used home/natural remedies in this Country for generations until the mighty drug industries came along and offered a quick fix to things (and of course with our "everything has to be done yesterday" attitude today we're all too happy to immediately jump on that band wagon and then tend to forget that "grandma" did indeed have wisdom that we (would rather?) forget today in exchange for "gotta' have it NOW".
Personally this dive into natural/Eastern/herbal stuff has been the greatest thing I've ever done for me! Don't get me wrong, I was just as skeptical as you sound Eric when I first heard of "old fashioned" remedies. All I ever heard were the "snake oil" stories that often people would go around peddling in the Depression or traveling salesmen would do. But after going through many, many years of limited results with drugs I figured "Heck, if it don't work, I'm no worse off. The worst that can happen is I lose $20." After not too long I really started to notice a decline in severity & frequency of seizures that NO drug could ever accomplish for me.
The way I see it, some people desire to compile the negative about people & things and run with it (I know several like that personally), and well, that's their right. But in retrospect, THEY'RE the ones missing out on what they could be discovering. Everyone knows the media LOVES to discredit & dig dirt up on people often & make them look as criminal or evil as possible (sad as it is). But if you go searching deeper for the other half of the coin you often discover what they're not telling you (AKA "...what 'they' don't want you to know" to quote Tredeau's book)
All I know is what I've seen on myself & others has worked much better than any drug I've ever tried for things, and personally I've been convinced for years that if Nature would've meant for us to be sustained on drugs, Someone would've made pills grow on trees for us to stay healthy with instead of food.
If you don't think a study is easy to twist, have someone shove a few thousand dollars under your nose...... Happens all the time in Washington D.C. -everyone knows it.

 

[epileric]

Well, there are people who will not believe anything unless they are literally holding it in their own hand (and then some of those will even question whether or not what they are holding is actually the real item or just a replica) ....I know several people like that & they drive me up the wall.

Actually, when we’re dealing with my health I don’t think it’s very smart to put trust in things that haven’t been proven. I think that the fact that it is so important to you that people blindly trust something says to me that there probably is no proof that it works. I honestly think it’s better to ask too many questions than to not ask enough.

Then there are those who will expand their field of vision in the world (realm?) of possibilities which many times (as I and many others) have witnessed on many occasions. People used home/natural remedies in this Country for generations until the mighty drug industries came along and offered a quick fix to things (and of course with our "everything has to be done yesterday" attitude today we're all too happy to immediately jump on that band wagon and then tend to forget that "grandma" did indeed have wisdom that we (would rather?) forget today in exchange for "gotta' have it NOW".

I don’t know if blindly accepting someones claims without proof is expanding ones vision, especially with people like Trudeau who spend all their time telling of conspiracy theories but don’t say much of cures & claim it’s “the system” that won’t let them speak.

True we are very impatient as a society & need things immediately but I can’t blame people not trusting questionable practices on that fact. Even mainstream medical remedies don’t work as very fast. I can say that people who sell remedies that don’t work often say it takes a long time so that the person can get better on their own & credit it to the remedy.
You do claim that people have been using these “therapies” for years & that justifies them. That’s so common a fallacy that they gave it a name- the Appeal to Tradition Many things have been used long ago but are not true. If having done it previously even for long periods of time made something valid then we’d still be practicing bloodletting

Something typical of all conspiracy theorists is like I said before, they spend more time criticising non-believers (& of course big pharma) rather than giving good justifications as to why their alternatives work. Also, you’ve given me no reason to believe in a known fraud other than anecdotal evidence. Of course that’s all he’s given so I’m not surprised. I have to agree that the media tend to glorify things & love to dig up dirt but when someone has gone to court in the US then it is pretty easy to confirm that they were charged. I hope you're not saying that because the media dig up dirt on people that we should ignore the dirt they have dug up on Trudeau.

Personally this dive into natural/Eastern/herbal stuff has been the greatest thing I've ever done for me! Don't get me wrong, I was just as skeptical as you sound Eric when I first heard of "old fashioned" remedies. All I ever heard were the "snake oil" stories that often people would go around peddling in the Depression or traveling salesmen would do. But after going through many, many years of limited results with drugs I figured "Heck, if it don't work, I'm no worse off. The worst that can happen is I lose $20." After not too long I really started to notice a decline in severity & frequency of seizures that NO drug could ever accomplish for me.
The way I see it, some people desire to compile the negative about people & things and run with it (I know several like that personally), and well, that's their right. But in retrospect, THEY'RE the ones missing out on what they could be discovering. Everyone knows the media LOVES to discredit & dig dirt up on people often & make them look as criminal or evil as possible (sad as it is). But if you go searching deeper for the other half of the coin you often discover what they're not telling you (AKA "...what 'they' don't want you to know" to quote Tredeau's book)

It isn’t a matter of just labelling something “snake oil”. It’s a matter of someone doing nothing but believing in old wives tails & making conspiracy claims of how evil modern medicine is & using that as an excuse not to tell me anything else. I think that behaviour is why he is known as a snake oil salesman.
There are people in this world who like to focus on the negative and yes, that is the job of the media but I hope you’re not saying that because someone points out that you’re listening to the advice of a proven fraudster that they’re just being negative & we should ignore Trudeaus past legal convictions. By that standard I could say that you’re just focusing on the negative of the pharmaceutical companies. After all, they have helped many people with numerous diseases which is more than what Trudeau has done.
I find it odd that you’d accuse people of liking to compile negative things when all you’ve done is say negative things about modern medicine & people who don’t believe in Trudeaus claims instead of giving me factual proof of why his practices are legitimate.

All I know is what I've seen on myself & others has worked much better than any drug I've ever tried for things, and personally I've been convinced for years that if Nature would've meant for us to be sustained on drugs, Someone would've made pills grow on trees for us to stay healthy with instead of food.
If you don't think a study is easy to twist, have someone shove a few thousand dollars under your nose...... Happens all the time in Washington D.C. -everyone knows it.

Like I’ve said before, anecdotal evidence just doesn’t count as evidence. If I’m going to accept something as a cure in my body I’m going to want to know it’s been studied as in depth as possible. I have to agree that we do need changes to how pharmaceutical companies do their studies but that doesn’t mean that we should accept something that isn’t studied at all or proven not to work.

Again- that fallacious conspiracy theory of money controlling everything. Aside from your assumption, you have no facts to prove that is what happens with every politician & every pharmaceutical company like you claim. Everyone in DC knows it?? Doesn't that sound like a false conspiracy theory to you? What I find odd is that you never question Trudeaus income after doing things like selling a book that was an add for his webiste that notoriously ripped people off or claiming to sell a book with cures then claiming in the book that he can't because of a big conspiracy, even ignoring his fraud conviction those are good reasons not to trust him. Also, like I've said before- you spend more time changing topics & claiming conspiracies rather than telling me why Trudeaus claims are valid. Don't you think that would make anyone question the validity of your claims?

 

[JaneP]

*Shaking head* (it's just that this is starting to be kind of funny playing devil's advocate back & forth)
I suggest you go read his book "Weight loss cures. What 'they' don't want you to know." (I know that won't go anywhere! .....JUST KIDDING) He says the same thing my favorite 2 M.D.'s have said over & over: These popular weight loss tricks, diets, fads, etc. are SO amusing! There's ONE way to really lose fat.....Stop eating carbs. and (I know you're going to be shaking your head at me after reading this) ironically eat MORE fat. Before you come looking for me with a net & white coat for saying that (I'm just being cute today), this IS based on simple chemistry & physiological matters: First your body burns its sugar, of which it has about 24 Hr. supply. Then it burns its carb supply (about 2 days if I recall being told right). Only AFTER your carbs. are pretty much gone does your body even THINK about touching its fat reserve. And because hardly anyone -if anyone- can manage to eat a 100% carb. diet everyday (there's always SOME fat in your daily diet, be it minute maybe) your body isn't going to use it at all as long as it's being fed any carbs. & sugar. So all it will do is store & store & store it waiting & waiting. Because of, once again, our ways in this Country, our diets are SO overwhelmed with pasta, bread, rice, sugar (please, no aspartame cracks) potatoes, etc. we don't BURN the fat we eat (at least not most of it). Obviously (and because of brevity, this is where you won't find Douglass & Mercola who have covered this before get into this much detail) you can't sit down & eat a pound of bacon a day and work at a desk job & expect this to work. But from the standpoint of this is how our bodies burn food, this works perfect because your body is burning the weight off using its only supply left (yeah it has protein but if you start burning that you're in trouble, so that doesn't count). Tredeau covers that whole thing in his other book. I've lost 15 pounds in about 2 months with this and I'm trying to see if this doesn't play into a (here's that dreaded word again)....theory of mine. That because the only thing I've changed since H.S. (which is when I noticed my seizures increase) is about 40 pounds weight may have something to do with seizures. I'm going to start keeping watch & see if anything changes.

 

[epileric]

I'm surprised you'd bring that book up considering Trudeau was sued for false claims on that book.

On November 16, 2007, Trudeau was found in contempt of the 2004 court order for making "patently false" claims in his weight loss book. U.S. District Court Judge Robert W. Gettleman ruled that Trudeau “clearly misrepresents in his advertisements the difficulty of the diet described in his book, and by doing so, he has misled thousands of consumers.” A penalty will be determined at a later hearing.[6][7][8] In October 2008, Trudeau was fined more than $5 million and banned from infomercials for three years for continuing to make fraudulent claims pertaining to the book.[9]

Complaints about Trudeau's weight loss system and business practices can be found at the Consumer Affairs website. In summary, the complaints tend to refer to a problem of unsubscribing from the website and its monthly fees as well as the inability to follow the protocol, detailed by Trudeau, in the United States due to product availability and legal reasons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Weight-Loss_Cure_%22They%22_Don%27t_Want_You_to_Know_About

Despite no formal medical training and several criminal convictions, Trudeau has sold millions of books offering cures for dozens of ailments, from faltering memory to hair loss. They have titles such as "The Weight Loss Cure 'They' Don't Want You to Know About," the book at the center of his latest legal trouble.

The FTC first sued Trudeau in 1998, charging that he made false and unsubstantiated claims in infomercials for hair growth, memory and weight-loss products. In 2003, the agency sued Trudeau for deceptively marketing a calcium product as a cancer cure and a product called Biotape as a pain reliever.

Trudeau paid $2 million in 2004 to settle the FTC's charges and agreed to comply with a court order banning him from infomercials except those that accurately promote books.

Three years later, the judge held Trudeau in civil contempt for misrepresenting some of the facts in an ad for his best-selling weight-loss book, namely that the diet plan was easy and allowed adherents to eat anything they wanted.

http://news.msn.com/us/pitchman-in-contempt-for-not-paying-dollar37m-fine

He does give a few good suggestions but he mixes it with complete & utter quackery

Most of the steps are downright weird and have no scientific basis! You can’t wear makeup, other than a little natural eyeliner and lipstick. This is because makeup makes you fat. I hope you don’t have dry skin, because you can’t use body lotion. That’s right, it will make you fat. You also have to buy a special expensive magnet which you wear around your neck.

Do you have a heart condition? Diabetes? Epilepsy? Depression? Allergies? Headaches? If you are taking ANY medication, you have to stop taking it. According to Kevin Trudeau, “ALL non-prescription, over-the-counter, and prescription medications of every kind absolutely, 100%, are proven to lead to weight gain and obesity. All non-prescription, over-the-counter, and prescription medications and drugs absolutely, 100%, cause illness and disease. This is proven. No drug, including even a common aspirin, is safe.”

BUT! Get yourself to a physician quick, because you must ask for a PRESCRIPTION for human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). hCG is a hormone excreted in the urine of a pregnant woman. Injections of this hormone, when combined with an extremely low calorie diet of 500 calories per day, are claimed to cause rapid fat loss. First Trudeau tells us that every prescription is proven without a doubt to cause obesity, then he tells us to get a prescription to cure it?

http://www.3fatchicks.com/the-weight-loss-cure-they-dont-want-you-to-know-about-by-kevin-trudeau/

Not only does he not have any medical training & suggest quackery (I bolded those facts) but he suggests people with disabilities like epilepsy stop their medications. This is what makes people like him dangerous and one of the reasons he is constantly being sued. Conspiracy has nothing to do with it.

He also recommends hCG & that has been proven to be completely useless numerous times.

Numerous clinical trials have shown HCG to be ineffectual in producing weight loss. HCG injections can induce a slight increase in muscle mass in androgen-deficient males. The diet used in the Simeons method provides a lower protein intake than is advisable in view of current knowledge and practice. There are few medical literature reports favorable to the Simeons method; the overwhelming majority of medical reports are critical of it. Physicians employing either the HCG or the diet recommended by Simeons may expose themselves to criticism from other physicians, from insurers, or from government bodies.

The HCG Diet: Yet another ineffective quick fix diet plan and supplement

 

[epileric]

Also....

This review didn't speak highly of the book either but they gave a list of 10 red flags (all of which Trudeaus book has) that will imply something is quackery that I feel can be good advice when evaluating any treatment of any sort:

And what are the 10 red flags? According to the FNSA, they are:

- Recommendations that promise a quick fix.
-Dire warnings of danger from a single product or regimen.
-Claims that sound too good to be true.
-Simplistic conclusions drawn from a complex scientific study.
-Recommendations based on a single study.
-Dramatic statements that are refuted by reputable scientific organizations.
-Lists of "good" and "bad" foods.
-Recommendations made to help sell a product.
-Recommendations based on studies published without peer review.
-Recommendations from studies that ignore difficulties among individuals or groups.

http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/weight-loss-cure-dont-want-you-to-know

 

[JaneP]

In all fairness, if you would've walked up to someone 150 years ago and in effect said "HEY! Take this man made drug! A company invented it. It'll cure you!" people probably would've at best shaken their head at you too. How about Celebrex, Phen-fen, Vioxx, Guardasil, let's see.....what else in the last few years? How much $ is in their wallets from the sale of those and more before something was found not right?
Well, I don't know, but with the luck I've had with what I've tried in the last 20+ years and what it's done (and that drugs haven't), I think I'll stay with the "wild" ideas of the "convicts" and "frauds" as so many people say. They may be annoying some people in the world, but they're working for me (any many others I've taught this stuff to). As I always say to people: the more I get into this natural stuff and the more I see more of it work, the more I'm convinced that if Someone who knew what He was doing a lot more than we do meant for us to live on drugs, pills would be growing on trees as our food.

 

[epileric]

In all fairness, if you would've walked up to someone 150 years ago and in effect said "HEY! Take this man made drug! A company invented it. It'll cure you!" people probably would've at best shaken their head at you too. How about Celebrex, Phen-fen, Vioxx, Guardasil, let's see.....what else in the last few years? How much $ is in their wallets from the sale of those and more before something was found not right?

Are you saying that Trudeau is just ahead of his time & we haven't caught up yet? I'm not sure what relevance what you said has to the conversation.

 

[masterjen]

\ As I always say to people: the more I get into this natural stuff and the more I see more of it work, the more I'm convinced that if Someone who knew what He was doing a lot more than we do meant for us to live on drugs, pills would be growing on trees as our food.

You refer to "natural stuff". Did you know that many drugs ARE natural? For consideration, note this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_product
So many pills, in fact, do grow on trees (plants). And they live in the oceans. And inside animals. You can't get more natural than this!

 

[JaneP]

Point being: why does man have to stick his fingers in it and make it "better" or "improve" on it? Science is NOT better than nature. You can't get a patent on something you didn't invent, so no one can patent a natural plant. But take it and process it into something else...... there you go $$$$$

 

[epileric]

Point being: why does man have to stick his fingers in it and make it "better" or "improve" on it? Science is NOT better than nature.

Well, Drugs have the actual active ingredient that plants have & no more. That lessens the amount of useless material going into our bodies. It also gives the user more control over the dosage & means that they can consistently ingest the same amount whereas herbs can vary so much in potency that you really take your chances. Besides, Most of it has been proven not to work.

Except for acupuncture, already proven effective in China, almost all the research has come to the same conclusion: the stuff doesn’t work.

The powerful industry that sells these products ignores the results and often finds allies who believe in them because of an anecdote or advertisement.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15387493/#.UnWZtRCmbio

You can't get a patent on something you didn't invent, so no one can patent a natural plant. But take it and process it into something else...... there you go $$$$$

Are you kidding? In 2009 Americans alone spent 33.9 Billion (yes with a Billion with a B) on complementary & alternative medicine & that number goes up every year.http://nccam.nih.gov/news/2009/073009.htm. Just a year later the dietary supplement industry alone was worth $60 Billion. Dietary Supplement Industry Contributes More than $60 Billion to National Economy

I don't know why you would think that the pharmaceutical industry is so greedy & the supplement/herb industry are so innocent

So-called “dietary supplements,” such as DHEA, saw palmetto and chondroitin, present the biggest problem.

Marketers often sell them under the guise of a mom-and-pop alternative to big pharma. Yet the $29 billion-a-year dietary supplement industry wields such power that it got Congress to pass a law in 1994 that basically frees it to peddle almost anything that doesn’t kill people with claims of medical benefit that need not be proven.

No doubt some of the thousands of products sold as dietary supplements work well, but the industry that sells them has neither motivation nor desire to know which ones work and which don’t.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15387493/#.UnWZtRCmbio

 

[epileric]

Also, consider this

Maybe you should take a few statistics into consideration:

French giant Boiron (EPA:BOI) is by far the largest distributor of natural health products in Canada – they’re responsible for nearly 4000 (15%) of the 26,000 products approved by Health Canada’s Natural Health Products Directorate. They’re also one of largest natural health products companies globally, with 2010 revenues of €520M ($700M CAD) – a size achieved not just through the success of killer products like Oscillococcinum, but also through acquisitions. In recent years, the company has acquired both its main French rival Dolisos (giving them 90% of the French homeopathy market) and the largest homeopathy company in Belgium, Unda.

So this is a big company that’s prepared to spend money to get even bigger. What about spending some of that money on research? Well ostensibly it’s a priority: “Since 2005, we have devoted a growing level of resources to develop research,” they proclaim in the opening pages of their latest annual report, citing 70 in-progress research projects. Yet the numbers tell a different story – €4.2M in R&D expenditures in 2009, just 0.8% of revenues.
o put that in perspective, consider that in the same year, GlaxoSmithKline spent 14% of its revenues on R&D, Pfizer spent 15%, and Merck spent a whopping 21%.

But if Boiron’s not spending like pharma on research, there’s one line item where they do go toe to toe: Marketing. The company spent €114M – a full 21% of revenues on marketing in 2009. By contrast, GSK, Pfizer and Merck reported 33%, 29%, and 30% of revenues respectively on their “Selling, General, and Administrative” (SG&A) line – which includes not just sales & marketing expenses, but also executive salaries, support staff, legal, rent, utilities, and other overhead costs. Once those are subtracted out, it’s likely that Boiron spends at least as much of its revenues on marketing as Big Pharma.

To sum up: Boiron is an industry giant. They’re not afraid to spend on acquisitions. They’re not afraid to spend on marketing. But research gets short shrift.
Atrium Innovations

The story at Montreal-based Atrium Innovations (TSE:ATB) isn’t much different. Though a bit smaller than Boiron (2010 revenues of $320M), they’ve taken an even more M&A focused approach to growth. Most recent was their $110M acquisition of Seroyal on December 31st, giving them the #3 spot in the NHPD database, with over 1100 approved products. Over the prior 3 years, the company spent another $130M to acquire seven more companies all over the world – Minami (Belgium), Trophic (Canada), Garden of Life (US), Nutri-Health Supplements (US), EAB (Germany), Orthos (Netherlands), and Multicare (Netherlands).

All those acquisitions require cash, which is why it’s fortunate that their executive team is so connected in the financial community. CEO Pierre Fitzgibbon was Vice Chairman of National Bank, where he underwrote Atrium’s IPO prior to joining the company in 2007. Additionally, Atrium’s VP Legal and VP Mergers & Acquisitions both hail from SGF, the investment arm of the Quebec government, which was an early investor in Atrium. Clearly a strong management team for the type of acquisition-driven business Atrium does.

But the similarities with Boiron don’t end there, unfortunately. R&D expenditures in 2009 amounted to $2.3M – just 0.7% of revenues. SG&A paced Big Pharma at 30% of revenues. Another successful business clearly able to spend on research, but choosing not to.

Bankers, Buyouts & Billionaires: Why Big Herba’s Research Deficit Isn’t About The Money

 

[Cint]

You refer to "natural stuff". Did you know that many drugs ARE natural? For consideration, note this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_product
So many pills, in fact, do grow on trees (plants). And they live in the oceans. And inside animals. You can't get more natural than this!

:agree: and was thinking the same thing as I was reading.

 

[Janus]

I agree. Firstly, i remain skeptical of 'studies' and i read lots of them. There is so much being published today that i feel it is imperative to cross-reference and wait until i can collect multiple tests/opinions before i make my choice. Allthat said. I vehemently read all the fine print on everything before i eat it. I avoid MSG and sugar substitutes and highfructose corn syrup like the plague. i also try to avoid table salt now. I hate to seem nihilistic and still have to say that the federal government is not our friend in many cases.

 

[qtowngirl]

I'm convinced that GOD already gave us everything we need in a state He knew was a lot better than anything man can come up with.

what convinces you? religion, which is fine that’s your desire, is purely an opinion, not fact. if health and nature (aka what you refer to as god’s design) were ALL human beings needed, can you explain why people that have never been on medication, never eaten refined foods, and always look to the positive have died in their 30s? 40s?
though these things are beneficial to one’s life they are no type of guarantee. when i had my first seizure at 15 i’d never been on medication, ate my mom’s healthy cooking out of our garden, and was a happy, happy girl. what was wrong with my healthy food? was this god’s design? where was he then?
i am an avid health researcher and writer, and in 2011 was 2/3 of the way through college becoming a registered nutritionist. why did i have to quit? i was a positive, healthy, organic food-eating happy person! because, i had one of the worst tonic clonic seizures in my life, the mri correlated to this seizure showed a lesion, and i had to have brain surgery. without a considerable medical system and epileptologists and surgeons that were TRAINED and PROVEN it wouldn’t have been possible. their schooling and job criteria are on paper, in research and on their profiles, not in a court case.
putting your faith in someone goes across the spectrum, and we do it with those we love, work with, and live for. for faith to be something true it needs to be adapted to everything, which begs the question.
if you still fully put your faith in someone (especially when it comes to your health, nothing is higher in importance!) charged with fraud for lying and stealing from people he ‘was helping’... what does this mean? all it says is that you believe in something PROVEN to be untrue. onder:

curious how much real research you’ve given to your epilepsy. continuous eeg’s and mri’s, and mri after every grand mal (this is standard)? gone down every medical avenue, including possible surgery, to cross off everything that may be an option? as eric and i say, reviewed medical journals from the right sites are REAL research, and there isn’t much, if any, risk following and learning from them.
to override that and say something ‘criminally proven’ to be untrue is the smarter, healthier choice, well, it bodes that the proven research, history, and medical necessities that come with having epilepsy don’t apply to you. that is not admirable at all, esp. for many on here that wouldn’t be alive today without both regular and emergency medical, and medicinal, help.

and to eric... i'd like to follow up on all of your posts here, but my agreement would take pages so i'll just say 'yes, thank you.' shows greatly the research, time and thought you put into being better, being okay, while you live with epilepsy and all it endures. well said.

 

[JaneP]

They say Noah lived until he was 400. Abraham til he was 600....they must've been doing SOMETHING right! (Sorry, couldn't resist)
Some people STILL live only until 30 or 40. Others until they're over 100. They obviously can't study every skeleton from 20 million years ago until now. In all fairness, that should be a "flaw" in the age study.
All I know is these "unproven, unscientific, unestablished, non-double blind studies" have worked for me in the last 20 years more than any man made drug has in the 20 years before that. Does history not tell us they laughed at Thomas Edison too? Where would we be today if he would've just gone along with the majority that it wouldn't work and threw his light bulb away because it was unproven & unstudied by double blind "experts"? Sometimes going against the grain and striking out on your own is better than going with the flow -as it has been for me. Sure, I could've wound up in a "Darn. This doesn't work." situation, in which case I would be no worse off than I was before. But this previously unfamiliar territory turned out to be the best thing I ever did for myself. ....I haven't wound up in the ER due to status seizures as I had on occasion as a kid for about 15 years, nor have I totally blacked out & started to shake, etc. from a full blown G/M seizure since shortly after high school or spent hours getting back my ability to talk & think since then or spent sometimes as long as a week regaining my balance & coordination. I noticed some of this start to change in LESS THAN A MONTH after starting on this Eastern stuff.
All I know is it's working for me no matter what science or Pfizer or any M.D. or whoever wants to investigate.
Anywho....I think I've said everything I can say here. I'm moving onto another thread.

 

[Cint]

And where would we be without Penicillin? Where did it come from? It originated from a mold (can't get more natural than that) and is a great anti-biotic. The ancient Chinese and even the Indians used mold to treat infected wounds, without understanding the chemistry of it. And on some occasions, folks could have died without an anti-biotic.

I haven't ended up in the ER because of status in well over 17 years, nor have I had a TC since my VNS. I've taken many meds and some have been good, others haven't been good with bad side effects. Like qtowngirl, I had brain surgery, too, and when I suffered from depression, there was NO god there for me. Then the seizures returned. More EEGs, MRI, CT's CBC's etc. On and on. Where was/is this god?! Why do some folks with brain surgery go seizure-free, but not others? I sure as hell was not going to put my faith in false testimonies of people with cure-all treatments. I agree with Eric and qtwongirl, if it hasn't been studied to the nth degree, then it isn't worth it's weight. It is more than likely a lie.

Plus, I know pharmaceuticals and some M.D.s are in it for the $$. When I was going thru that depression, I was seeing a shrink. Nothing seemed to work as far as anti-depressants, so he finally put me on a small dosage of a med used for bi-polar. Before long, I ended up with Type 1 Diabetes, also. So I joined a class action lawsuit against the pharmaceutical who manufactured that particular med. We won, but I still have to take insulin for the rest of my life. The drug is still legal and there is a black box warning for all docs. Some things work, some do not.

My point is, I won't trust this Eastern medicine stuff as long as we have well trained doctors, specialists and pharmacies who do know when to blow the whistle!
And, this religion stuff........ take it or leave it....... I left it long ago!