From: hutch@hutch (Stephen Hutchison)
Subject: Re: FDA still at large
Keywords: FDA, unconstitutional illegal action,single-issue blindness
Organization: Intel Corp., Hillsboro, Oregon
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 92 16:42:09 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.081405.3582@cbnewse.cb.att.com> doctor1@cbnewse.cb.att.com (patrick.b.hailey) writes:

>We want to take the guns away from most of the government.  In the case at
>hand, that means that the FDA would be welcome to test and approve all the
>drugs, foods, food additives, etcetera that it wants.  But if your doctor,
>Consumer's Reports, or even just lowly, stupid old you decide that  something
>would be good for you, the government can't send men with guns to tell you you
>can't have it.

uh... right.

>As another example, if you have a fatal disease and have only 6 months to
>live, and you read about some treatment in France that is working wonders, you
>could actually have it, if you want.  The FDA could certainly tell you that
>they don't know yet if it's safe.  But they couldn't force you (or your
>doctor) at gunpoint to withhold treatment so that your last 6 months are safe
>months.

I want the government to actively persecute health frauds.  Not the borderline
treatments of last resort or the as-yet-unproven treatments (which should still
be regulated for reasons I'll give) but the actual frauds.

A good friend of mine just came back from Lost Angeles.  Her mother has been
diagnosed with cancer, metastasized throughout her entire body.  She will live
for six months at the outside.  This woman avoided AMA doctors for years because
she (like many others) was taken in by the promise-them-anything conmen of the
alternative "health" movements.  She's been on every flipping fad diet that
exists.  Usually at great expense and large profit to the fad diet creator.

Since the cancer is so advanced, the chemotherapists did not object to her
decision not to do the chemo - she's too weak, already, and there is less than
a 30% chance that it would cause any kind of remission.  They aren't doing
rad therapy either, for similar reasons - all it would do is extend her pain.

So this woman just went down to Tijuana Mexico, where she went to an "oncology
treatment research centre" where they have a "progressive experimental program"
that involves being on a pure-juice diet.  Yes, but to Properly Extract the
Vital Healing Essences, the True Virtues of the Wondrous Plants, they insist
that their patients either stay THERE (at around 250$ a day) or buy their special
3000$ juice extraction machine, which Gets All the Nearly-Magical Healing
Enzymes and Vitamins from the All Natural Organic Fruits and Vegetables.

This crapola deserves to earn its founders a long prison sentence at forced
labor - taking care of people dying because of their fraudulent treatments.

The point is, that before the FDA was established, this was the NORM for
medical treatment in the USA.  If you go to other countries you'll find that
yes, we do indeed lose access to new exciting treatments.   But the ones we
do have work a damn sight better than the rip-off-the-dying-fools scams that
you find elsewhere.

I'm not supporting Reagan/Bush's war on the constitution.  I want to see
the forfieture and siezure regulations that have been put in place, named
unconstitutional, and restitution ordered.  I especially want to see the
overeager assholes who have been using these regulations to fund their
police departments and pad the retirement accounts, taken down for their
violations, but it'll be a warm summer day in the ninth circle of hell first.

Hutch
Newsgroups: sci.med