From: hall@cheetah.cs.uidaho.edu
Newsgroups: sci.med,talk.politics.drugs,pnw.general
Subject: Re: FDA still at large
Date: 22 Jul 92 15:39:56 GMT
	<1992Jul20.164848.14435@eskimo.celestial.com>
	<1992Jul23.081405.3582@cbnewse.cb.att.com>
	<1992Jul23.164209.16428@intelhf.hf.intel.com>
Organization: University of Idaho, Computer Science Dept.

In article <1992Jul23.164209.16428@intelhf.hf.intel.com> hutch@hutch (Stephen Hutchison) writes:

>I want the government to actively persecute health frauds.

I want the government to prosecute criminals, of any kind.  That's one of
their jobs.

>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

Who the hell are the chemotherapists to object to her decisions about her
own body, anyway?

>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 center 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.

Sure it's expensive, but then so's chemo and radiation.  Let her spend her
money as she sees fit.  If this was the US and an "approved" medical
institution, chances are that us happy taxpayers would get to *share* the
cost of the treatment.

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

Did these people promise one thing and deliver another?  That's the
definition of fraud, right?  If this woman wants to spend her last six
months doing this since conventional treatments won't work, then so be it.
It's her decision, after all.  If she's not satisfied with what she was
promised and then what was delivered, then that's another matter.

>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 don't want the FDA to tell me what I can and cannot do to my own body.  I
don't trust the government that far.  In my opinion, no one should.
Instead, I'd prefer an FDA that tests new foods, drugs, treatments, etc for
their possible benefits and side effects - and then releases the results.
Once the information is out, I'll make my own judgements (or trust my
doctor's) about what drugs and treatments I'll use.

As for the quacks and frauds out there, we've got plenty of tools to use to
limit these people:  the power of the almighty buck, and the existing
local, state, and federal criminal laws.

>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.

I agree totally on this...

>   Hutch



--
| Kelly Hall           hall @ leopard.cs.uidaho.edu       |
| "Disclaimer?  We don't need no stinking disclaimer..."  |
Newsgroups: sci.med