There are No Side Effects

The next time your favorite television show is interrupted by a drug commercial claiming to make your life better and brighter with their chemical products, do me a favor. Ignore all those ecstatic, smiling faces at the end and actually listen to the “side effects” listed by the calming, authoritative voice. I looked up a few of the more common drugs on drugs.com, and here is what I found.

Statin drugs, which inhibit the production of liver enzymes, are commonly prescribed to reduce cholesterol. This class of drugs has the highest sales in the country. Common side effects of statin drugs, such as Lipitor, or Crestor, include memory loss; muscle pain; diarrhea; joint pain; mild sore throat; nausea; runny or stuffy nose; stomach upset. Severe side effects include:  Severe allergic reactions (rash; hives; itching; difficulty breathing or swallowing; tightness in the chest; swelling of the mouth, face, lips, throat, or tongue); change in the amount of urine produced; dark urine; muscle pain, tenderness, or weakness (with or without fever or fatigue); painful, difficult, or frequent urination; pale stools; persistent loss of appetite; persistent pain, soreness, redness, or swelling of a tendon or joint; red, swollen, blistered, or peeling skin; severe or persistent nausea, vomiting, or stomach pain; unusual tiredness; yellowing of the eyes or skin.

Now I will break down some of these drug effects. Yellowing of the eyes and skin, along with urine changes, fecal changes like diarrhea and pale stool, all indicate a breakdown of your liver. Great! The drug is working! Statin drugs are designed to stop liver function. I hope you have realized, at this point, that liver function is essential to your life. I didn’t say “to your quality of life.” I said, “to your life.” Other side effects of statin drugs, like muscle soreness, tiredness, and memory loss indicate that your nervous system is breaking down. This country is in the midst of an increasedtrend in Alzheimer’s Disease, multiple sclerosis, early-onset dementia, and other, more nebulous nervous system problems. You can bet that some of this increase relates to statin drugs.

Let us look at a gentler, kinder drug, shall we? Let’s take a look at a drug for the treatment of simple airborne allergies. Nasonex has these “common” side effects:  Burning or irritation inside the nose; coughing; headache; muscle and joint pain; nosebleed or pink color to the mucus; painful menstruation; sinus pain or pressure; sore throat; upper respiratory tract infection; vomiting.I have not listed the side effects classified as “severe.”

There are no side effects. Pharmaceutical companies coined the term to denote “undesirable” effects a drug may have on your body. Just because the effect of a drug is not desired does not mean it is not important. There are no side effects. There are only effects. How are your drugs effecting you?

The Broken System

If I tried to sell you a snow suit to wear in the Bahamas, you would call me crazy. If I tried to sell you Twinkies as a weight loss supplement, you would think I was a liar. If I tried to sell you surgical operations that are unnecessary and prescription drugs that do more harm than good, you would have to call that par for the course in America’s current health system. Today, I read an article written by Donald Petersen, Jr in Dynamic Chiropractic that gives some interesting statistics. According to the NCHSData Brief No. 42, released in September of 2010, in 2008 the percentage of Americans on prescription drugs in a given month rose to 47.2 percent. It is four years later, and you can bet that now over half of the population of America is taking a prescription drug. 

Intrigued by these numbers, I did some more digging. I encourage you to follow my lead and find out some facts. A Google search should yield some good information for you. America spends almost 300 BILLION dollars on prescription drugs annually. If health comes in pill form, we should be oozing it. According to the CIA, we rank around 50th in life expectancy, and 47th in infant mortality rates out of 221 countries rated in 2011. These two categories are largely what the World Health Organization uses to rank the health of a nation. Granted, the actual numbers are not terrible; apparently, we can expect to live to the age of 78 and only 6 out of 1,000 infants born alive die within their first year in America. Here is the point I want to drive home: we spend BILLIONS more (on what pharmaceutical companies insist on calling healthcare) than any other industrialized nation, and we have worse health results than at least 47 of them. How is that logical?

Yes, we need healthcare reform. It will never happen on a mass scale. It absolutely will not happen out of government decree. You need to take control of your own body, and take responsibility for your own health. You do this by eating well, exercising and sleeping well, and taking holistic care measures. Yes, I am a chiropractor, and yes, I am promoting my profession in place of mainstream medical treatment for wellness care. From my perspective, nationalizing healthcare is about pushing a system that is broken. Follow the money trail. Sickness for profit is no way to get healthy. 

Ignore all those smiling, nodding faces during the voiceover and pay attention to the words at the end of the drug commercial: side effects include loss of function, loss of money, loss of control, and loss of life. If this is better than the symptoms you are experiencing, then by all means, take the drug.