For God’s Sake! Why are Pro-Lifers so Crazy? Abortion vs. Infanticide.

For God’s Sake! Why are Pro-Lifers so Crazy? Abortion vs. Infanticide.

A recent article I pulled off Google News reports that a Dr. Minerva at the University of Melbourne is receiving death threats. She just published an article in Journal of Medical Ethics making the case that abortion a pregnancy is no different from killing a newborn baby. Minerva’s paper claimed that, wherever the law allowed abortion, it is illogical not to allow infanticide (under the same set of criteria for child health).

The death threats come from members of the pro-life religious right. This is no surprise – after all, it makes sense that people who oppose abortion should also oppose an argument supporting the extension of abortion-like behavior. But really, death threats? If you’re really pro-life, how can you conscience threatening to kill another human being, full grown or not? Not only is your position illegal and illogical, but sadly it is all too common among members of the vocal religious right. All you have to do is drive on I-75 through South Carolina – or really anywhere in the Bible Belt – and watch the billboards and crosses on the side of the road. You’ll a sign saying “Jesus saves” right next to an adult-only store. It’s pretty hypocritical.

Okay. Now that I’ve ranted sufficiently, let’s get down to the meat of the issue: is she right? I say no. Not having read her article in full, I cannot claim to address the specific claims and evidence she presents in writing, but I believe I can offer a legitimate argument against her central position as explained in the article cited below.

My counterargument uses the mathematical process of providing a counterexample as proof that a statement is invalid. Specifically, let’s look at the case where a woman is raped, resulting in an unwanted pregnancy. A case could be made for the law to protect the woman’s right to an abortion in this case – particularly if she sought one immediately after the incident when the embryo was only a very few cells. Such a case would rely on the fact that the woman did not choose to have the baby and that the embryo, though conceived, is only a few cells and cannot be termed sentient or even “human” using those terms as conventionally applied to children and adults. In short, it is not unreasonable to assume that law might give the woman the right to have an abortion.

But these ethical arguments do not apply after birth. Once born, the infant is an individual – completely separate from the mother. As an individual, with the human rights due an individual (regardless of dignity or mental capabilities or anything else), the infant could not be morally harmed. After all, we condemn child abuse. My point here really comes down to the fact that, unlike the abortion, here there is another option: if the mother still does not want the child and somehow failed to get an abortion, she could put the child up for adoption.

In the end, as strongly as I disagree with Minerva’s argument, so I also support her right to publish her opinion so long as she supports it with evidence and analysis. The pro-life death threats – oxymorons that they are – are the only part of the whole scenario that cannot be conscienced, under any circumstances.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8428050/melbourne-abortion-author-gets-death-threats

Aging as a Disease

Currently there are two different types of research focused on anti aging.  The first group consists of research to prevent or cure "diseases of aging" such as Alzheimer's, Type 2 Diabetes or Cancer.  The elimination or cure of these diseases would create a longer and healthier life span for many individuals.  A new branch of research has recently emerged however, that defines the aging process as a disease in itself.  One of the pioneers of this new philosophy and research branch is Aubrey De Grey the founder of the Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence Foundation (SENS).  This organization is pioneering research in what Grey describes as “Rejuvenation Biotech”.    The most promising research is this field involves the results of a cash prize contest initiated by the Methuselah Foundation, which offered prizes to researchers who were able to break records in mouse lifespan.  The winner managed to keep a mouse alive for 1,819 days, which represents a significant increase on the life expectancy of mice in the wild, which is less than one year.  The problem with this new research is that it will at some point need to undergo human experimentation in order be tested for use as a new medication or treatment on the market.  As researchers near the end of the animal testing component of research there are many problems that arise with the inevitable human testing of treatment for aging.  First of all the definition of aging as a disease is likely to spread controversy with regard to the ethics of human anti-aging experimentation.  How we define aging is an important factor in how we evaluate the risks, benefits and beneficence of experiments to determine ethical research.  The other problem with anti-aging testing is that it would require that healthy persons take enormous risks to help the population to avoid what might be considered a stage of life rather than a disease.  One finally concern as we approach future human anti-aging research is the concern that the population’s desire for anti-aging medication is so greatly and the risks of the actual experimentation are so high that the temptation to force human experimentation on the poor and vulnerable might be great.  I conclude that efforts at anti-aging are not unethical but that if anti-aging experimentation is to proceed ethically that it is necessary  that we clearly redefine our definition of aging and that we take special care not to violate codes of ethics such as The Declaration of Helsinki and The Belmont Report in order to prevent potentially unethical experimentation. 

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/future_tense/2012/01/aubrey_de_grey_sens_anti_aging_drugs_and_clinical_trials_.html

Unlimited Human Eggs?

Recent research has shown that stem cells in adult women can spontaneously create new egg cells in the lab. This discovery uproots the long-held notion that girls are born solely with a finite amount of egg cells at birth and brings up very pertinent ethical issues.

The study, which was published online yesterday by Nature Medicine, involved living human ovarian tissue grafted inside mice. Yes, and according to lead researcher Jonathan Tilly, the main goal was to prove that oocyte (immature egg)-producing stem cells exist in the ovaries of women during reproductive life.

The implications of this study suggest that it may one day be possible to create a virtually "unlimited" supply of human eggs for fertility treatment, an extremely promising prospective. As of now, the cells are unsuitable for any clinical use, yet, questions in the ethical use of "unlimited" eggs arise.

First, critics may say the mice grafting is problematic. I think that it is fine that the study involved human cells grafted into another organism - the mice. Animal studies have long been used in medicine to evaluate treatments and as long as the use of human cells in other life is closely monitored, their use may be appropriate in the pursuit of medical knowledge. This study was obviously reviewed pre-execution and pre-publication.

Second, I think that the prospect of "unlimited" human eggs is promising. Critics may say that we are wrong to choose one egg to live among the potential lives of many. And indeed, through genetic engineering scientists are choosing the best prospective egg via gene screening (meaning the other eggs will not grow into babies) This is fine. We are simply choosing a genotype that will become the one child that develops. By doing so, the mother is not taking away human life - in fact, she is merely choosing the genes of her still very precious child. Consider this thought experiment - is a reproductive female committing murder by not getting pregnant every year? No.

Although the immediate use of the egg cells in the present study will be used solely for research right now (e.g. testing effectiveness of drugs), I believe that their future implications for fertility therapy are highly positive and promising.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17152413
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/health/research/scientists-use-stem-cells-to-generate-human-eggs.html?ref=health

Informed Consent: A relic of the past?

               

             Last September the state of California passed the bill AB499 which allows children 12 and older to be vaccinated for sexually transmitted diseases with vaccines like Gardasil, without informing the parents or getting their consent.  In fact, even after the vaccine is administered the parents will not be informed, and if there are any medical complications the parents will have to cover the costs.

 Although parents not vaccinating their children is a problem in the US, which puts the entire society at risk for a preventable disease, this law is not the answer.  For one, this law is overstepping the boundaries of physicians, it is one thing to encourage parents to vaccinate their children, it is another thing entirely to force vaccination upon them.  This law undermines the very foundations of medical ethics as it violates the concept of “voluntary informed consent” dating back to the Nuremberg Code.

The proponents of this law argue that the children are “informed” and that the doctor is required to receive “voluntary consent” from the child before administering the vaccine.  But this point doesn’t make much sense, 12 year olds are by any definition of the word, children – the same children we don’t let talk to strangers or even go on a field trip without parental consent.  And yet, we give these children, who are just beginning to learn basic biological facts in school the right to make an “informed” decision on whether or not they should get a vaccine. 

According to American Academy of Pediatrics, “Only patients who have appropriate decisional capacity and legal empowerment can give their informed consent to medical care.” Clearly, in this case a child of 12 does not have the “appropriate decisional capacity” to make this decision due to numerous factors.  First, oftentimes even adults don’t properly understand all the information given to them by a doctor, so there is little chance that a young child will be able to understand all the risks and the benefits associated with the vaccine, and then be able to use that knowledge to make an informed decision.  Moreover, children are often unaware of their family history, allergies, or other potential medical problems they could be at risk for, all of which are vital in the decision of getting a vaccine.  Finally, a child is easily susceptible to being pressured and swayed by a person of authority, such as a teacher or doctor, which invalidates the notion of “voluntary” consent.

Another pressing question this law brings up is, why this vaccine?  There are so many other deadly diseases out there that children are often not vaccinated for, such as smallpox or polio, and yet the state doesn’t mandate vaccination for them.  So what is so special about Gardasil?  The answer is money.  Pharmaceutical and medical lobbyists played a large role in passing AB499 through the California state government, and they stand to make millions of dollars, as each vaccine costs the government $108.  Thus, not only does this law violate the concept of informed consent, but it also pushes health factors aside and allows financial rewards to play a role in the administration of medical procedures, a clear conflict of interests.

Bill AB499 has the potential to rattle the foundations of medical ethics, as it muddles the issue of informed consent, and allows medical standards to be altered out of greed.  Although this is not the only case where this has happened, it is time to make a stand before informed consent becomes a thing of the past. 

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/09/16/vaccine-wake-up-call-for-parents-your-children-are-being-taken.aspx

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203315804577209230884246636.html

http://www.nocirc.org/consent/

It's Not Your Decision

SNL’s Weekend Update aired an episode last week that highlighted one aspect of our nation’s health policy that has much room for reform: women’s reproductive health. A few days earlier, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee had held a hearing on the Obama administration’s legislation requiring that women receiving health insurance through religiously affiliated employers are still provided with contraception. Amy Poehler and Seth Meyers pointed out one glaring flaw with this hearing: there were no women on this panel.

They took a crass approach (in the format of one of my favorite segments – Really?! With Seth and Amy), poking fun at the failures of the “contraceptive” measures espoused by some politicians (specifically two certain Republican primary candidates). But the side opposed to this policy, and similar ones, isn’t backing down, and candidate Rick Santorum recently argued that employers also shouldn’t be “forced” to provide prenatal tests for pregnant women.

This ongoing debate largely surrounding abortion and “life” is generally seen as a religious issue, but both sides of the debate have potentially valid ethical points. One the one hand, there is the question of whether or not the government has a right to prevent certain personal decisions women may want to make, and whether it is right for these decision to be made by a group consisting only of men. On the other hand, there is the question of what “life” is defined as and, as Santorum’s objections bring up, whether or not it is right to abort fetuses who are known to have conditions like Down syndrome.

This last question is the one that interests me the most, as it is currently the least political and religious. I see it as a very real ethical dilemma – is it better to prevent a child who will have to suffer their whole life from being born in the first place? Or is this eugenics? Does it matter if the parents’ motivations were economic, as Tucker Carlson argues is generally the case?

It’s a tricky question, one that can be analyzed through many different lenses. If we start thinking about it as eugenics – a genetic weeding out of society – then it’s hard to support. But is aborting a Down syndrome fetus the same as killing a Down syndrome child? And, is aborting a Down syndrome fetus the same as having an abortion for any other reason? I think prenatal tests like amniocentesis are vital to the health of all infants, especially those who have conditions that can be treated if caught early on, and if caregivers are prepared at birth with the necessary treatments. As for children who are aborted early on because of their health, I think parents have the right to make the decision for their own well-being and for that of their future child. We have no ethical problem with women with AIDS aborting children who would also have aids – in fact it can be considered ethically responsible to do so. Such abortions are not out of disdain for a sickly child, but are intended to prevent unnecessary suffering. While a fetus determined to have Down syndrome is slightly different, it still should not be considered eugenics. It is not a system-wide policy to terminate all such pregnancies. It remains, as it should, a personal decision made by individual parents based on their values and resources. The decision is always a difficult one, and while the majority of women who do become aware their child would have Down syndrome do choose to end their pregnancy, we cannot condemn them as unethical, callous, or murderous. Abortion is always a decision, influenced by countless factors specific and unique to every woman, and the right to make this decision should not be restricted to certain extreme situations. No woman would take this decision lightheartedly, and no government should prevent a woman from doing all she can to have a healthy pregnancy and a healthy child just because there is a chance she may choose to have an abortion.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/331282/saturday-night-live-really-with-seth-and-amy-birth-control

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/16/contraception-hearing-house-democrats-walk-out_n_1281730.html

http://life.salon.com/2012/02/21/santorum_amnio_open2012/singleton/

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/02/rick_santorum_prenatal_testing_and_abortion_tucker_carlson_s_classic_essay_on_prenatal_testing_and_the_abortion_of_down_syndrome_babies_.single.html#pagebreak_anchor_5

Cosmetic surgery to reconstructive surgery

I’m sure many of us have heard of Hang Mioku, better known as the “Fan Lady,” a middle-aged Korean woman whose face became abnormally large after she pursued countless operations of cosmetic surgery. The Fan Lady got her first cosmetic surgery when she was 28 and gradually became obsessed with it, never satisfied with the way she looked. She would get more and more operations until finally, even her own parents couldn’t recognize her disfigured face anymore.

The Fan Lady isn’t the only person who has experienced the drastic addictive nature of cosmetic surgery. In the United States, the number of cosmetic surgery operations has increased from 6.9 million in 2002 to 11.7 million in 2007, with a 9% further increase in 2010 alone.

Cosmetic surgery is indeed dangerous for its disastrous effects on the physical and psychological state of a person. The most risky operations often lead to permanent damage or even death. Cosmetic surgery is often misunderstood as a means to boost self-esteem, but it’s not the solution to fixing emotional diseases. In fact, due to post-surgical depression and dissatisfaction with the outcomes, women who underwent cosmetic surgery in the past 30 years have been 3 times as likely to commit suicide compared to those who didn’t. That’s not to mention that cosmetic surgery is, by principle, against many of our established ethical standards for the practice of medicine: Helsinki, Belmont, the basic Hippocratic Oath, you name it. The third line of the Hippocratic Oath states: “I will prescribe regimens for the good of my patients according to my ability and my judgment and never do harm to anyone.” Far from being a medically necessary operation, cosmetic surgery is done for the purpose of enhancing beauty. Far from improving patients’ health, it damages them both physically and emotionally.

So it seems that the harms of cosmetic surgery could call for an international ban on it. But of course, making cosmetic surgery illegal has too many problems associated with it: underground operations which would make it more dangerous than it already is, putting cosmetic surgeons out of their jobs, etc. just to name a few. What we should do instead is make use of these resources and turn them towards a different effort: reconstructive surgery. Just to be clear, cosmetic surgery is done purely to enhance beauty when the patient has not had a disease, accident, etc. that calls for a restoration, while reconstructive surgery is done to cure diseases, restore bodily functions, or correct disfigurements. Both require similar skill sets in terms of surgical procedure.

In developing countries today, there are an overwhelming number of people in need of reconstructive surgery. However, billions of dollars spent every year in countries such as the US demonstrate that the resources that could be used to meet the needs of these people are instead wasted on cosmetic surgeries that try to fulfill the never-ending demands of people who continuously strive to enhance their aesthetic appearances.

For example, The WHO estimates that there are over two million women who suffer from obstetric fistula, a pregnancy-related complication, worldwide. Especially in developing countries such as Sudan, there are 50 thousand to 100 thousand new cases every year. Even though obstetric fistula is curable through reconstructive surgery, the women in southern Sudan cannot afford or access it. In January 2004, for example, a woman with obstetric fistula was brought to a local hospital in southern Sudan, but due to the dearth of reconstructive surgeons, she had to wait for hours, suffering prolonged pain. As similar cases abound, thousands of women in developing countries die each year in need of surgery while being unable to access it, counting women with obstetric fistula alone. If cosmetic surgery resources were redirected, not only would monetary resources be used more wisely, but also more cosmetic surgeons would be available to perform similar surgeries but for a different purpose so that they can benefit the people in need.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3439638/Cosmetic-surgery-addict-injected-cooking-oil-into-her-own-face.html

http://www.surgery.org/media/statistics

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1016/j.jmwh.2005.03.009/full

Can't be a Sensitive Boy Anymore?

    Is it important to play your own gender role as a child. As a boy
is it necessary that you play solider and not house. Well according to
some recent studies it is. Recent studies have shown that children who
do not conform to their gender roles while playing pretend during puberty 

are at an increased risk for abuse and trauma.  Not only does their

behavior seem to attract physical abuse but it seems they are at
increased risk for PTSD. 

            In the light of this information is it important for
parents to make sure their kids fall into their particular gender
roles? This question brings up to what extent should kids be allowed
to differer from a prototypical female or male role. What is more
important, the child's freedom of expression or their potential
safety, both mental and physical? Because of this the AMA has
recommended that sex changes not be preformed on any person under the
age of 18.

       Now some doctors have started hormone treatment so
that children can age to about 16 without the onset of puberty. This
is done so that when the patient becomes 18 he or she can make a more
informed decision about a sex operation or any other permanent medical
decisions relating to their sex without becoming at increased risk for PTSD.

However have they really grown mentally to the full extent if they have 

not experienced puberty, are they able to make an informed decision?

This and many other questions surround gender uncertainty. Personally I 

believe it needs to be addressed in a case by case basis. However, maybe 

it would be wise to put kids with extreme gender uncertainty in therapy

to help avoid any future physical or mental trauma. 

http://mailview.bulletinhealthcare.com/mailview.aspx?m=2012022101ama&r=4899738-527f

An Eye for an Eye, a Liver for a Liver: A Proposed Solution to Organ Shortages

The organ transplant list is one of the most depressing places to be in a hospital. The patient waits while their health slowly deteriorates, hoping for a miracle. One of the main shortcomings of the transplant list is the lack of available donors. A surplus of patients with a dearth of available organs creates many compromising positions, both for the patients and doctors, who must decide on the recipient of the donor, a life or death decision in many cases. The system of organ donation, where patients can opt into donating their organs, is lacking because it relies simply on altruism rather than some more substantive motivation.

A proposed solution to low supply of donors was instituted as a law in Israel in 2010 and will take effect in this year. The plan is to incentivize signing up as organ donors by giving priority on the transplant list to those who sign organ donor cards. In addition, the law gives compensation to live donors of organs. This more active incentive, along with a healthy ad campaign, has lead to a sharp increase in signups both for live organ donors and organ donor cards.

Opponents of this law argue that it can be a form of religious discrimination, as many Orthodox Jews will decline to fill out donor cards out of religious objection to the “desecration of the body”. I would counter that people who fundamentally disagree with the desecration of their own body should not be able to benefit from the desecration of another’s.  Others argue that a medical decision should not be able to be influences by nonmedical factors, and that such a law is fundamentally unethical. The law, however, does not offer undue discrimination against certain groups. The law only applies when comparing patients with identical medical needs, and a tiebreaker that encourages greater overall happiness in the increased availability of organs seems like as good a tiebreaker as any. 

REFERENCES:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/16/in-israel-a-new-approach-to-organ-donation/?ref=health 

Fire the Parents

For most of us, going to the doctor for vaccinations was hardly an event we looked forward to, but we knew we had to do it.  In the past decade, however, some parents have started to refuse vaccinations for their children.

This leads to one obvious question: why? It seems like protecting your child from the likes of measles, polio, and numerous other once-common childhood diseases would be a primary concern for parents.  Many, however, believe that the vaccines do more harm than good.

One major cause for fear in many parents is the belief that vaccinations somehow overwhelm their child’s immune system or leads to autism.  This belief became widespread after the 1998 publishing of a report linking the MMR vaccine to autism.  Although the paper has been shown to be false and its author, Andrew Wakefield, discredited, the specter and implications of the paper remain in some parents’ minds.   Another possible reason may be that few parents are able to remember a time when many of these were common childhood diseases. Some of these parents then choose to bypass vaccinations altogether because they see the risk of contracting a now uncommon disease as far less than any perceived risk of developing autism.  In response, some family doctors have chosen to “fire” parents who refuse to vaccinate their children.

Who is in the right?  Are the parent’s concerns unfounded?  There have been numerous studies disproving any relationship between vaccines and autism. I believe it is negligence for any parent to prevent their child from being vaccinated.  This is not only for their own child’s benefit, but also for the benefit of other peoples’ children.  One of the strengths of universal vaccinations is that it builds up a group resistance to diseases.  This prevents these diseases from taking hold again, which leads to virtual extinction of most of them.

But the question remains: what should doctors do when parents refuse vaccines for their children?  Even if the parent’s are negligent, what is the doctor’s role?  Should they continue to care for a family even if the parents refuse vaccinations?  One recent trend has been for doctors to ask families to leave their practice.  I believe that it is each doctor’s right to make this decision, as many do not want to deal with uncooperative parents or potentially placing other patients at risk.  In the end, however, if a doctor is unable to convince the parents, then the family leaving has accomplished nothing except placing them in a position without a regular family doctor until they can find one who will accommodate their wishes.  It boils down this: does the doctor have an obligation to care for a child even if their parents are uncooperative?  It’s hard to say, but for the moment, it is a decision that many doctors, for better or for worse, are having to make for themselves.

source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203315804577209230884246636.html

"You All Don't Need to Have Any More Children"

           In 1967, 21-year-old Sarah Cotton gave birth to her third child at the Mathiesen Clinic in Pittsboro, North Carolina. According to Cotton’s sister Brenda Womble, Cotton’s husband got into an argument with Dr, Mathiesen, who had delivered the child. Cotton’s husband still recalls the doctor’s eerily prescient last words: “you all don’t need to have any more children.” Sarah Cotton never again became pregnant, despite a stated desire to do so.

            The mystery of Sarah Cotton’s sterility was finally solved in 2007, when she began experiencing severe stomach pains. Womble drove her sister to the hospital, where they made a shocking discovery: inside Cotton’s uterus was an IUD (intrauterine device), a mechanical contraceptive. Cotton says that she never knowingly had such a device implanted in her, and the fact that the device had been in her body for almost forty years provides at least circumstantial evidence indicating that Dr. Mathiesen sterilized Cotton without her knowledge and against her will.

            If Dr. Mathiesen did indeed implant the IUD in Cotton without her approval, then he is clearly in the wrong. It cannot be morally acceptable for one human being to unilaterally make such a personal decision about another human being’s body. However, Cotton’s case does raise some interesting ethical questions, especially in light of the eugenics movement that was prevalent in North Carolina at the time of Cotton’s pregnancy and the current issues of resource scarcity that become more and more pressing as the human population expands.

            Firstly, we must ask if it is an inviolable human right to have children. I believe that a case can be made that it is. As animals, we have an innate biological drive to perpetuate our genetic material. No one person’s need is in this case greater than that of any other person’s, and so it stands to reason that we may not restrict the right of one person to have children without calling into question the right of any other person to do so. As mortal creatures, we have a similar drive to be survived and remembered, which again carries no inherently greater weight in the case of one person than another.

We now ask whether there are any limitations to this right. For example, is it the right of every person to have a child at any time and under any circumstances? Is it the right of every person to have as many children as they desire, regardless of whether or not they can support all of them? Both of these questions become increasingly relevant in a world of constrained resources. If a woman cannot support the children she already has, could it be considered child abuse for her to have another child that will take resources away from her current children? At what point do the rights of her children to life outweigh her right to have an additional child, if ever?

Source: “Woman claims doctor secretly sterilized her,” http://abclocal.go.com/wtvd/story?section=news/abc11_investigates&id=8546202

What Bugs Me about Pesticides: A look at Pesticide Testing on Humans

Oftentimes human experimentation refers to an experimental treatment being tried out on people. What happens, however, when the test isn’t for a medicine but a poison? This is what happens with human pesticide testing. For everyone who doesn’t know, pesticides are chemicals designed to kill whatever it is that humans want dead. According to the EPA, the official definition is:

“Any substance or mixture of substances intended for preventing, destroying, repelling, or mitigating any pest. Pests can be insects, mice and other animals, unwanted plants (weeds), fungi, or microorganisms like bacteria and viruses…also any substance or mixture of substances intended for use as a plant regulator, defoliant, or desiccant.”

Obviously, there are many chemicals that qualify for these roles, all of which have some pretty nasty effects on their intended target. The thing is, one of the most common uses of pesticides is in commercial agriculture, and there is always a possibility that some residue is left behind on the final product. That’s right! There could be pesticide in your food (unless you only eat organic). Don’t worry though; you’re not in danger of dying from pesticide poisoning. The EPA sets some pretty strict limits, just a fraction of the highest harmless daily dose, on the amount of these chemicals that can end up on food. The main issue here is a loophole: a company can get the EPA to increase the maximum amount by demonstrating that their proposed amounts have no adverse effects on humans. How do they do that? Human testing.

            Pesticide companies are arguably encouraged to entice people into taking these poisons daily in order to assess what the highest healthiest levels of exposure are. In order to determine the highest safe amount, you will inevitably have to cross the line and find the lowest unsafe amount. In 2005, a report to the EPA from two California Senators described ghastly industry-sponsored trials which included people being placed in chambers with vapors of an active ingredient of tear gas at higher than federally mandated levels, and other subjects being required to take pesticide capsules with breakfast every day during the study. Even worse is that the report also suggested that the informed consent required for the trial may have been clouded by technical jargon or incomplete in nature.

            This report was received by the EPA and some changes were made. Last year the document was amended to “expand the protections for subject in human studies research.” As a result, the EPA no longer supports studies involving pregnant or nursing women, and children. Unfortunately, this just doesn’t cut it. The exact language specifies that this rule applies to research that is “intended for submission to EPA.” However, many activist groups are worried that pesticide companies will simply conduct their studies and submit them to other nations, or to the state governments. Since the EPA is significantly influenced by other nations, this strategy could still bring about the companies desired result, minus the restrictions. Additionally the informed consent rules still seem vulnerable to exploitation by depriving potential subjects of the clear truth.

            Ideally, we could talk about banning the use of pesticides as a potential solution for this problem. Unfortunately, however, they play a large role in cheaply mass producing food. Regardless, the legislation needs to be revisited again. The existing loopholes need to be closed up to prevent as many people as possible from poisoning themselves for whatever compensation the company is offering. It would be even better if we could integrate commercial farming with some of the techniques used by organic farms in place of herbicides and insecticides. This could make it so the EPA’s limits on residue on food need not be exceeded, bringing about an end to these ridiculous human trials.

http://www.epa.gov/oppfead1/guidance/human-test.htm

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1480534/

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2007/08/human-pesticide/

http://www.mindfully.org/Pesticide/What-Is-A-Pesticide.htm

Money and Medicine

The makers of prozac aggressively denied that prozac caused patients to feel suicidal in cases. However when prozac's patent was nearing its expiration date, the company tinkered with the molecular formula and patented its new and improved drug: prozac-R. Of course though, to patent the improvement of a drug, one must put forward the new drug's improvements. So what did Prozac-R do better? Well in their patent application, the makers cited that Prozac-R did away with the side effects of suicidal feelings, exactly the side-effect the company denied ever existed in the original prozac.

Why am I telling you this? Because it highlights the fact that providing care has fallen far behind the agenda's of profit-driven pharmaceutical corporations.

Today, 1 in 10 Americans adults and 1-27 American children aged 12-17 are taking anti-depressants. This figures are a testament to our societies completely skewed view of medicine.

Modern medicine is a wonder at treating acute problems. You get in a car accident. You'll be taken care of better today than any other time in human history. Unfortunately this isn't true with chronic conditions. Chronic conditions are the bodies way of saying that it is missing something it needs. Instead of figuring out what the deficiency is however, we sweep the whole problem under the rug with the help of a doctor's prescription.

This epidemic of overprescribing medication really hits a nerve with my because I was prescribed anti-depressants my freshman year of high school. They work for a time, but the side-effects but after a year I started to built up a tolerance, and when I stopped taking them, I was right back to where I was before I started taking the SSRI.

I never stopped to consider that maybe the food I was eating and the things I were doing could have any effect on my mood. I saw food as the stuff that I put in my mouth to survive, not as something that could have any therapeutic effects.

Long story short, I changed my whole life around. I began eating raw organic foods, took up meditation and channelled all my extra energy into my sport. I've never looked back.

When it comes to medicine, I don't think there have ever been truer words than Hipprocrates' "let thy food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food."

For anyone interested, I've attached a link to an AMAZING documentary about the science of nutrition and natural healing. It's called Food Matters, and it will change the way you think about your body.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IFRw3mOatok

Sources:

http://blogs.psychcentral.com/relationships/2012/02/depression-anxiety-why-take-a-pill-when-itsyour-nature-to-heal/

Will it Never End? Counterfeit Drugs and the Mayhem They Cause

Today’s online Wall Street Journal reports yet another case of drug counterfeiting. Okay. Okay. I’m sure everyone knows what counterfeiting is. But it’s typically associated with money, or with a signature. In fact, over intersession, I was walking through an art museum and I noticed an exhibit in which the artist had “counterfeited” a US stamp, with the caption asking which was real. I couldn’t tell, but for the difference in fading which betrayed the older, real stamp. The point is, counterfeiters are good at what they do.

And although counterfeiting is certainly not a good thing, at least counterfeiting money doesn’t really hurt anyone, at least not physically. While I certainly do not condone the practice of printing fraudulent dollar bills, I can understand why people do it and I recognize that it does little more than swindle society out of its hard-earned money. But does anyone remember the melamine scare in China a couple years ago (if you don’t, see http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/4315627/Two-sentenced-to-death-over-China-melamine-milk-scandal.html)? Now, that was different. People died because of that. And not just any people died – those counterfeiters killed defenseless, unknowing babies just to make their “product” look more like the milk from healthier cows. And that’s no oversimplification. Who drinks milk, predominantly? Children in need of building bones. Who’s the main consumer, then? Children. Who died? Children. Were they capable of avoiding their fate? No, at least not knowingly. Counterfeiting foodstuffs is fundamentally different than printing bills – one kills people, the other only robs them of their money.

Today’s story is no different than the melamine in China. Apparently, the Danes caught counterfeit drugs (injectable cancer drugs made by AstraZeneca) and reported it to the FDA. Another counterfeiter stopped. The Journal puts the number of apprehended drug counterfeiters at 2003 for the year 2009. That is simply astronomical. And these aren’t just placebos or fake Viagra that doesn’t sufficiently induce erection. Now counterfeiters have started to pass false injectable drugs, drugs that cash-strapped medical facilities might be lured into purchasing for things like cancer treatment. These aren’t generics, either. Generics are just cheaper versions of drugs that were previously protected under patent laws. Counterfeiters are worse, because although generics might not be as pure as the real McCoy, companies that make them have an incentive to keep those who take their medicine healthy so that they keep their customers. Counterfeiters operate underground, and have no concern for their victims.

This must stop. The Journal mentions several new laws, under consideration all across the globe, that fight the scourge. But we need to move quickly.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204059804577225640701811020.html