Month: September 2006

The drug pusher on the street is obviously “hooking” kids on drugs and is often arrested for his (or, her) efforts. But, what about large pharmaceutical companies? Are they “drug pushers” as well? Drug companies are getting “heat” from the coupon programs they are offering, which, when coupled with their commercials that encourage consumers to ask their doctors for drugs, may be “sucking them in” to becoming “users” of their drugs!

Prescription drug giveaways draw complaints

“Coupons ‘can increase the patient’s desire to take a drug that may or may not be the most suitable drug … This is not shampoo,’ said Susan Sherry, deputy director of Community Catalyst, a Massachusetts-based group that has joined 22 others seeking a Food and Drug Administration ban on the giveaways… The FDA has raised concerns. In a notice earlier this year, the agency said prescription drugs promoted with coupons or free trial offers may be seen as more widely indicated, more appropriate and/or less risky than they really are.'”

Drug companies make drugs, and drugs are their “product.” They aggressively market that product because they are in the industry to make money!

“Harvard’s Avorn said the coupon trend was ‘the same symptom we have seen in the drug industry for years – the ascendancy of marketing over science’ as companies fight for market share. ‘They are getting so preoccupied with marketing, and unfortunately they seem to be less successful in coming up with creative drug solutions,’ he said.”

Are you an “angry” person? Or, are you easy going and not much ever “gets to you?” I fall into the latter category. And, apparently that is a good thing… because a recent study indicates that longstanding anger issues diminish lung function.

Anger speeds decline in lung function: study

“Doctors in the U.S. recruited 670 men aged between 45 and 86, with an average age of 62 and followed them for an average of eight years. Participants’ levels of hostility were measured and rated at the start of the study and lung function measurements were taken three times during the follow-up. The men’s hostility scores were closely linked to lung capacity, after taking into account other factors such as smoking and education that could influence the results, researchers said. Those who became more hostile showed a more rapid decline in lung power than those whose hostility levels were lower. Anger and hostility will change neurological and hormonal processes, which in turn may disturb immune system activity to produce chronic inflammation, Dr. Rosalind Wright of the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, Mass., and her colleagues wrote in this week’s online issue of the journal Thorax, published by the British Medical Association.”

Note that anger also dimishes the immune system. Your emotional state definitely ties in to your physical health. Be calm, be happy, stay healthy! “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.” (Proverbs 17:22 – KJV)