Big Pharma officials run the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), its mandate focused on profit-making over human health and welfare.
Consumer advocate Ralph Nader earlier slammed “unrestrained drug industry havoc.”
Big Pharma “receives billions of dollars in tax credits for doing research and development that it should be doing anyway” — along with billions more in corporate welfare.
The Center for American Progress accused the industry of “reap(ing) profits while hurting everyday Americans.”
Exorbitant prices charged by Big Pharma far exceed their cost in other countries,, including developed ones.
In 2018, Americans spent $535 billion on prescription drugs, a 50% increase since 2010.
In her book titled “The Truth About the Drug Companies,” former New England Journal of Medicine editor Dr. Marcia Angell said the following:
“Only a small fraction of (Big Pharma’s) drugs are truly new. Most are simply ‘me too’ variations on older drugs.”
The industry is “primarily a marketing machine to sell drugs of dubious benefits, using its wealth and power to co-opt every institution that might stand in its way, including the US Congress, the (FDA), academic medical centers, and the medical profession itself.”
According to Katherine Greider in her book titled “The Big Fix: How the Pharmaceutical Industry Rips off American Consumers:”
“Other countries move to control prices and sharply limit advertising” — polar opposite how the US operates, competition not resulting in lower prices for consumers.
Industry analyst Tim Anderson earlier explained that “drug companies…looked at each other and said, ‘(n)one of us needs to compete on price if we just hold the line.’ ”
Despite US federal law requiring that FDA approved drugs must be “safe and effective,” Public Citizen’s Health Research Group revealed otherwise in three earlier books titled:
- “Pills That Don’t Work”
- “Over the Counter Pills That Don’t Work”
- “Worst Pills, Best Pills: A Consumer’s Guide to Avoiding Drug-Induced Death or Illness”
Virtually all drugs have labels that warn of potential side effects that can be hazardous to human health.
Time and again, the FDA approves use of drugs prematurely. An estimated 100,000 American die annually from the toxic side effects of prescription drugs.
Is newly touted/FDA approved Remdesivir to treat COVID-19 infected patients the latest example of an agency OK’d drug that may do more harm than good if used as directed.
On Saturday, Thailand Medical News (TMN) reported the following:
Coronavirus infected “Americans are getting their lives placed (at) risk again, this time as the incompetent and fraudulent team compris(ed) of…Trump…Anthony Fauci, and the US FDA…rapidly approved remdesivir as a drug to treat COVID-19 despite conflicting study results, and the fact that the drug does not clearly demonstrate any specific efficacy against the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus,” adding:
Use of the drug in trials “show(ed) hepatoxicity effects coupled with even slight indications of nephrotoxicity and even cardiotoxicity, and there are insufficient studies to demonstrate its safety on humans.”
US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony Fauci and others are touting use of the drug for its alleged shortened hospitalizations of small numbers of COVID-19 infected patients on whom the drug was tested.
The WHO noted that remdesivir used in the study failed to improve patients’ health or reduce pathogens in their blood.
Trump, Fauci and the FDA endorsed “an unproven but toxic drug” for use in treating COVID-19 patients, said TMN.
If widely marketed, its use will be a potentially large-scale experiment that may be harmful to human health.
A Final Comment
TMN noted studies in the US and UK show that the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus that produces COVID-19 illness is “more complicated and far more potent than the HIV virus” for which no successful vaccine was developed.
TMN concluded that despite all the hype about alleged progress in developing vaccines for COVID-19, reality suggests otherwise, saying the following:
“Mutations of SARS-Cov-2 mak(e) it more transmissible and dangerous. The reality is that there is unlikely to be a vaccine.”
All vaccines are harmful to human health. No successful ones were ever developed for coronaviruses, according to vaccine expert/immunologist Ian Frazer.
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Award-winning author Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)
His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
