Malpractice Makes Perfect
by Mickey Z.
Dissident Voice
January 17, 2003
"Never go to a doctor whose office
plants have died."
-Erma Bombeck
Two articles in
the January 17, 2003 New York Times offered a telling glimpse at what passes
for health care in the home of the brave.
First, in
"White House Allows Limits on Emergency Coverage," we learn that "the
Bush administration has ruled that managed care organizations can limit and
restrict coverage of emergency services for poor people on Medicaid."
Okay, shortly
after he proposed yet another tax break for his rich buddies, it's not too
shocking that our Supreme Court-elected leader would continue to kick the poor
while they're down, but here's a question: Reduced access or not, what kind of
treatment are any of us getting in the typical American emergency room anyway?
But first, the
other Times article:
In "Bush
Enters the Fray Over Malpractice," reporter Richard A. Oppel Jr. opens
like this: "With doctors across the country protesting the cost of malpractice
insurance, President Bush is making a renewed push for strict limits on the
jury awards he blames for skyrocketing premiums." Blaming "frivolous
lawsuits," Bush declared: "We're a litigious society. Everybody is
suing, it seems like."
As the Times
ignored the reality that the vast majority of lawsuits in America pit
corporation against corporation, another question remained unasked: Why have
the number of malpractice suits increased?
Here's a
thought:
*There are 80
million gun owners in America and 1500 accidental gun deaths
per year.
*There are
700,000 doctors in the U.S. who cause 120,000 accidental deaths
per year.
*Statistically
speaking, doctors are 9000 times more dangerous than gun owners.
Botched
surgeries, incorrect dosages, missed diagnoses-even when you take into account
all gun-related deaths (30,708 in 1998), the AMA is still three times more
lethal than the NRA. Of course, such numbers are disputed by groups with reason
to do so. A 2001 study purported to show that medical mistake estimates are
exaggerated, claiming that one of the reasons the examination of deadly errors
is flawed is because patients often are extremely ill to begin with (they were
gonna die anyway?). Still, before you trust any pro-medical industry study, you
might want to contemplate another bit of research that exposed doctors as
admitted liars. A University of Chicago Medical Center study found that in four
out of 10 cases, doctors intentionally told patients they would live longer
than expected.
"Although
nearly everyone agrees that frank, open and honest communication between a
doctor and his patient is optimal, on this one absolutely crucial issue, it
remains very much the exception," said study co-author Dr. Nicholas
Christakis, professor of medicine and sociology at the University of Chicago.
"As a consequence, two out of three patients may have to make important
medical and personal decisions based on missing or unreliable information."
The trouble is,
it doesn't really matter what all these studies allegedly demonstrate. Mistakes
are inevitable. A mechanic will screw up your car and lie about it. Your
teachers will go through the motions and lie to themselves. A writer will
publish a terrible book and blame the editor. What makes doctors different is
that stakes are usually higher. But perhaps more importantly, even when they
get it "right" and they tell the "truth," they're no less
dangerous than the doctors who make mistakes and/or lie. Whether it's human
error or misguided science, Western medicine is-directly or indirectly-the
number one killer in America. Read on.
When the US
system plays the prevention card (i.e. the smallpox scare), it has nothing to
do with adopting a healthier lifestyle. It's all about drugs and high-tech
intervention. For example, even though most of us have a reasonably functional
immune system, we'll be pressured into getting a so-called vaccine that may
contain any of the following: formaldehyde, mercury, aluminum, cells from
sickened animals (calf lymph, monkey kidney, chick embryo), and
genetically-altered materials. The impact is difficult to quantify.
"There are
about 12,000 reports made to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System every
year," explains Barbara Loe Fisher, president and co-founder of the
National Vaccine Information Center. "If the number 12,000 only represents
10 percent of what is occurring, then the real number may be 120,000 vaccine
adverse events. If 12,000 reports
represents only one percent of the actual total, then the real number may be
1.2 million vaccine adverse events annually."
"'Immunity'
is a grand medical delusion," writes vaccination activist, Sharon
Kimmelman. "Immune function, though, like all other body processes, responds
to and is the direct result of changing beneficial and detrimental health
practices and factors. There is no magic pill or potion which will lock us into
a state of 'protection' in spite of our actions. We are biologically
accountable for our behavior. Technology cannot trick it without serious repercussions."
"The more
the reality of vaccine reactions, injuries and deaths is denied and
minimized," Fisher adds, "the more distrustful the people will
become."
Despite
submitting to a purported immunization, many of us get sick anyway. That's when
the man in the white coat whips out his prescription pad and sends us off the
local pharmacy where we'll undoubtedly encounter a line since every day, 80
percent of Americans take a potentially addictive prescription drug. From 1962
to 1988, street drug addiction in America increased by 30 percent while
prescription drug addiction increased by 300 percent. In most cases, these
drugs are improperly tested and based on fraudulent science. According to the
U.S. General Accounting Office, of all the new drugs put on the market between
1976 and 1985, 52 percent had to be either pulled from the shelves or relabeled
because they proved to be more hazardous than studies had indicated.
Both the shot
that failed and the drug that made things worse are based upon research that is
usually funded by corporations. In their book, "Trust Us, We're Experts:
How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles with Your Future," authors
Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber discuss the vast amount of time that "a
modern researcher spends writing grant proposals; coddling department heads;
corporate donors, and government bureaucrats; or engaging in any of the other
activities that are necessary to obtain research funding." The influence
of this money on research can result in the
suppression of
certain studies while corporations commission writers to pen favorable articles
in peer-reviewed journals. A study of the relationship of pharmaceutical
industry funding and research conclusions about calcium-channel blockers was
published in 1998 in the New England Journal of Medicine. After examining 70
articles on the drug, researchers found that 96 percent of the authors of
favorable articles had financial ties to manufacturers of calcium-channel
blockers. One year later, the editor of the Journal of the American Medical
Association, Drummond Rennie, complained that the "influence of private
funding on medical research has created 'a race to the ethical bottom.'"
Government
agencies have also become bottom dwellers: "Pharmaceutical companies are
big campaign finance contributors having given $44 million over the last ten
years," explains Dr. Ray Greek, president of Americans For Medical
Advancement. "Food and Drug Administration
scientists who approve drugs or decide upon regulations are also current, past
or future employees of the drug industry. They are inextricably tied to the
industry that they are supposed to be policing. What this means is that the FDA
is effectively financed and staffed by the pharmaceutical industry. The agency
'works for' the industry, not for consumers, because consumers are not making
campaign contributions; nor are they arbiters of job security."
Whether the
research is privately funded or not, it would be doomed to failure since it
typically relies on animal experimentation and/or genetic propaganda:
Let's
contemplate some rudimentary animal experimentation facts, with a little
guidance from the researchers at Wellness of Nature:
* Every species
of animal has a very singular cellular makeup and structure. Therefore, the
testing of one species cannot lead to serviceable conclusions about another:
"The fact is that animals react differently to different chemical
substances, not only from human beings, but also from each other. Aspirin kills
cats and penicillin kills guinea pigs. Yet, the same guinea pigs can safely eat
strychnine-one of the deadliest poisons for humans but not for monkeys. Sheep
can swallow enormous amounts of arsenic, once the murderers' favorite poison.
Potassium cyanide, deadly to humans, is harmless to owls."
* "The
truth is that animal experimentation has not cured a single human disease. The
reason is simple: animal experimentation cannot produce any cures simply
because it is based on a premise that is medically and scientifically
false."
* "Animal
research is not science and therefore it must be abolished. It is only through
the use of truly scientific methods which are directly relevant to people
(these include prevention and clinical studies of human patients) that we can
hope to understand the causes of human diseases and find their cures."
* Even a cursory
glance at the large number of pharmaceutical drugs pulled from the shelves by
the Food and Drug Administration will offer a clue as to how ineffectual animal
experimentation is. Ironically, it's the human who ends up as the "guinea
pig."
* Universities,
hospitals, the pharmaceutical and health care industries, politicians,
lobbyists, private corporations, and celebrity dupes like Jerry Lewis and
Christopher Reeve gain wealth and prestige thanks to animal experimentation.
* Animal
experimentation is a scientific fraud but by shrewdly presenting the issue as
one of choice-100 million animals per year must suffer and die to keep the
world safe for Prozac, Ritalin, and Viagra-moral stances are effortlessly
quashed by those seeking to justify the laboratory torture of animals. However,
if it can be established that such experiments are not only morally vacant, but
scientifically specious as well, the focus changes drastically.
Then we have the
brave new world of gene therapy. "We are not the expression of our
genes," declares Ruth Hubbard, professor emerita of biology at Harvard,
"and knowing their location on the chromosomes, or their composition, does
not enable someone to predict what we will look or be like." This simple
reality is obscured by he almost-daily media reports on new gene findings. What
follows naturally is the creation of predictive tests based upon these genetic
discoveries. These tests are far more lucrative than any therapy that is only
prescribed to someone who already "has" a condition. Predictive tests
are for everyone-just like vaccinations. Yet another expensive medical procedure
based upon flawed and corrupt science.
"It is a
mistake to put too much weight on genes or DNA," Hubbard concludes. "Human
beings are genetically a relatively homogeneous species. If Europeans were to
disappear overnight, the genetic composition of the species would hardly
change."
Yeah, but our
health care system may improve.
The final leg of the curative journey, until the
condition inevitably flares up again, begins when we feel a touch better.
That's when our physician will dispense with dietary advice. And why not? Every
45 seconds, someone in the US has a heart attack. Every 55 seconds, an American
dies from heart disease, a highly preventable illness and the nation's number
one killer. Forty-five percent of all heart attacks occur in people under 65.
Even more disturbing is the growing number of Americans (75,000 per year) under
40 who are now suffering heart attacks. Every seven seconds, an American is diagnosed
with cancer, the number two killer. One out of three in the US will get cancer
and one out of four will die from this highly preventable disease. Seventy-five
percent of the carcinogens in our bodies come from eating animal products.
Clearly, some nutritional counsel is in order.
Now that he has
to spend less time worrying about getting sued, what will our doctor recommend?
Almost without variation, he or she will push the tenets of the standard
American diet, with all the deadly animal products, additives, chemicals,
pesticides, and GMOs that go with it. Featured prominently will be the Food
Guide Pyramid-complete with its carved-in-stone theology of 2-3 servings from
the meat-poultry-fish-eggs group and 2-3 servings from the milk-yogurt-cheese
group (make that 3-4 servings for children and pregnant women). Then again, what
else should we expect when the typical American doctor sat through only FOUR
classroom hours of nutrition during medical school?
"The human
body has absolutely no requirement for animal flesh," says Michael Klaper,
M.D. "Nobody has ever been found face-down 20 yards from Burger King
because they couldn't get their Whopper in time."
The sampling
offered above is but the tip of an iceberg immense enough to sink ten Titanics.
I didn't get to the mercury in your teeth, the fluoride in your water, the
over-reliance on surgery, the two million "dis-labeled" people locked
in nursing homes against their will, HMOs, GMOs, the "war" on cancer,
the HIV/AIDS cartel, and so much more. Still, I hope it's now clearer that the
faults in the system lie much deeper than individual human error and the
lawsuits they provoke. Even the most well-meaning and diligent physician is
often unprepared to offer legitimate help within the structure she or he was
trained in. The entire corporate medical configuration is defective and
corrupt, and thereby anti-health. Until American health care consumers move
toward awareness, self-education, and direct action, visiting your doctor (or
restricted ER) will continue to be hazardous to your health.
Mickey Z. is the author of The Murdering of My Years: Artists
and Activists Making Ends Meet and an editor at Wide Angle. He
can be reached at: mzx2@earthlink.net