Alternative Lifestyle Reality to Drug Prescription Overload

 

The future for everyone is we live, may become sick and die. How I wish we could bypass the sick part by living a healthy lifestyle.

A few years back, one of my first encounters requesting a drug prescription was asking my brother’s doctor about Low Dose Naltrexone as a possible drug to help MS patients. I remember well how the doctor reached to a back shelf and removed a massive blue cover volume filled with pages of small script to locate the name of the drug and drug identification number (DIN).

This was the Compendium of Pharmaceuticals and Specialties as a Reference for Health Professionals that contained drug monographs and their numerous features to better prescribe drugs safely and appropriately.

It may be hard to imagine this reality of two volumes filled with approximately 18000 approved drugs provided by pharmaceutical manufacturers’ identification of pills, tablets, caplets, capsules, syrups, injections, drug updates, appendices and glossaries in different colored sections: green, pink, lilac, white, and shades of grey.

Drugs.com is a prescription drug interaction checker with more than 24000 prescription drugs, OTC medication and natural products.

So I checked for side effects of Naltrexone that showed interactions with 337 drugs … 34 are major, 303 are moderate, 2 diseases interaction and 1 alcohol / food interaction.

Can you see any inherent problems with this system?

Is there a Drug Prescription Problem of Magnitude Proportions?

So, you’ve high blood pressure, feel a little pressure on the left side with lower back ache so the first thing to do is see the doctor. Quick appointment, check your records and get a prescription drug(s) with warnings of directions to follow and possible side effects. You hope your symptoms will be relieved at least temporarily until the next visit.

Or, you may be watching TV when a happy drug commercial praises the energy benefits of an all-night sleep medication along with numerous side effects like stomach aches, mood swings and depression. You want to believe the ad and the pretty smile and ask your doctor for a prescription.

Are We Living in a Pharmageddon?

What is happening to our society has been described as a Pharmageddon or a national epidemic of legal drug abuse leading to addiction and overdose deaths. This widespread problem is defined as “the prospect of a world in which medicines produce more ill-health than health, and when medical progress does more harm than good.”

In fact, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), reports 106,000 deaths per year which makes legal prescription drugs the 4th leading cause.

The situation is further described as living in a polypharmacy and buying mixed multiple medications.

The hidden danger here is the chemical interactions that occur in the body when medications are mixed. Another problem is the number of times one drug is prescribed to take care of the side effects of another known as a “prescribing cascade.”

Have you ever wondered what materials constitute a drug?

I know what’s in my food, more or less, and ingredients in my supplement pill. But from where do ingredients for drugs come?

The chemical compounds tested … are maintained in large compound libraries, some of which contain more than 5 million chemicals. Products from natural sources like plants, fungi, bacteria, and sea organisms can be integrated within these libraries, some robotically. Most compounds, though, are derived through the use of chemical synthesis techniques, in which researchers create chemical compounds by manipulating chemicals.

Have you ever wondered how drugs get into the marketplace?

Drug companies have to prove how their drugs work through market clinical trials starting with Phase 1 for safety to minimize side effects … to Phase 2 or Proof of Concept with double-blinded large targeted patients for a few years … to Phase 3 that requires regulatory proof of risks, benefits, efficacy and comparison to other drugs with thousands of patients for over several years on a worldwide basis. If succesful, the trials meet FDA legal requirements for a drug approval application and identification (DIN).

Have you ever wondered about such an absurd list of side effects?

Drug companies need to warn people of all the potential risks of their drugs. Adverse effects must be reported and investigated in human clinical trials and must be included in the patient information leaflet (PIL) for the public.

Meantime, they can lobby and offer financial incentives to doctors to use their drugs through unbranded campaigns via pharmaceutical representatives with sales bonuses for top sellers.

Advertisements hit mainstream media in the 1990’s which require no context, cost, or cheaper generic versions or how improved diet and exercise could help before medication. Ads can often overstate positive components and understate negative ones.

Note that direct-to-consumer prescription drug ads on TV are allowed to be played only America and New Zealand where other countries have health protection measures like Canada.

Now, there seems to be even a new non-expert phenomena of celebrities eagerly sharing for monetary gain but patient misinformation. Once Kim Kardashian was issued a warning letter from FDA to correct her ad promoting a morning sickness drug by mentioning potential side effects.

All in all, perhaps there’s a redundant contentment on media to take the easiest route to virtual good health like expensive Ozempic injections for weight loss with long-term side effects like stomach paralysis, constipation, muscle weakness and more rather than a brisk walk with one less hamburger.

An Alternative to Reality of Human Nutrition Minus Drugs

Unfortunately, the hundreds of billions of dollars being spent on prescription drugs have only resulted in failing grades for many people. Instead, we’re seeing massive increases in chronic illnesses like cancer, heart disease and diabetes, and obesity rates are at an all-time high.

It’s time to stop passively spending on drugs even as your health continues to decline … this is not a coincidence.

Be your most motivated advocate.

Disease can only be resolved by addressing its root cause; not because your body is missing or needs a particular drug. It’s common sense that a healthy lifestyle is worth your best bet to produce a strong functioning body and mind, avoid diseases and increase your longevity.

Respect your body as a complex interactive system requiring a total balance of macro-nutrients and micro-nutrients for growth, development, and immune system competence starting with individual cells.

Importantly, understand the difference between two kinds of diseases:

Infectious diseases are caused by infections … something you catch “like a bug,” an outside virus, bacteria, or microbe. These are best treated with a handy drug or medications to kill the invaders. Modern medicine does a great job here along with treating trauma situations.

Cellular degenerative diseases are caused when cells become sick because they lack proper nutrition for growth and healthy regeneration.

Degeneration results when your very own cells no longer absorb adequate nutrients or eliminate waste properly. These patterns of symptoms or metabolic disorders are compounded over a long period of time as if your own cells are “warring with each other” creating free-radical inflammation where anti-oxidants work best.

There are at least 70 degenerative diseases for which there are limited cures outside of proper nutrition.

For example, all of the following conditions can be treated or prevented with Lifestyle Changes, yet if you go to a typical doctor, you’ll likely be prescribed a potentially dangerous drug instead:

Diabetes … Heart disease … High blood pressure … High cholesterol

FINAL WORD

There is common agreement that with advanced science we know more about food and health than any population in history. And yet, we’re sicker than ever even with increasing chronic diseases and a prescribing cascade of drug related deaths. Health care costs are pacing higher ($8500 per Canadian 2022).

There are several factors from hazardous effects of pesticides on farmers and consumers, depleted soils, concentraed animal factories, to the processed food industry that hooks appetites, to the pharmaceutical industry to make billions of dollars selling medications to an increasingly sick population.

What is the Real Alternative Solution?

Only you have the power in your hands to reclaim your health. It’s not about feeling lazy, uninformed or victimized by a Pharmageddon system.

The human body is programmed to live a healthy life, but unhealthy lifestyles bring pain and financial gain to big business who thrive on treating diseases, with or without cures.

Only you can control the plan to follow wellness principles for preventative health care by choosing wholefoods, right supplements, exercises and relaxation.

Questions and comments about how to improve your healthy lifestyles are always welcome to share.

Mary (Annemarie) Berukoff

info@newbetterchoices.com

250 304 9710 PST

BEST NUTRITIONAL ALTERNATIVE

My newest recipe for chicken curry includes all kinds of macro-nutrients, protein, vitamins, minerals and spices that are such strong anti-oxidants … chicken breast, carrots, mango chutney, onions, peppers, celery, onions, garlic, tumeric, cumin, ginger, coriander, cardomon, masala, pinch of cinnamon and coconut milk…all delicious nutrients to build and protect cells.

PS: You may be interested to learn more about a 20 year old Pharmaceutical Company with clinical research on their Pure Cell™ Technology to patent their range of unique nutraceuticals with up 100% bioavaliabilty to individual cells.

They have created the most efficient products possible to address the most common problems with nutraceuticals, which are mostly related to absorption, efficiency, cell permeability and toxicity.

Interesting research: National Library of Medicine (NIH)

Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice.