medicines or drugs: are they saving your life or killing you?

Medicines or Drugs: Are They Saving Your Life or Killing

You?


You?

The most important subject we can talk about

…

that’s your health.

The most important subject we can talk about

…

that’s your health.

Time-tested principles, proven strategies and

best-kept secrets

Time-tested principles, proven strategies and

best-kept secrets

That thousands of wellness doctors use for themselves and their families.

Do you know?Do you know?

Every 30 seconds in the United States,

someone files for bankruptcy as a

result of the treatment they receive

for a serious health problem?

-- according to researchers at Harvard University


That’s over 50%of all personal

bankruptcy filings affecting over two million Americans

every year.-- researchers at Harvard University


“…three-quarters of the medically bankrupt

had health insurance at the

time of their illness.”

-- researchers at Harvard University

“Nobody’s safe.”“Nobody’s safe.”

-- Elizabeth Warren a law professor at Harvard University

Inconvenient Truths of Health Care


“America is in serious financial trouble.”

-- David WalkerU.S. Comptroller General

(America’s top accountant)



“America and Americans are going bankrupt due to health care …

or dare I say – lack of caring for our health.”

-- Discover Wellness, How Staying Health Can Make You Rich

The American LifestyleThe American Lifestyle

• Pain = stop exercising

+ gain weight

+ poor posture

+ unhealthy thinking

+ poor habits

The American LifestyleThe American LifestyleDepression

High Blood Pressure

Elevated Cholesterol

Increased Risk of Preventable Diseases

Heart Disease

CancerDiabetes OBESITYStress Related Conditions

… And Much More


The cycle continues… • Increased Pain =

increased weight gain + unhealthy posture + depressed thinking + destructive habits.


Are YouLiving Sick?

America SpendsAmerica Spends

$2 trillion per year on health care …

really… sick care.


More than 15% of every dollarspent in America … goes toward health care


More than 70% of our health care Dollars treating preventative lifestyle-related chronic

diseases.


Heart Disease, Cancer, Diabetes, Obesity, Stress Related Conditions,

Chronic Pain and Adverse Drug Reactions

The Seven Conditions causing America’s #1

crisis


$6,280

Each and every man, woman and child spends per year on

medical care.


• If you and your children didn’t spend $6,280 each on health care last year, – that means your neighbors and

coworkers spent your share and you still paid for it.

– A family of four = $25,120 per year

Now, If you’re thinking to yourself…

Now, If you’re thinking to yourself…

I’m not spending that much on health care – this isn’t my

problem… why should I care?

I’m healthy, I feel good,

look good, my family is healthy

Think for a moment…Think for a moment…• Starbucks spends more

money on health insurance than they do on coffee.

• General Motors spends more money on health insurance than they do on steel for their cars.

Think for a moment…Think for a moment…

How do you think they pay for that?

They pass the costs on to us – their customers.

Every time you spend:Every time you spend:

• $1.95 at Starbucks for a cup of coffee, – $.30 goes to cover medical costs.

• $10 for a movie ticket, – $1.50 goes to cover medical costs.

• $20 for a pizza, – $3 goes to cover medical costs.

• $50 for a tank of gas, – $7.50 goes to cover medical costs.

Every time you spend:Every time you spend:

• $250 for an airline ticket, – $37.50 goes to cover medical costs.

• $1,000 on auto repairs, – $150 goes to cover medical costs.

• $2,500 on a plasma television, – $375 goes to cover medical costs.

• $25,000 on a new car, – $1,666 goes to cover medical costs.

We’re all paying the bill …

Increased prices, Increased taxes, Increased premiums

We’re all paying the bill …

Increased prices, Increased taxes, Increased premiums

Medicines or Drugs: Are They Saving Your Life or Killing You?

What Your Medical Doctor May Not Have Told You.

When I discovered the research that I am about to share with you today, I was shocked. I

thought to myself…

this is impossible, it can’t be true.

You may feel that I’m about to convince you to believe in my

opinion. I’m not.

You’re Crazy!No Way!

That’s Not Right! Can’t Be True

Use your favorite search engine and enter: adverse drug

reactions, medical mistakes and

pharmaceutical marketing.

Discover information widely reported within the medical

profession in professional journals such as the Journal of the

American Medical Association, information directly from the FDA’s website, 60 Minutes, The NY Times

and The Washington Post.

There are three main

points that I believe can and

will save your life.

1. Medicines Are Not As Safe As Most People Believe

Them To Be

2. Prescribing medications is

not as scientific as we believe it to be and…

3. The pharmaceutical industry is

a much bigger business than most people believe it to

be.

Each year, approximately 2.2 million people experience Adverse Drug

Reactions (ADRs) from taking prescription medications.

— Journal of the American Medical Association

We’re Not as Safe as We Thought


Of these, it is estimated that more than 100,000 patients die

annually. ADRs are the fifth greatest killer in U.S.



Right after heart disease (743,460)

cancer (529,904)

stroke (150,108)

pulmonary disease (101,077)



This study is a Meta analysis of 39 research reports

published from 1966 to 1996. — (JAMA 279:1200 1998)



Approximately 1.5 million hospitalizations a year were

caused by adverse drug reactions.

Every day, more than 4,000 patients have ADRs so serious

that they need to be admitted to American hospitals.

— Journal of the American Medical Association



2.09% of all pediatric hospitalizations were caused by ADRs and 39% of these were

life-threatening.



In one year, there are 79,000 children admitted to the hospital because of ADRs -

31,000 of these children had

life-threatening

adverse reactions.



The FDA reported that Vioxx may have contributed to almost 28,000 heart attacks in the U.S. between 1999 and 2003.



There are approximately 100,000 deaths

annually due to adverse drug reactions – that is…



Five times the number of

deaths due to AIDS in America (20,000)



Almost twice the number of

deaths due to Diabetes (53,894)



Medical errors (wrong medications or doses, surgical mistakes,

infections and other preventable adverse events) contribute to

more than 1 million injuries and up to 98,000

hospital deaths per year. — Institute of Medicine (IOM) report

To Error is Human: Building a Safer Health System



A more recent study titled Patient Safety in

American Hospitals, found that such errors could be as

high as 195,000 deaths per year.



“I don’t know why the public isn’t more pissed off about this.

Imagine what the reaction would be if we had a similar

mortality in aviation.” — Donald Berwick, MD

member of the IOM panel President of Institute for Healthcare

Improvement



“Imagine a fully loaded Boeing 747 crashing every day of the year with no survivors. Then, you can begin to understand the number of preventable deaths that occur in our health care

system.” — AmericansMadAndAngry.org



Medicine is not as

scientific as we thought

Off-label use of prescription medications (medications

prescribed for conditions other than those “approved” by the U.S.

Food and Drug Administration) occurs in about one in every five prescriptions filled in the

United States.

Medicine Is Not as Scientific as We ThoughtMedicine Is Not as

Scientific as We Thought

73% of all off-label prescriptions (109 million) had little or no evidence supporting the

use in question.

The most common off-label uses were for heart medications, anticonvulsants and asthma

medications.



Why are there so many Adverse Drug

Reactions and medical errors?



Americans have been convinced – through billions of dollars of

pharmaceutical advertising – to just… ask their doctor.

As a result, 64% of all patient visits to physicians result in

prescriptions.



Americans have a mania for medications. 2.8 billion

prescriptions were filled in the year 2000. That is about 10

prescriptions for every person in the United States.

Most new drugs are approved with an average of

1,500 patient exposures and

usually for only relatively short periods of time.

— FDA.gov

Most experts agree … there is a total lack of incentive to improve the quality of our health care system. Our providers are

actually paid more when quality is worse, such as

when complications occur.

When studies are done to test the safety and efficacy of

medications to be approved by the FDA, they are not done

to determine the safety and efficacy of multiple

medications being taken at the same time.

Medicine is a much bigger business than we thought…

The pharmaceutical industry has been the most profitable industry in America for most of

the past decade.

In 2002, Pfizer Inc., the world’s largest drug company, reported

return on sales of 28.4%.

Two and a half times

better than the 10.7% return of

General Electric Company, perennially ranked

as America’s best managed business.

Nearly nine times better than

the 3.3 percent return of Wal-Mart Stores, the country’s largest and best-run

retailer.

And it was nearly 32 times

better than the .9% of

General Motors Corporation, America’s

largest car manufacturer.

The percentage of personal health dollars spent on prescription drugs has grown faster

than any other segment, including doctor and hospital bills.

— The New England Journal of Medicine

Americans comprise only 5% of

the entire world’s population, yet we consume

50% of all the prescription drugs manufactured worldwide

- more than three billion prescriptions each year.

How does the pharmaceutical

industry sustain such

profitability?

Congressmen are outnumbered two to

one by lobbyists for an industry

that spends roughly $100 million a year in campaign

contributions and lobbying expenses to protect its profits.

— Center for Public Integrity

The drug lobby invested

more than $10 million in campaign contributions during the

last election and has been a source of lucrative

employment opportunities for congressmen when they leave

office.

Annually, the drug industry spends nearly twice as much on marketing as it

spends on research and development, although drug

companies report neither total precisely.

Marketing R & DPfizer $16.90 $7.68GlaxoSmithKline $12.93 $5.20Sanofi-Aventis $5.59 $9.26Johnson & Johnson $15.86 $5.20Merck $7.35 $4.01Novartis $8.87 $4.21AstraZeneca $7.84 $3.80Hoffman La Roche $7.24 $4.01Bristol-Myers Squibb $6.43 $2.50Wyeth $5.80 $2.46Abbott Labs $4.92 $1.70Total $99.73 billion $50.3 billion

In 2004, Pfizer spent almost $120 million for media ads for Lipitor, the world's number-one selling prescription drug, while companies promoting

erectile dysfunction treatments Viagra, Levitra and Cialis spent

$425 million.

Direct to consumer advertisement has grown significantly: from $791 million in 1996 to $3.8

billion in 2004.

The pharmaceutical and health products industry has spent more

than $800 million in federal lobbying and campaign

donations at the federal and state levels in the past seven

years…

They are the largest lobbying effort in the nation and invest more money to protect their

interests by ensuring that pubic policy remains in their favor

than any other industry, except the insurance industry.

— Center for Public Integrity

All medicines are bad.

Medicines don’t save lives.

Your doctor is not a great doctor.

You should change your prescriptions without consulting the doctor who prescribed them to you.

I am NOT Saying That…I am NOT Saying That…

What I am saying is that there are three things your medical

doctor may not have told you:

1. Medicines are not as safe as we thought.

2. Medicines are not as scientific as we thought.

3. Medicine is a much bigger business than we

thought.

Want to learn more?

Read The Truth About The Drug Companies: How they Deceive Us

And What To Do About It

written by Marcia Angell, MD – former editor in chief of

The New England Journal of Medicine

The Ultimate Solution To America’s Health Care

Crisis


Crisis

• Yes, it is true…– America is rapidly

heading toward economic disaster due to skyrocketing health care costs.


Crisis


Crisis

Who’s going to fix our health care system?

We Are!


Crisis


Crisis

Discover Wellness …

It works, if you live it… it doesn’t, if you don’t.


Crisis


Crisis My message to you today

is one of hope.

It is time for us to work together to put the health and the care

back into health care.

If you choose to…Discover Wellness,

the ultimate solution to America’s health care

crisis…

You will discover…that staying healthy CAN make you rich.

Thank YouThank You


You?


You?

medicines or drugs: are they saving your life or killing you?

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