ConMed and the Creation of IllnessChapter 5: the more money spent on NHS-ConMed, the more illness and disease that is generated. It isn't just that spending money on NHS-ConMed fails to make us better - it actually makes us sick.by Steven Scrutton9 September 2011 
Chapter 4: Why ConMed Will Always Fail Chapter 5 - Synopsis: Drugs Cause Illness This chapter examines a simple but important equation - that the more money spent on NHS-ConMed, the more illness and disease that is generated. In other words, it is not just that spending money on NHS-ConMed fails to make us better - it actually makes us sick.
It dismisses the terms 'side-effect' and 'adverse reaction' in favour of the term DIE's, or 'Disease Inducing Effects' as this more accurately reflects the impact of drugs on our health. It looks at how NHS-ConMed treatment causes disease, and even creates new diseases, and then introduces new, highly profitable drugs to deal with the disease it has created, or escalated. It also looks at how NHS-ConMed has become adept at deflecting and avoiding responsibility for the creation of disease. Iatrogenic DiseaseThe idea that NHS-ConMed is making us sick is not a new one. The concept of 'iatrogenic' (or doctor-induced) disease was described by Ivan Illich in the 1970’s. Yet its roots are deeper, and go back much further. Dr James Hamilton, a distinguished Edinburgh physician, in his book "Observations on the Use and Abuse of Mercurial Medicine" published in 1819, was one of the first studies of drug side-effects. He said that whilst the immediate side-effects of Calomel were rare, its long-term action might be much more insidious, especially in children, and just as deadly. Griggs (p194) describes his argument: He suggested that a great many of the major health problems of the day, as well as much general ill-health and debility, were due to constant dosing with calomel. He was frightened by the alarming rise in the incidence of convulsions - 'all those fatal conversions to the head, which of late years have so frequently taken place in the fevers of children' - and by 'the daily increasing ravages of hereditary scrofulous disorders' that tuberculous infection of the lymph nodes in the neck which produced the huge disfiguring ulcers known as The Kings Evil. Hamilton became more and more convinced that both could be laid at the door of calomel, and he strongly suspected that this drug might also be a factor in the upsurge in numbers of deaths from ordinary tuberculosis. Similar suspicions are now commonplace, and they apply to all modern NHS-ConMed drugs. And the size of the problem is huge, probably much bigger than anyone currently understands. The Hypocratic oath - do no harmThe primary, and perhaps the most obvious responsibility of any medical practitioner, is enshrined in the ancient Hypocratic Oath. It is simply 'to do no harm'. NHS-ConMed contravenes this primary duty on a massive scale. The main function of NHS doctors now appears to be to prescribe NHS-ConMed drugs, and it has been proven, time and time again, that these drugs cause an enormous amounts of harm. Over-hyping drug efficacyNHS-ConMed regularly overstates claims about drug safety and effectiveness - it is in their interests to do so. We are told regularly that some new drug will transform the lives of people suffering from this or that disease. Yet most drug tests reveal something much more modest. For instance testing may have indicated that a drug will give a 25% reduction in symptoms for about 20% of people suffering from a disease. What this means is that 75% of the symptoms will remain for 20% of sufferers, and 100% of the symptoms will remain for the remaining 80% of sufferers. Rarely, if ever, has a drug merited the iconoclastic headlines that frequently inform us that they are 'cures' for a particular disease. Despite this regular experience the media seems ready to submit to NHS-ConMed's propaganda, and meekly inform us of that incredulous possibility. So many people, suffering from incurable diseases, wait patiently but expectantly for medical science to come up with a cure before they die. Sadly, most of them wait in vain for a future that never arrives. A more sober and realistic experience suggests that NHS-ConMed drugs are rarely effective, many more are found to be unsafe, and some quite lethal. Perhaps they are as safe as the testing and regulation regimes of 'science' can make them - which, as chapter six will outline, is not very safe at all. The Journal of American Medicine has recently said that, in the USA alone, deaths from drugs are similar to a jumbo jet crashing every three days! The ages of drugsThere is a regular pattern of 'new' drugs replacing 'old' drugs, accompanied by strident claims about their miraculous capabilities - only for these new 'wonder' drugs to be withdrawn as silently as possible just a few years later. One of the recurring features of NHS-ConMed drugs is that each one appears to pass through a specific life cycle. Birth The new drug is announced as a 'medical breakthrough' that will transform the lives of patients who suffer from a particular disease. We are told that they have been 'scientifically' tested, and found to be both safe and effective. Childhood The drug is prescribed to patients, who quickly discover 'side effects', or 'adverse reactions' (which as will be seen are really DIEs). However, in the early days these are considered to be unimportant, it being considered that the benefits to patients greatly outweighing these minor disadvantages. Adulthood As time goes on, evidence about the DIEs caused by the drug accumulates. The problems can no longer be entirely discounted, so it is reluctantly accepted that the use of the drug has to be restricted, and can be used only with caution, with severe limitations being imposed on its prescription. Old Age Resistance develops amongst patients taking the drug, and doctors finally accept that the drug does cause damage. The use of the drug declines, and its profitability is severely reduced. By this stage, however, Big Pharma has often come up with a 'new' replacement. Death Finally, when the drug has been found to be either ineffective or unsafe it is removed from the market - as quietly and surreptitiously as possible. The old promises, the claims for the former 'wonder' drug, are quietly forgotten. The drug is dismissed as 'old' technology. We are told that there are new, more effective drugs available to take its place. There is a long list of drugs / vaccinations / hormonal treatments and similar that have gone through this process - Melleril, Seroxat, Bextra, Tysabri, Vioxx, and HRT to name but a few. Even substances used in the general manufacture of drugs have had to be banned. For instance, in 2005, phenglpropalamine (PPA) was banned by the FDA. Amongst other uses, PPA was used in Alka-Seltzer products - so it is often popular, over-the-counter medicines that have been found to be unsafe too. Anti-depressants of the SSRI group, which include Prozac and Seroxat, can be used to demonstrate the typical life-cycle of NHS-ConMed drugs.
This pattern is repeated frequently. It demonstrates that the 'science' of NHS-ConMed is quite incapable of protecting us (discussed in detail in Chapter 6). DIEs are often not predicted at the testing or licencing stage of regulation, indeed, they are usually not discovered until a drug has been marketed for many years, after millions of patients have suffered, or died as a result. The British National Formulary (BNF)The BNF is the doctor's bible, the book that provides the medical profession with all the information they need to keep patients safe from harm. Even a cursory examination of BNF will indicate that there are 'side-effects', or 'adverse reactions' (DIEs) to every prescription drug. NHS-ConMed tells us that all drugs are rigorously tested, and that the BNF is our safeguard. We are told that Big Pharma would not be allowed to produce drugs, however profitable they might be, if they were a danger to health. And obviously, our doctors would not prescribe them if they knew they were dangerous. Through such a stratagem we are led to believe that medical science is our guarantee of the safety and effectiveness of NHS-ConMed drugs. Yet every NHS-ConMed drug that has been restricted, withdrawn or banned because of its safety record, or its lack of effectiveness, have passed through this apparently rigorous process of scientific testing, licensing and reporting, and at each stage, each drug has been pronounced as being safe. This means not only that the drug regulatory system devised to protect us has never proved capable of doing so, it also means that the DIEs caused by drugs are accepted and understood by NHS-ConMed, and a matter of record. Poly-pharmacy and the problem of drug interactionsPoly-pharmacy is a term used when patients take more than one drug. The safety problems of taking a single drug are compounded when people take multiple drugs, often necessary when a patient is prescribed a second or subsequent drug to counteract the DIEs of the first one! Some older people in residential and nursing care units can be on as many as 6, 8, 10 or even more drugs at the same time. Polypharmacy does not just present patients with the accumulated dangers of the DIEs of each drug, but from the reaction of the combined cocktail of drugs within the body. Even though there must be endless combinations of poly-pharmacy there has been little research on how drugs interact with each other in this way. Some drug interactions occur when they interact with more 'natural' products, such as vitamins and herbs. In these situations, NHS-ConMed can often be heard bemoaning the natural product, stating that such herbs are 'dangerous' - because they interact with their drugs! This is perverse. It is based on an arrogant assumption that the drug is 'essential', and 'scientifically proven', whilst the vitamin or herb is 'dangerous', and warnings are issued about taking it! 'Side-Effects'? 'Adverse Reactions'? Or 'DIE's'?The terms 'side-effect' and 'adverse reaction' do not adequately describe the damage that NHS-ConMed drugs can do. They can quite literally kill us - and often do. And they do not kill just a few people. One American writer stated that Big Pharma drugs kill more people each year in the USA than during the entire Vietnam war! About 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam, whilst it has been estimated that between 106,000 and 125,000 people die each year by approved, 'scientifically' tested drugs - even when they are used properly, and taken as per prescription. The situation is no better in the UK. The British Medical Journal (2006, 332:1109) estimated that more than 250,000 thousand people are admitted to UK hospitals every year suffering a serious reaction to a prescription drug. The survey found that the drugs most likely to cause a serious reaction are aspirin, diuretics, warfarin, and the NSAID (painkilling) drugs. These figures were said to be only rough calculations, based on hospital admissions over a six-month period in 2004. It was thought that the total was probably a significant under-estimate - not least as hospital doctors are notoriously bad at reporting drug side effects. Moreover, the survey only measured drug reactions that required hospital care, and did not include people who suffered severe drug reactions at home, many of whom may not realise that a drug, or a combination of drugs, was to blame. Public announcements about deaths caused by drugs probably represent only the tip of the iceberg - the figures include only those people definitely known to have died from NHS-ConMed drugs. The actual figures are undoubtedly much greater. So to describe the carnage caused by NHS-ConMed drugs as 'side-effects' or 'averse reactions' are understatements of enormous proportions. They are inadequate descriptions of what drugs can do to us, a gross underestimate of the human tragedy they cause on a regular basis. The terms make a mockery of the reality - that thousands of people every year suffer serious ill-health as a direct consequence of taking drugs to make them better. Drugs can and do create disease. And these diseases are often more serious and life-threatening than the original condition for which the drugs were given. And many can kill us.
For this reason we need a new, more accurate way of describing the real outcome and consequences of taking NHS-ConMed drugs - a description that illustrates realistically what they do to the human body. Drugs produce disease-inducing effects, incapacity-inducing affects, addiction-producing effects, quality-of-life destroying effects - and too often, killer-effects. So the term 'side-effect' and 'adverse reaction' should be replaced by 'Disease Inducing Effects' or DIEs, particularly apt as the 'D' is interchangeable for both 'disease' and 'death'. Medical mistakesThere is considerable circumstantial evidence that the direct impact NHS-ConMed is that people are becoming sicker, and indeed dying in large numbers as a direct result of this form of medical treatment. (Medical Mistakes - a catalogue). The Daily Mail (6 July 2006), and WDDTY reported on 'medical errors' following two publications, the British Medical Journal (2006; 333: 59); and the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee Report: 'A Safer Place for Patients: Learning to Improve Patient Safety'. The reports included these estimates:
The risk of dying in hospital as a result of medical error is estimated as 1 in 300, this according to Britain's most senior doctor, Chief Medical Officer, Liam Donaldson (Guardian, 7 November 2006) http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1941120,00.html in which he said that clinical 'mis-judgments' mean that the odds of dying following hospital treatment is 33,000 times higher than dying in an air crash. In an airline industry, the evidence ... from scheduled airlines is the risk of death is one in 10 million. If you go into a hospital in the developed world, the risk of death from a medical error is one in 300 So how comprehensive is our knowledge of medical error? WDDTY (December 2006) reported on a study (Arch Intern Med 2006, 166:1585-93) in which 1 in 5 doctors admitted they would not own up to a medical error if it resulted in the patient's death. And just 40% of doctors said they would openly admit when errors had taken place. The other doctors said that they would either hide the mistake behind terms like 'an adverse event' or, in 20% of cases, not mention the mistake at all. So the true size of the 'medical error' problem is probably quite unknown - and considerably greater than realised or understood at this moment. Medical mistakes - the cost.These medical errors, costly in human terms, are also costly financially. The Daily Mail reported, on 6th February 2009, that NHS managements had warned that serious medical errors were to cost the NHS £700m during the next year. "The latest figures were released to the Tories following a parliamentary question. The NHS Litigation Authority has told trusts to prepare for a clinical negligence bill totalling £713million. This is almost double the premium collected during 2008/09 of £396million – and far higher than the £41.2million the NHS paid out in 2001/02. The £317million rise since last year will eat up a third of the total additional funding pledged to hospitals in last year's Budget. The Tories say this means vital services may have to be cut". Medical mistakes: error or consequence?Yet can this be put down to 'medical mistakes'? When speaking of death by drugs, NHS-ConMed will often introduce the words 'error', 'misjudgement', 'mishap' or 'mistake'. In this way it is the individual medical practitioner who are routinely blamed for such events. Rarely is it admitted that 'doctor error' is really the natural, and almost inevitable consequence of a medical system that is inherently dangerous. This is a time-honoured way of passing the buck. It is 'bad doctors', or 'careless nurses'. It is inadequate recording or prescribing practices, or poor administration and management. Sometimes, even the patients are blamed - they do not take their drugs properly, or according to the instructions. In these subtle ways we are led to believe that medical mistakes have nothing to do with a dangerous system of medicine. Everything would be fine if it were not for the people administering or taking the medication! Homeopaths, and most other traditional therapists, find this situation to be tragically laughable. They know that healing, and treating illness and disease successfully does not require dangerous drugs. It is important to realise that even the most malevolent homeopath, treating his worst enemy, would be quite incapable of killing anyone merely by using the tools of his trade! The conclusion must be that NHS-ConMed is not dangerous because of 'mistakes' or 'errors'. It is dangerous because of the nature of the drugs being used. Balancing the risks and benefits of drugs?DIEs are not entirely hidden from our view by NHS-ConMed. Their spokespersons can sometimes be heard explaining that taking a drug is a kind of subtle balancing act - between the need to treat a particular disease, and the risk of the known, or admitted 'adverse reactions' from treatment. Indeed, a new agency was set up to do that job. NICE (the National Institute of Clinical Excellence) seeks to advise on the 'balance' of these risks, both in terms of cost effectiveness and safety. Yet the benefit of the doubt always appears to be with the drug rather than the patient. The reason for this is clear. Most drugs are 'hyped' when they first appear on the market; they are 'wonder' drugs with amazing powers. This goes on one side of the balance. On the other side goes the lack of knowledge or understanding or acceptance of the DIEs caused of the drug. It is not surprising that we are therefore usually encouraged to take the drug! Yet there is an alternative to this 'fine balancing act', although it is one patients are never offered by the NHS. This is to avoid taking NHS-ConMed drugs, and instead, to find safer and more effective medical therapies to treat illness. Most traditional therapies offer treatments that are without significant risk. So it is incorrect to say that patients need to balance the risk between treating their illness and DIEs. Homeopathic remedies can be taken in complete safety. If a close match is found they will help make the patient better - without 'side-effects', and certainly without DIEs. And if a close match is not found they will have no impact on the illness, but equally they will not harm the patient - exactly in line with the Hippocratic Oath. "There is no scientific proof"The suggestion that NHS-ConMed drugs actually generates disease is quite regularly made, but rarely accepted. The easy explanation, often used by NHS-ConMed, is that such diseases have always existed but were never previously noticed, or properly diagnosed. Yet chronic diseases, new and old, have now reached epidemic levels. The strange new diseases discussed later in this chapter, require a more satisfactory explanation. In this explanation the role and culpability of NHS-ConMed drugs needs to be properly and honestly examined. There is enormous evidence linking NHS-ConMed drugs to these illnesses, not least the 'coincidence' of the rise of these diseases, and the consumption of drugs. NHS-ConMed's answer is usually denial. They decry the evidence with the plaintiff response 'there is no scientific proof'. They are usually right, of course, there is often no 'proof' available, and for two main reasons.
The 'there is no evidence' defence is therefore heard increasingly. The phrase means just that; there is no evidence - science has not bothered to look for the evidence, or even to come to a view about the possibility, one way or the other. It does not mean what is often implied by the phrase - that the issue has been investigated, and no evidence found. This defence usually endures for many years, until the evidence becomes too overwhelming for further denial. The increase in NHS expenditureSo whilst our knowledge about iatrogenic disease informs us that NHS-ConMed is dangerous, the question remains. Does it become more dangerous, do we become sicker when we consume more of it? We are certainly consuming more of it - an ever increasing amount of NHS-ConMed treatment has been given ever since the NHS began, even since the beginning of health insurance at the start of the 20th century. The NHS quickly became popular. It was free, and the concept of health care freely available for all seemed to be so full of promise. It was the people's reward for standing firm against Nazi Germany, part of the creation of a 'land fit for heroes'. Indeed, even its greatest opponents eventually agreed to join up - including 95% of ConMed doctors who fought so hard to prevent its formation, but who were destined to dominate the NHS, and create the NHS-ConMed monopoly. Yet from the earliest days, quite contrary to some expectations, the NHS found that its resources were being rapidly dissipated. The annual sums put aside for dental and optical treatment were quickly spent. The £2 million budgeted for free spectacles for the first nine months of the NHS was spent in just six weeks! This trend has continued ever since. The government originally estimated that the NHS would cost £140 million per annum by 1950. In fact the NHS was costing £358 million by that time. And exponential rises in expenditure, year-by-year, government-by-government has continued for over 60 years. It has brought governments down, and obliged political parties, at every general election, to make increasingly generous promises about future NHS spending. It is undeniable that the NHS is costing more than originally envisaged. It is more in real terms. And it constitutes an ever-increasing proportion of the nation's gross national product (GNP). NHS OverspendingYet despite these regular, and at times massive increases in health expenditure, the NHS continually fails to keep within its ever-expanding budgets, and when each new overspend emerges, one of two reflex cries of justification invariably arise.
In other words, there is nothing wrong with the medicine we are being offered - we just do not have enough of it! Increased drug prescriptionsThere has been a massive increase in prescribed drug consumption, all willingly fed to us, free of charge, by ConMed's marketing and distribution agent, the NHS. There has also been a corresponding increase in over-the-counter (OTC) drug sales. A Guardian article (21 July 2006) "England has become a nation of pill-takers" gave just a few of the statistics about our increasing drug dependency, obtained from the NHS Information Centre.
On a more 'optimistic' note the article stated that after 2005 prescriptions for HRT fell by 6%. But this arose from the disastrous research that linked HRT with heart disease and breast cancer, the tighter guidelines on its prescription that resulted, and patient reluctance to take the drug. The increase in drug taking is probably even worse in the USA. Between 1986 and 2004 antidepressant sales went from $240 million to $11.2 billion. During the same time the sale of antipsychotic drugs increased from $263 million to $8.6 billion. When combined, this represents a 40-fold increase in less than 20 years. Increased surgery'Hospital Episode' statistics show that the number of operations performed by the NHS rose from 5.9 million in 1995-6 to 6.8 million in 2003-6. (http://www.hesonline.nhs.uk/Ease/servlet/ContentServer?siteID=1937&categoryID=451) Hospital admissions increased over the same period by almost 2 million (an 18.6% increase) mainly due to lowering the average length of stay in hospital.
Some operations reduced in number, either because they were no longer so necessary or had fallen from favour. However, the statistics showed that overall there were nearly 1 million more operations performed each year, a rise of 15%. Again, the reason for, and the value of, this increased surgery is rarely questioned. Do operations lead to long-term improvements in health? Or does the ever-increasing need for surgical intervention arise from a drug-based medical system that has failed to prevent the deterioration of our organs and limbs? Pressure on GP servicesThere are regular concerns about the length of time it takes to see a GP, and the short time allocated for each consultation. In recent years NHS-ConMed has resorted to recruiting doctors from overseas because they have insufficient GP’s and many other categories of medical staff available to cope with the workload. The huge increases in expenditure over the last decade seems to have improved this situation, but there are still considerable pressures on doctors caused by the sheer volume of patients who need to see them - a problem as old as the NHS itself. Information from Pulse, the GP magazine (1 October 2008), stated that figures from the Department of Health showed the number of referrals by practices increased by more than 350,000, or 16%, in the first quarter of 2008/9 compared with the same period in 2007/8. It commented that these figures "sent shivers down the spines of NHS chiefs, as have the overspends of up to £5m that are emerging in some PCTs". Hospital waiting listsHospital waiting lists have been another ongoing NHS problem, and a prominent political issue in recent years. Again, it a problem that dates back to the beginnings of the NHS. The doubling of expenditure over the last decade seems to be having an impact on the length of waiting lists, but it is a marginal improvement based on increased resources rather than reduced demand. And some claim that the improved waiting figures are being 'massaged' or 'manipulated' in order to meet government targets. If patients were getting better from the NHS-ConMed treatment they receive, this combination of budget and personnel pressures would have stabilised, at least. They would certainly not have increased in the way they have throughout the lifetime of the NHS. Health in the USA - a comparisonSo what if the UK did spend even more on NHS-ConMed - as they do in the USA - would we be healthier? It does not appear so. In a Guardian article (3rd May 2006) James Randerson found that middle aged Britons were healthier than their American counterparts, and that higher health spending (about double the UK rate) was failing to bridge the gap. James Banks, an economist at University College, London, who wrote the report on which the article was based, said: If anything, given the higher health spending in the US, we might have thought that health levels would be a bit better there. Instead the research found that rates of disease such as diabetes, lung cancer and high blood pressure among Americans aged 55 to 64 were twice as high as in England. Americans also had higher rates of heart disease, heart attacks and strokes. The report said that lifestyle differences such as smoking, drinking and obesity could not explain the differences.
Despite his findings, Professor Banks did not raise the issue whether more ConMed drugs had led to more ill-health in the USA! Instead, he speculated that childhood obesity in the USA, experienced earlier in life, left a health imprint that showed up later in life. An extraordinarily convoluted explanation indeed! The only sensible explanation for the findings in this research is the argument being developed here - that NHS-ConMed drugs make us more unhealthy, and so, the more we spend on them, the more we consume, the sicker we become.
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