It is time for the scientific community to stop giving alternative medicine a free ride There cannot be … - Marcia Angell

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What you ain't never understood is that I ain't got nothing, don't own nothing, ain't never really wanted nothing that wasn't for you. There ain't nothing as precious to me. . . There ain't nothing worth holding on to, money, dreams, nothing else--

Marcia Angell

It is time for the scientific community to stop giving alternative medicine a free ride There cannot be two kinds of medicine — conventional and alternative. There is only medicine that has been adequately tested and medicine that has not, medicine that works and medicine that may or may not work. Once a treatment has been tested rigorously, it no longer matters whether it was considered alternative at the outset. If it is found to be reasonably safe and effective, it will be accepted.

Conventional, Giving, Kinds, Medicine, Tested, Two

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It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine.

Believe, Editor, Guidelines, Medicine, Reached, Two

Over the past two decades the pharmaceutical industry has moved very far from its original high purpose of discovering and producing useful new drugs. Now primarily a marketing machine to sell drugs of dubious benefit, this industry uses 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.

Decades, Fda, Industry, Medical, Past, Two

Consider the clinicaltrials by which drugs are tested in human subjects. 5 Before a new drug can enter the market, its manufacturer must sponsor clinicaltrials to show the Food and Drug Administration that the drug is safe and effective, usually as compared with a placebo or dummy pill. The results of all the trials (there may be many) are submitted to the FDA, and if one or two trials are positive—that is, they show effectiveness without serious risk—the drug is usually approved, even if all the other trials are negative.

Administration, Dummy, Effectiveness, Fda, Show, Two

We should be willing to spend the money in return for the innovation.

Innovation, Money, Return, Spend, Willing

A review of seventy-four clinical trials of antidepressants, for example, found that thirty-seven of thirty-eight positive studies [that praised the drugs] were published. But of the thirty-six negative studies, thirty-three were either not published or published in a form that conveyed a positive outcome.

Conveyed, Drug, Example, Four, Praised, Thirty Eight