Needing an honest answer

Nurses General Nursing

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As nurses why do you guys think that medications only treat the symptoms of a disease instead of curing the disease? Is it because no one has come up any cures yet? (:rolleyes:) Or do you guys think it's a conspiracy?

I for one think it's a conspiracy and that's what I'm writing a paper on. Just wanted to know how you all felt. Thanks.

Side note: OMG just noticed I put "and" instead of "an" in my title. Disregard Please!

Well, I can't read all these posts... but the answer may be prevention rather than "cure".

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Specializes in ICU, ER, EP,.
Well, I can't read all these posts... but the answer may be prevention rather than "cure".

Oh my, unfortunately I read them. It's challenging enough having to explain basic concepts to teach my patients and families. I simply lack to willingness or energy to even begin with you here. .:hdvwl:

Amazing

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I do not believe that a conspiracy that vast would go unreported in today's age of viral videos. Every body reacts differently even to innocuous substances(allergies?). curing things takes a lot more precise treatments and is almost individualized process not easy in today's litigious society better for mass treatments. I do not think very many researchers actually make fortunes off of treatments. And look at cancer research to find treatments that are cures. Some of the newer HIV treatments are trying to get the body to recognize and fight the virus more efficiently.

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Specializes in Health Information Management.

I'd call this a National Enquirer sort of question, but even it does some semi-respectable research (if one can consider its investigation into a presidential candidate's affair and illegitimate child to be respectable). Good heavens! Believe me, I'm no fan of Big Pharma or the insurance industry, but what you're saying is just plain goofy.

The day's barely started and I'm already depressed....

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Yes, pharmaceutical companies are crooks, but they arent holding out on any miracle drug. They are only using their leverage to make a lot of money.

As a person who spent years making and developing drugs, I have to disagree. Yes, drugs are insanely expensive. But making and researching drugs is insanely expensive. People need to remember that drug companies are in fact drug COMPANIES and need to make money to stay afloat. People who make comments like that have no idea the complicated and expensive research that goes into making the simplest of drugs. That is in no way meant to be an insult. It is just so much more complicated than most people can ever understand.

No one forces you to take drugs. People are lucky as hell that the ones available are there for them to take. If I didn't pay for and take my pill every day, I'd be dead. That's a choice I make. I don't get ****** at the company for charging me for the pill, I am grateful that someone took the initiative to research my disease and make a pill available to me.

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I heard someone saying that a lot of diseases could be cured but the pharmaceutical companies wants to make money.Is this true? I dont know for sure.I know though that medications are in one of the top 10 causes of human death.So medications can heal,treat as well as kill people.

The only difference between a drug and poison is the dose.

Drugs, like poisons are chemicals. Chemicals have efffects on the body. Some are desired, some are not. You take a drug for the good effects and deal with the bad. You take a poison for the bad effects. If you take too much of a drug that can cause good effects, it will kill you at some dose. People need to understand that drugs are simply chemicals. They are not miracles. If you do not use it properly, then yes, bad things will happen.

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As a person who spent years making and developing drugs, I have to disagree. Yes, drugs are insanely expensive. But making and researching drugs is insanely expensive. People need to remember that drug companies are in fact drug COMPANIES and need to make money to stay afloat. People who make comments like that have no idea the complicated and expensive research that goes into making the simplest of drugs. That is in no way meant to be an insult. It is just so much more complicated than most people can ever understand.

No one forces you to take drugs. People are lucky as hell that the ones available are there for them to take. If I didn't pay for and take my pill every day, I'd be dead. That's a choice I make. I don't get ****** at the company for charging me for the pill, I am grateful that someone took the initiative to research my disease and make a pill available to me.

I fully agree that pharmaceutical R&D is expensive and that drug companies need to make money in order to stay in business. However, I'd be more inclined to think positively about Big Pharma if it weren't the case that the pharmaceutical industry is consistently one of the most profitable industries in the world (the pharmceutical industry was the most profitable industry on the planet for many years, but has recently dropped to only #3), and they spend quite a bit more on advertising than they do on R&D. Not to mention all the maneuvering and hijinks to try to maintain patent protection for extended lengths of time (all the reformulations and "me, too" drugs) and lobbying to protect and increase their profits (Medicare Part D was nothing but a big Republican giveaway to the pharmaceutical and insurance industries, and the recent healthcare "reform" bill was not much better).

Fortune 500 2009: Top Performers - Most Profitable Industries: Return on Revenues

FORTUNE 500 2006: Top Performers

Drug-Companies.net - Pharmaceuticals Rank As Most Profitable Industry, Again

Big Pharma Spends More On Advertising Than Research And Development, Study Finds

http://www.actupny.org/reports/drugcosts.html

What Drug Companies Arent Telling YOU

PLoS Medicine: The Cost of Pushing Pills: A New Estimate of Pharmaceutical Promotion Expenditures in the United States

Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Pharmaceuticals, ProQuest Discovery Guides

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Elkpark,

I do agree that the advertising money spent is crazy. People shouldn't be learning about drugs from TV, they should be learning about what is most appropriate for them from their doctor. And I am so happy that they stopped dolling out tons of free lunches, pens, clocks, you name it with a drug logo on it. That's innapropriate influence of prescription writing.

But, I still contend that they have a right to make a profit. Afterall, that IS why they started companies. They don't HAVE to make like saving drugs. But they do. Good for them. They could be pumping out Justin Beiber merchandise instead....

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So, now I have read all the posts and OP, to avoid being accused of wearing a tin foil hat, I would think twice about writing this paper - unless it's too late, in which case please post! :)

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Specializes in Med/Surg.

I do agree that the profit from managing a diseases symptoms keeps some from looking for a cure, however I'm sure all the big companies are fully aware that another may discover a cure and therefore put them out of business without any profit at all. As far as HIV as an example, that is a very difficult case to argue. We don't have a CURE for many viruses, most of them are symptom management with the reduction of viral load, well we can do that with the antiretrovirals. However the fact that HIV is constantly mutating and attaches to your DNA complicates the ability to eradicate it. If you have an endless supply of money and can afford to have the antiretrovirals tailored to your specific HIV strands, you will die of something else long before you develop AIDS.

Cancer again is a problem within your cells, which complicates its treatment and is why there are so many negative side effects with our current treatment modalities. Heart disease, HTN, type II DM are all effected by lifestyle, I do not see that we will ever have a CURE unless we mandate and enforce people to live healthy lifestyles which would definitely take away the whole autonomous aspect. I do think that naturopathic and complementary medicine has a lot to offer, but I've never heard of someone being definitively cured of AIDS by any method.

While you do have some interesting hypotheses, I think you are going to have a hard time writing an informative paper with reliable resources.

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Specializes in ICU/ER/L&D.

:sstrs:

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Specializes in Peds/outpatient FP,derm,allergy/private duty.
As nurses why do you guys think that medications only treat the symptoms of a disease instead of curing the disease? Is it because no one has come up any cures yet? (:rolleyes:) Or do you guys think it's a conspiracy?!
,

I don't think it's a conspiracy to deliberately withhold news of a cure from the public, but not because I think that the US Government, and/or large multi-national companies always operate in an ethical, honest manner including promptly owning up to the big scr-w ups that occur. You don't have to look very far to find evidence of collusion or cover-up by specific groups within government or corporations, including governments and corporations joining up to keep damning information out of the public arena. (see Tuskegee experiment, tobacco company whistleblower Jeffrey Wigand and countless others like them).

To prove a conspiracy as you present it, you would have to find evidence that a great many people joined together and agreed in advance to lie, cheat and deceive, and that as of now no one that I know of has broken out of the agreement and blown the whistle on the whole sorry lot. That means that out of hundreds of corporate executives, elected officials and scientists, NONE blew the whistle or left a paper trail of their misdeeds. Human nature being what it is, I don't think it's possible.

Not saying there's nothing in your idea for your paper that is workable, though! There are quite a few ideas in there you could pursue, and by narrowing your focus you have a better shot at writing a paper that supports the original premise. You included an assumption there "that medications only treat the symptoms of a disease and don't cure the disease". You could write a paper on how you came to that conclusion. You present the idea that citizens are suffering and dying from diseases that could be cured if the drug companies would stop preventing that knowledge from going public. If you could write your paper about one such cure being deliberately withheld and by who, you would probably get an A.

You didn't mention what class assigned you the paper. If it's not a science class, and it's more of an essay about cultural characteristics, then the broad impressions you have would probably be fine. :)

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