Has the FDA pulled out of the drug business all together????

[bersaguy]

Can someone tell me if the FDA has just pulled out of watching what drugs the pharmaceutical companies shove out on the market? I spend a lot of time listing many different drugs as they hit the market and get advertised on TV. Just about every thing that hits the market regardless of what it's purpose is designed to do they all seem to have the same serious warnings first such as 1) can cause cancer in some people, 2)Can cause suicides in some people  3) Can cause bleeding if you take it with this or that. 4) Can cause heart attacks in some people and the list goes on and on and then after they have listed everything that can kill you by taking them they add in the minor ones like may cause dizziness and dry mouth. Ok now if I look at this right. Anything listed that can cause suicide might be used to keep you from getting an HCP so if your doctor write one of them drugs for you and it becomes part of your medical records they your on a drug with those side effects your a danger to your self and others. Am I just being paranoid of am I making any sense at all? I'm wondering if the FDA has been told to back off on purpose or have they been bought off or maybe a little of both?  Just would like to hear some opinions........... :popcorn: :popcorn:

[Guest Lester Weevils]

I sometimes get the impression that all the decent drugs were already invented and now they are just cranking out the second-rate left-over poisons just to be hawking something new and on-patent. FDA sure seems to want further power to meddle in the tobacco and "neutraceutical" markets, etc.

 

My primary care physician also owns a company that does drug trials. He is both a physician and pharmacologist. Smart fella. He keeps trying to sign me up, but I figger there's no benefit in betting against the null hypothesis for drugs that haven't even shown efficacy yet. Only of "possible" benefit if one is dying and it is either try a new drug and hope it works, or just go ahead and croak without bothering.

 

I have near-crippling problems with excessive daytime sleepiness and asked the doctor, "Don't they have any glaucoma, diabetes or high blood pressure meds that have the side effect of making you more alert rather than less alert? Every pill you prescribe lists sleepiness as a side-effect, and if I could find equivalent meds that list "wakefullness" as a side-effect it sure would help."

 

So he replied, in his business of running drug trials, they have to notate every symptom and complaint that the human guinea pigs tell him about. So he explained that sleepiness isn't necessarily a side-effect that most people would experience. Merely that sick people are more likely to be sleepy and lacking energy, and they are not very likely to report being alert and energetic. And that is why virtually all medicines list sleepiness as a possible side-effect.

 

So maybe the fella has a point. And maybe it also applies to many of the other common symptoms such as death, infection, etc. If somebody dies taking the test drug, they have to list it as a side-effect, yada-yada.

 

But the new drugs, I'm reluctant to take em anyway. After a drug has been around a long time, by then they ought to have a real good handle on the odds of it killing a fella.

Edited September 24, 2013 by Lester Weevils