Kill or cure

[Thracian]

I read an astonishing claim yesterday - that potential cures for various ailments are supressed by medical professionals/researchers because if "cures" are not drug based they don't make any money either for the practitioners or for the pharmaceutical companies.

How far does it go, for God's sake?

I came on the comment by chance when I learned that you could not buy Apricot seeds as such, even though they supposedly have great curative value. You can order them from a specialist natural therapy company but for how long?

There seems to be a massive attack on natural therapies at the moment and is this being led by the pharmaceutical giants?

If so it is a scandal.

When my wife took sick she was never advised that there is any alternative to surgery and yet I cannot believe, having visited a surgical ward for the desperately sick, that they are actually being cured. Given a lease of life maybe but cured - I doubt it.

And for every individual I speak to who celebrates their recovery after such treatments as radiotherapy or chemotherapy I hear many, many more who insist it is the wrong way forward, that the treatments have serious side effects and the cures are rarely permanent.

I have always believed that nature has provided us with an answer to all non-skeletal ailments. If so why is the medical profession so quiet about them.

Doctors, like bank managers, are always portrayed as the kindest and most humane of people whose lives are dedicated to improving the lot of others. Trouble is, I now know what bank managers are like and I wonder if doctors just coat themselves in the same sort of veneer.

Does the money matter to them more than the life?

[Hullfox]

Sounds like a conspiracy theory to me.

The truth will always come out in the end.

[Nationwider]

As a user of prescription medication that keeps me alive on a day-to-day basis, I've become a bit institutionalsed by over the counter drugs. Ergo, I'm a bit sceptical of some more "herbal" remedies. That's just me, though. I pay my £100-odd quid for a yearly "subscription to life" and generally do what I'm told by my docs.

The pharmaceutical industry has to be a stitch up, at least, in parts and as such, nothing that Thracian says surprises me. Unscrupulous practice touches all businesses - the medical/pharmaceutical industry are no different.

[Guest]

Natural remedies have been used for thousands of years, and forensic archaeologists are finding physical evidence of the amazing powers some of these substances obviously have.

Skeletons from prehistory have been found with healed fractures as good, if not better than modern medicine can provide.

Digitalis and salicylic acid once came directly from plants.

I personally think that as more and more people are turning away from synthetic drugs and return to the 'old' rememdies, the drugs companies are getting worried, and are thinking of their shareholders rather than the well-being of the general population.

[rossporterlc]

it makes business sense to have a drug you have to take everyday rather than one that has to only be taken once