“The person who takes medicine must recover twice, once from the disease, and once from the medicine.”
~ William Osler
Most of us laugh at the ads we see on TV for pharmaceuticals. They usually show happy people, smiling and spinning in circles on the front lawn for no reason or holding hands in a bathtub on a beach as the narrator sneaks in words like ‘anal discharge, spontaneous bleeding, impotence or suicidal tendencies.’
At the end of these ads, we hear things like “talk to your doctor today to see if NuHappyLife™ is right for you!” Have you ever stopped and wondered: wait a second, why are they advertising dangerous medications to me as if it’s a new flavor of Coca Cola?
That’s the Doc’s job, isn’t it? He’s the highly trained expert chemist who decides if this new chemical is right for you. Right?
If you believe that’s true, you’ll be left in confusion by the end of this article. Because, like it or not, doctors quite frequently supply us with prescription meds that can cause symptoms much worse than the conditions you wanted fixed in the first place.
Five Medications With Side Effects Worse Than Your Symptoms
- Levothyroxin (Brand Names: Levothroid, Levoxyl, Synthroid, Tirosint, Unithroid): Used in the treatment of hypothyroidism and goiter, Levothyroxin is the #1 most prescribed drug in the last few years. (Wait, wasn’t this problem fixed by iodizing table salt?) Side effects of this chemical include: hair loss, infertility, difficulty swallowing, hives, nausea, irritability, decreased bone density, etc. etc. The full list of possible side effects encompasses some 80+ unpleasant conditions. Oh, and the manufacturers do well to remind you that “generally, thyroid replacement treatment is to be taken for life.”
- Warfarin: Originally developed as a rat poison, Warfarin is now widely prescribed to humans to prevent blood clotting. The only downside to taking warfarin appears to be that spontaneous, unstoppable and life-threatening bleeding can occur from almost any part or orifice of the body. While a blood clot or embolism can be a life-threatening event, aren’t we just trading one possible death for another? Surely there’s a better way.
- ADHD Medications (lisdexamfetamine): “Exactly how lisdexamfetamine works is not known.” Wow. That inspires confidence in the patient. Used as a treatment for ADHD, this drug might be able to help you focus better, but you could experience: thoughts of suicide, sudden death, stroke, myocardial infarction (heart attack), seizures, and dependence on the medication… and I suppose any number of other nasty things, since they aren’t sure what the drug is doing to you. As a side note, check out this article where Neuroscientist Carl Hart says he believes Adderall (a different ADHD medication) and methamphetamine (a nasty street drug) are nearly identical.
- Antidepressants: This entire class of drugs, which are supposed to help those people with mild to moderate depression, are warned by 134 drug regulating agencies across the world to cause side effects such as: suicide attempts/risk, heart disease, death, depression (seriously?), hostility, violence, aggression, and birth defects. The worst part? They’re also highly addictive.
- Armodafinil (Brand name: Nuvigil): This drug is less widely prescribed than the above four, but has (in my opinion) the greatest difference in risk vs reward than many drugs prescribed today. Used to treat ‘Shift Work Disorder,’ which sounds made up, but is a fancy way of saying work related fatigue and sleep deprivation. Armodafinil can cause: depression, anxiety, mania, suicidal thoughts, aggression, ‘sensing things that aren’t really there,’ and (the most vague statement ever) ‘other mental problems.’ And this is to treat mild sleepiness!
As far as I’m concerned, (and I’m fortunate in that I’m on no prescription medications) if my doctor was having me take any of the above five drugs, I would seek alternatives and discuss them with an open-minded primary healthcare provider. Maybe for some people the risk of the drugs is worth the reward, but surely in modern science we have answers better than this for disease. If you’d like to learn more about what really goes on behind the scene read “The Truth About Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us And What To Do About It“.
Click play below to view the commercial that we should be seeing…
Sources:
Drugs.com
Drug Manufacturer’s websites
