The Key to Longevity

The study "Is US health really the best in the world?", published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH came to the following conclusions:


Every year in the US there are:

12,000 deaths from unnecessary surgeries;
7,000 deaths from medication errors in hospitals;
20,000 deaths from other errors in hospitals;
80,000 deaths from infections acquired in hospitals;
106,000 deaths from FDA-approved correctly prescribed medicines.
The total of medically-caused deaths in the US every year is 225,000.

*Starfield, B. (2000, July 26). Is US health really the best in the world? Journal of the American Medical Association, 284(4), 483-485.
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"The most stunning statistic, however, is that the total number of deaths caused by conventional medicine is an astounding 783,936 per year. It is evident now that the American medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the US. (By contrast, the number of deaths attributed to heart disease in 2001 was 669,667 while the number of deaths attributable to cancer was 553, 251.5.

Death By Medicine By Gary Null PhD, Carolyn Dean MD ND, Martin Feldman MD, Debora Rasio MD, Dorothy Smith PhD
www.wnho.net/deathbymedicine.htm
www.lef.org/magazine/mag2006/aug2006_report_death_01.htm


http://www.iatrogenic.org/

The study "Is US health really the best in the world?", published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH came to the following conclusions:

Yes, pretty much -- if you have money. End of story.

If you avoid "mainstream" medical care you can expect a moderately fast and painful demise and a definitely shortened life span. While the cynic in me says "well, have fun guys, couldn't care less..." the realist says "this is contrary to our aims... LIFE EXTENSION"

Medicines that work come at a cost (surprising, isn't it?); a lot can and must be done about 'iatrogenic' death, but sensationalist reporting won't help (for instance the opening statement, although, it's just a quote I fear that it reflects the style of those articles very well... and I just read LEF, the masters of sensationalist BS).

Edited by kismet, 20 December 2009 - 04:15 PM.

End of story.

It depends on whose telling it.

I prefer non-drug life extension.

If you avoid "mainstream" medical care you can expect a moderately fast and painful demise and a definitely shortened life span.

Really? There are many communities of people throughout the world that avoid mainstream westernized medicine and have some of the longest current lifespans.

Medicines that work come at a cost

Yeah...death. Kind of makes you rethink the term "works" in regard to these drugs. Yes, Uncle Fred had no more arthritis pain because of Drug X. It WORKED great. Unfortunately, he's now dead because of it. So much for Uncle Fred's plans for life extension.

but sensationalist reporting won't help

Hmmm...as opposed to the sensationalist reporting about the impending DOOM of the H1N1 virus that has been in the media around the clock for months and months. That is the epitome of sensationalism. Do you honestly think that vaccine manufacturers don't encourage such sensationalistic media coverage.

Believe me, sensationalism is very much a part of the modus operandi of mainstream medicine.

The study "Is US health really the best in the world?", published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH came to the following conclusions:

Yes, pretty much -- if you have money. End of story.

Not the end of the story at all. That's why so many rich celebs die in the 50's and 60's from heart disease. The USA is the best country in the world to have a car wreck, but we suck at treating chronic conditions like cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Thus we rank below 40 other countries in terms of life expectancy. Pretty crappy record considering we're suppose to be the world's most superior country.

The study "Is US health really the best in the world?", published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH came to the following conclusions:

Yes, pretty much -- if you have money. End of story.

Not the end of the story at all. That's why so many rich celebs die in the 50's and 60's from heart disease. The USA is the best country in the world to have a car wreck, but we suck at treating chronic conditions like cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Thus we rank below 40 other countries in terms of life expectancy. Pretty crappy record considering we're suppose to be the world's most superior country.

Well, the USA are not on top of life expentancy because of lifestyle, not because of bad medicine in general. They eat too much of what is considered a bad diet. Also social inequality is higher than in most other western nations and thus millions of people don't have access to proper health care. On the other hand the top 25 in life expentancy are nearly entirely made of what is considered the western civilization, relying on standard conventional medicine.

And the US is supposed to be the most superior country in terms of? The only things are military power and total GDP (if you exclude the integrated EU-market, otherwise second place). In terms of per capita GDP (which is more reliable to predict standard of living), social security, access to health care, per capita innovation etc. a bunch of other nations clearly outperform the US. And in the UN human development index countries such as Canada, France and Japan are ahead of the USA.

While the cynic in me says "well, have fun guys, couldn't care less..." the realist says "this is contrary to our aims... LIFE EXTENSION"

Strange alternative between quality and quantity of life (and may be you should only write the first word of the expression "LIFE extension" in capital letters) because no one wants to extend a life which is full of pain, suffering and misery. Quality and quantity of life are two different sides of the same coin and as long as the life extension movement will not see the deeper unity of these basic aspects there cannot be any substantial progress.


@ TFC:

The great rise in life expectancy in the western countries in the last 150 years is not only relying on modern medicine but also on the improvement of all kinds of general life conditions.


@ NeverSayDie:

I don't think that the problems you have listed are only those of the US-medical system, because here in Germany there are similar observations and debates. I have thought just the other day (in a different context), that the life extension movement cannot refer to common medicine and to the results of common medical research in a simple and uncritical way, not only because of the deficits you have mentioned but mainly because normal medicine, normal medical researchers and normal doctors do not share our central goal. In fact most of doctors and researchers are real deathists and there are only very few exceptions.

12,000 deaths from unnecessary surgeries;
7,000 deaths from medication errors in hospitals;
20,000 deaths from other errors in hospitals;
80,000 deaths from infections acquired in hospitals;
106,000 deaths from FDA-approved correctly prescribed medicines.
The total of medically-caused deaths in the US every year is 225,000.

"The most stunning statistic, however, is that the total number of deaths caused by conventional medicine is an astounding 783,936 per year. It is evident now that the American medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the US. (By contrast, the number of deaths attributed to heart disease in 2001 was 669,667 while the number of deaths attributable to cancer was 553, 251.5.

783,936 - 225,000 = 558,936 deaths from other Western Medicine-related causes. So what are these 558,936 deaths caused by anyway? And how is the number known to 6 significant figures? I think the second number is probably wrong.

12,000 deaths from unnecessary surgeries;
7,000 deaths from medication errors in hospitals;
20,000 deaths from other errors in hospitals;
80,000 deaths from infections acquired in hospitals;
106,000 deaths from FDA-approved correctly prescribed medicines.
The total of medically-caused deaths in the US every year is 225,000.

"The most stunning statistic, however, is that the total number of deaths caused by conventional medicine is an astounding 783,936 per year. It is evident now that the American medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the US. (By contrast, the number of deaths attributed to heart disease in 2001 was 669,667 while the number of deaths attributable to cancer was 553, 251.5.

783,936 - 225,000 = 558,936 deaths from other Western Medicine-related causes. So what are these 558,936 deaths caused by anyway? And how is the number known to 6 significant figures? I think the second number is probably wrong.

Perhaps the first number refers mainly to the deaths in hospitals and the second number includes all the deaths of ambulant therapies!?

Perhaps the first number refers mainly to the deaths in hospitals and the second number includes all the deaths of ambulant therapies!?

Given that they are claiming that iatrogenic deaths outnumber heart disease or cancer, I think it's a granola-head fantasy. We all know someone, most likely many people, who died of cancer or heart disease. How many people do you know that died of iatrogenic causes? I can't name one, but I must know a dozen or more people who died just of cancer and heart disease. Probably a couple dozen. And that's just people that I know.

Perhaps the first number refers mainly to the deaths in hospitals and the second number includes all the deaths of ambulant therapies!?

Given that they are claiming that iatrogenic deaths outnumber heart disease or cancer, I think it's a granola-head fantasy. We all know someone, most likely many people, who died of cancer or heart disease. How many people do you know that died of iatrogenic causes? I can't name one, but I must know a dozen or more people who died just of cancer and heart disease. Probably a couple dozen. And that's just people that I know.

You can of course question how these numbers have been found out but not just by your every day experience. How will you know whether the deaths you know from are not iatrogenic? Those cases have the severest consequences for the involved doctors or hospitals, so it's not going to be a normal diagnosis by the ones who are responsible.

I can't name one, but I must know a dozen or more people who died just of cancer and heart disease. Probably a couple dozen. And that's just people that I know.

Well, I have often wondered with all of these deaths due to cancer and heart disease- how many are actually due to the treatment rather than the disease itself, but have been labeled by medicine as a death from the disease itself. And its true, if you die directly from the result of cancer treatment (chemo, radiation, etc) your death will be listed as a result of cancer. I would imagine it may be similar with heart disease. There are so many different forms of and aspects to heart disease and there are dozens and dozens of drugs used to "treat" such health problems. Unfortunately, as with most other drugs, they tend to be quite toxic and kill a great deal of people that they are supposed to help. Once again, I have to wonder- when a person dies due to the toxic nature of their heart disease medication, will their death be listed as being due to heart disease...or maybe even complications due to heart disease?

As with cancer, I tend to think that it is rather probable that "true" cancer deaths are actually much lower than it statistically appears.

My mom has worked as a nurse for forty years. She has witnessed countless complications from treatment- be it infection, unforeseen drug reactions, unforeseen drug interactions, and obviously just plain incompetence. And yes, many people have died from these problems. These deaths are listed as being as complications die to their disease.

Think about this- how many times have you heard about someone dying from "complications" due to their disease? Well, a big alarm should go off, because it should be self-evident that dying from complications from cancer is not the same as dying from cancer, though at first glance (and to those less perceptive) it may appear that way. And the way that it is worded could be called somewhat deceptive, because it "sounds" as though the person died directly from their disease, when in fact that is often probably not the case.

See, I have it the other way niner. I can think of numerous people that died directly as a result of pharmaceutical drugs- my grandfather being one of them. My grandfather had developed a lung infection but was recovering nicely on his own. He was in great spirits and feeling better every day. My grandmother was still worried him (she was a chronic worrier) and thought that he should go to the hospital anyway, "just to make sure". They admitted him and put him on a coctail of drugs including some very potent steroids. He immediately went down hill. He completely went senile in the matter of about 3 days, while he was entirely lucid preceding the administration of these drugs. On the fourth day he developed pulmonary edema (which was a potential side effect of one of the drugs) and died. Of course, his death was listed as being due to complications of an acute lung disorder. Yes, complications caused by the drugs/treatment and not the condition itself.

Wait, how about this one- "they died from complications due to old age." Yeah, that's a good one!

Edited by NeverSayDie, 21 December 2009 - 04:03 PM.

I prefer non-drug life extension.

Unfortunately preferences in the real world don't matter, facts do. There won't be any considerable life extension without drugs and heavy medical interventions*. Personally, I do prefer non-drug life extension myself! Heck, personally I'd prefer waking up tomorrow and staying young forver; but I realise that's wishful thinking.
In the end it comes down to a combination, which will be heavily biased towards drugs and biomedical interventions once they get here, but, to repeat, there will never be considerable life extension without them.
(additionally I find the distinction between drugs and "supplements" quite funny, ironically American supplements tend to be drugs in Europe - the distinction between drug and supplement is completely arbitrary)

*this is a consensus statement (both in this forum and within the biogerontology community), as always the burden of proof lies on other people to refute consensus.

If you avoid "mainstream" medical care you can expect a moderately fast and painful demise and a definitely shortened life span.

Really? There are many communities of people throughout the world that avoid mainstream westernized medicine and have some of the longest current lifespans.

Really; while there are some communities (and in absolute numbers you could say "many") who have fine life spans most w/o westernised medicine don't. Those people drop dead from simple infectious disease or worse. Furthermore, I call this the fallacy of "no fitting comparison", after all, how can you know their life span wouldn't increase if they had access to better therapy? Populations should be only compared to themselves.

Medicines that work come at a cost

Yeah...death. Kind of makes you rethink the term "works" in regard to these drugs. Yes, Uncle Fred had no more arthritis pain because of Drug X. It WORKED great. Unfortunately, he's now dead because of it. So much for Uncle Fred's plans for life extension.

That's what I mean when I say sensatioanlism. FDA regulation is so god damn strict, it's incredible. No drug gets approved unless it shows solid benefits including decreased mortality also known as extended life span! Oh, and they get pulled if extremely rare but nonetheless severe side-effects are recognised. (yes, sometimes the system fails, and big business knows how to fake and fudge data but that's the exception)

but sensationalist reporting won't help

Hmmm...as opposed to the sensationalist reporting about the impending DOOM of the H1N1 virus that has been in the media around the clock for months and months. That is the epitome of sensationalism. Do you honestly think that vaccine manufacturers don't encourage such sensationalistic media coverage. They certainly do but it's irrelevant and offtopic, medical consensus is not generated by the mainstream media (which is very good at spreading disinformation).

Believe me, sensationalism is very much a part of the modus operandi of mainstream medicine. Did you just confuse mainstream media and "mainstream medicine"? (or did you do this on purpose?) Well, you could have gotten your information from MEDLINE, the cdc, science bloggers, doctors...

You can of course question how these numbers have been found out but not just by your every day experience. How will you know whether the deaths you know from are not iatrogenic? Those cases have the severest consequences for the involved doctors or hospitals, so it's not going to be a normal diagnosis by the ones who are responsible.

Or how will you know that if chemotherapy didn't kill them the cancer wouldn't have killed 'em much earlier and ? Yes, there are many shortcomings to both sides of the equation. But this problem is especially glaring w/ cancer therapy.

Strange alternative between quality and quantity of life (and may be you should only write the first word of the expression "LIFE extension" in capital letters) because no one wants to extend a life which is full of pain, suffering and misery. Quality and quantity of life are two different sides of the same coin and as long as the life extension movement will not see the deeper unity of these basic aspects there cannot be any substantial progress.

This is a misconception which I have refuted quite often. I can understand how this misconception arises, but believe me, it's a complete non-issue. To sum up:

Let's define quality of life (QOL) as "lack of disease and pain (lack of morbidity)". Now, keep in mind that mortality is a function of preceeding morbidity which is a function of biologic age. You cannot extend maximal life span considerably without slowing biological aging, thus without decreasing morbidity and improving QOL. And if you could such a therapy would never get approved.

While I don't mind refuting the understandable Tithonus error for the Nth time, I don't know how this is related to this thread? Do you imply that drugs do not improve quality of life? If yes, are you serious? Have you read the literature? Quality of life is one of the most important secondary outcomes and in some cases the major outcomes: hospice, pain therapy, antiemetics were (as cynical as it is) some of the greatest advances we made in cancer therapy. What do they do? Yes, they increase quality of life!

The same can be said about any single disease modifying drug: they all automatically improve QOL by slowing the disease.

Some outstanding points have been raised. There are definitely too many deaths caused by modern medicine, but cut the cranky sensationalism guys; especially the 'us vs them' mentality.

Edited by kismet, 21 December 2009 - 04:14 PM.

While the cynic in me says "well, have fun guys, couldn't care less..." the realist says "this is contrary to our aims... LIFE EXTENSION"

Strange alternative between quality and quantity of life (and may be you should only write the first word of the expression "LIFE extension" in capital letters) because no one wants to extend a life which is full of pain, suffering and misery. Quality and quantity of life are two different sides of the same coin and as long as the life extension movement will not see the deeper unity of these basic aspects there cannot be any substantial progress.

Yes, absolutely.

NeverSayDie:
I don't think that the problems you have listed are only those of the US-medical system, because here in Germany there are similar observations and debates.

Yes, I would imagine that there are many similarities. I only have numbers from the U.S. study.

In fact most of doctors and researchers are real deathists and there are only very few exceptions.

I would tend to agree.

FDA regulation is so god damn strict, it's incredible. No drug gets approved unless it shows solid benefits including decreased mortality also known as extended life span!

Oh, wow. You can't be serious with that one. That's a good one. I needed that, thanks.

The FDA is so damn strict, huh? Is that why they usually rely on drug safety studies submitted by the manufacturer of the drug? Hmmm, can you say conflict of interest?

Yeah, I have tremendous faith in an administration that approves drugs that, when correctly prescribed and administered, kill 106,000 people a year just in this country (and I think that those figures are actually much larger). It's remarkable how strict they are.

No, they are the model of incompetency.

...yes, sometimes the system fails, and big business knows how to fake and fudge data but that's the exception...

I would say that the exception is when the system doesn't fail and big business doesn't fake and fudge data. Unfortunately these multinational pharmaceutical corporations have one single goal, and that is to make a profit. Profit trumps every other concern, even respect for human life. Granted, they can't have too many people die or god forbid, people may wise up and stop buying into all their mass propaganda.

Did you just confuse mainstream media and "mainstream medicine"?

I guess you forgot about the unrelenting barrage of drug advertisements that are on every channel on TV, that I hear on the radio, read in newspapers and magazines.

You're right- no relation between mainstream media and mainstream medicine. Sorry I brought up that irrelevancy.

Edited by NeverSayDie, 21 December 2009 - 05:25 PM.

FDA regulation is so god damn strict, it's incredible. No drug gets approved unless it shows solid benefits including decreased mortality also known as extended life span!

Oh, wow. You can't be serious with that one. That's a good one. I needed that, thanks.

The FDA is so damn strict, huh? Is that why they usually rely on drug safety studies submitted by the manufacturer of the drug? Hmmm, can you say conflict of interest?

Can you say "who else is going to pay hundreds of millions of dollars for those studies"? Can you say "those responsible will be fired, possibly go to prison and the company will be sued for hundreds of millions of dollars and further tarnish their reputation if they fudge data". Can you say "the other companies selling working drugs will completely obliterate companies who don't (thank dog for capitalism)" Can you? 

Yeah, I have tremendous faith in an administration that approves drugs that, when correctly prescribed and administered, kill 106,000 people a year just in this country (and I think that those figures are actually much larger). It's remarkable how strict they are.

Well, they could kill hundreds of millions and it wouldn't matter if they saved hundred times more. Ironically this is exactly what is happening, it's called number needed to treat and number needed to harm. If the latter is considerably lower than the former then the drug is a winner. If you didn't know the FDA is extremely strict I fear what else you may not know; would you mind reading up on a topic before scaring people? I do love it, though, how people spit in the face of those who work hard to actually save lives (doctors, big pahrma scientists, NIH scientists and many more). (sorry, again the cynic in me is speaking)

No, they are the model of incompetency.

Do better, sir. Maybe join some tribesmen isolated from western medicine? Or just give up the sensationalist spin you give to your posts?


I give up. I knew all along that such threads are a crank magnet and I can't deal with this torrent of non sequiturs and fallacies anymore. Niner, you'll have to save this thread w/o me Perhaps people will manage to concentrate on the data and evidence, though. (see a positive example)

Edited by kismet, 21 December 2009 - 06:49 PM.

Something has come up once again in this thread that needs highlighting: the difference between "health care" and "medical care". The U.S. certainly has some of the highest tech medical equipment available (and now even increasingly biotech treatments). Outcomes for cancer treatment are the nearly the best in the world. Medical care is what you get when you have to go to the hospital or doctor to "get fixed" for lack of a better term.

Health care is how you manage your health. Eat well, exercise, avoid stress, get adequate sleep, and your health will be much much better. It doesn't matter how many Da Vinci medical robots are available or if medical care is public or private, if you eat too much and don't take care of your health, you will still suffer diabetes, heart disease, etc...

Or just give up the sensationalist spin you give to your posts?

You're bringing up this supposed "sensationalism" again. Nice try at distraction.

The numbers speak for themselves.

Kismet: Can you say "those responsible will be fired, possibly go to prison and the company will be sued for hundreds of millions of dollars and further tarnish their reputation if they fudge data".

It must be nice to live in a world where everyone responsible for medical errors/corruption/coverups are all exposed and all of those involved "get fired" or "got to prison". Unfortunately, in the real world this just isn't the case.

I certainly rest assured and sleep easy knowing that all corporate wrongs will be corrected by a wholly independent and objective legal/court system. Just like they were with the wall street financial fiasco. Right And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Wow, things must be really different in Austria...because you apparently have no idea about the workings of big business and corporate accountability here in america.

Kismet: Can you say "the other companies selling working drugs will completely obliterate companies who don't (thank dog for capitalism)" Can you?

Capitalism doesn't ensure responsibility or altruism. It would make a nice slogan, though, for all of the corporate fat cats. It ensures the bottom line- profits. If you are trying to say that corporate competition ensures safe drugs, then that it is a failed argument right from the start. It's interesting that you buy into all of that though.

It should be easy to understand that privately controlled, profit based business + medical/health care = disaster. An economic system that is organized in such a way that allows for unprecedented profits to be made from disease and suffering is, without doubt, in drastic need of reorganizing. That should go without saying.

Edited by NeverSayDie, 21 December 2009 - 08:00 PM.

It doesn't matter how many Da Vinci medical robots are available or if medical care is public or private, if you eat too much and don't take care of your health, you will still suffer diabetes, heart disease, etc...

Absolutely. Too many people depend upon the medical establishment to save them from all of their ills, when a lifetime of bad habits have finally caught up to them. Lifestyle based chronic disease has one etiology and one remedy- lifestyle. Big pharma's magic pills and false promises often distract people making proper decisions about their health.

I remember some friends I had back in college who used to smoke. I used to ride them about it quite a bit. Their response was that by the time they were going to be prone to cancer, there would be a cure for cancer. Can you believe that nonsense? As crazy as it sounds, I think that many people subscribe to this type of reasoning, only in less extreme ways. Many people that eat the SAD (standard american diet) are probably clutching onto this idea that by the time they are affected by their ways, the glorious savior that is modern medicine will have discovered the "cure."

Let's define quality of life (QOL) as "lack of disease and pain (lack of morbidity)".

Quality of life is so much more than lack of disease and pain, which is only a negative and - astonishingly - a pure medical "definition"!? Is the highest experience you expect from life really just being without disease and pain?? Of course some successes of modern medicine or some kind of drugs also contribute to the quality of life but not to this extent you are claiming and only if you take the disease as the referring scale. To motivate normal healthy people for the life extension cause this scale is totally meaningless.

In "the real world" normal medicine, normal biology and normal biogerontology (and normal capitalism) are not in favor of extreme life extension and do not want to abolish aging also. So without a fundamental shift of paradigms in the conventional medical sciences we cannot expect extreme life extension from this direction in our lifetimes, especially if you are 49 like me - and not 20 like you (but I think 30 years difference are nothing if the collective will is missing). And it's hard to imagine that this shift in medicine and science could happen, if the "rest" of society is not shifting in the same direction.

It doesn't matter how many Da Vinci medical robots are available or if medical care is public or private, if you eat too much and don't take care of your health, you will still suffer diabetes, heart disease, etc...

Yes, that hits exactly the point. Medicine alone or just aging research alone will never bring us extreme life extension, especially not in the given forms. The real key to Longevity is the (individual and collective) human will and the human wish for it, because only the human consciousness, the human "mind" (tricky nickname ), can integrate all the very different and complex causes of death. Therefore all kind of motivation factors, psychology, politics and so on are getting relevant - and THEN medicine, aging research etc. could be usefull. Do it the other way around and you will be killed or at least severely restricted far instance by the build-in aging "trance" in all the common scientific fields or other forms of morbidity, cynicism, hate, despair, ignorance, fatalism, life-denying and so on.

Edited by Lothar, 22 December 2009 - 01:55 AM.

106,000 deaths from FDA-approved correctly prescribed medicines.

I will accept this number as correct for the sake of argument. Now let us put it in context: How many people take a course (of any length) of any FDA approved medicine in a year? The population of the United States fills at retail pharmacies 12 prescriptions per capita. Mail order pharmacies add another 238 million, and hospitals add another large number. Ignoring hospitals, there were (12 * 304 million) + 238 million = 3886 million courses of medicine taken in 2008. Therefore, the odds of death from a course of medication are 106,000/3.886 billion, or 1 in 36,660. The question you have to ask yourself is: Out of 36,660 courses of medication, how many lives were saved? Did it substantially exceed 1? Speaking as one whose life was saved by modern medicine at least once, and whose family members' and friends' lives were saved or extended through various medical interventions, I would be quite surprised if it did not.

Bottom line: Your odds are a hell of a lot better with modern medicine than this thread makes them out to be.

I will accept this number as correct for the sake of argument.

Why not accept it for more than just "the sake of argument"? I mean, it was a study published in the JAMA. I don't know, it just seems like a passive denunciation of JAMA published study, and I'm not sure on what grounds. Many other researchers have to come to much higher numbers including Dr. Null so, if anything, I think this number is conservative.

Bottom line: Your odds are a hell of a lot better with modern medicine than this thread makes them out to be.

I'm not arguing against "modern" medicine. I'm arguing against modern mainstream/conventional (Big Pharma funded) medicine. And maybe this is the misunderstanding- I am not a proponent of those with disease avoiding dangerous drugs and doing nothing! I just think that arguably less dangerous alternative methods, based upon my years studying naturopathic medicine, offer a person a better chance with chronic, degenerative disease (which tends to be the result of lifestyle anyways).

I think that modern alternative medicine, naturopathy in particular, far excels at treating chronic, degenerative disease than does pharmaceutical-based approach. And I say this because this mode of medicine is by definition, less reductionistic in its approach. It usually operates in a completely different manner from conventional medicine which usually just tends to concentrate on the hiding/masking of symptoms while the underlying root cause of the pathology is still operating. Naturopathy seeks to unearth the fundamental etiology of the disease and reverse that disease process through naturally occurring compounds, nutrients, herbs, diet modifications, and lifestyle changes. Conventional medicine treats the body in a reductionistic and mechanical way- with individual working "parts". Naturopathy treats the individual as a whole, realizing that their are in actuality no "parts" and that the body is a single unified biological system. When you tend to simply concentrate on one symptoms/ set of symptoms and spend years in the lab mixing chemicals that somehow seemingly affects that symptom, it is should not inconceivable that this synthetic chemical compound (one in which the body has never seen before, as it does not exist in nature) may cause a cascading effect of problems throughout the entire body.

And yes, as for supplements that contains synthetic compounds (ie, that do not exist in the natural world)- I would consider these drugs. While in constrast, there are numerous drugs in Europe that contain naturally occuring compounds, such as St. John's wort, albeit in a isolated, standardized extract form.

As for acute traumatic injury (where one gets run over by the garbage truck), mainstream conventional medicine certainly excels.