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Original poster

Pharmacies want to keep us sick 🙁 is there ANY truth to this?

263 replies

TuscanMum · 26/03/2018 21:10

There’s a lady I know who posts lots of pharmaceutical conspiracies on a regular basis. Things like, they have a vested interest in keeping us sick so as we continue to need their drugs.

The sane part of me says this is rubbish, can’t be allowed, no way.

But a little part of me wonders.🙁

I have a vested interest in this as I’ve an autoimmune disease and keep trying different types of strong medication that haven’t yet worked but Rheumatologist says it’s not cureable and drugs are necessary.

Met a man, just today, who said his wife has lupus but refuses meds and just manages with diet.

I’d be interested to hear what others think or know about this?

OP posts:
TerfsUp · 27/03/2018 08:41

Anyone who believes that pharmacies want to keep us sick need to adjust the setting on their tinfoil hats.

I'll tell you what: if you are sick, don't go to a chemist for medication. See how quickly you get better.

TerfsUp · 27/03/2018 08:43

The evidence shown already that cannabis can cure and help cancer and epilepsy is outstanding

I have yet to see one peer-reviewed article in a respectable medical journal that claims this.

OTOH, I have seen plenty of unsupported claims by marijuana users about this.

Who to believe? Hmm...

KatharinaRosalie · 27/03/2018 08:53

Why are pharmaceutical companies not for profit then?

Why would they be? They are a business.

Cadence70 · 27/03/2018 08:55

.

Pharmacies want to keep us sick 🙁 is there ANY truth to this?
AllIWantIsaHippopotamus · 27/03/2018 09:00

Can we please make some distinction between pharmacies and the pharmaceutical industry?

Pharmacists who work in pharmacies are health care professionals who ensure the safe supply of medicines, most of them prescribed by doctors, to patients. They will receive around a £1 of the prescription fee you pay for the act of dispensing it, the rest goes to the NHS to subsidise the drug cost. Only 10 per cent of prescription items are actually paid for in the UK. Most pharmacists are employed by community pharmacy chains (Boots, Lloyds) and receive a PAYE salary for their work, around £35,000-£70,000 per year. Some are independent though they are a dying breed.

The pharmaceutical industry makes the drugs that you will receive on prescription or buy over the counter. They are persistently extremely defensive of their userous prices and will frequently get the law changed to allow them to behave in a way that is for many other industries illegal.

NorthStarGrassman · 27/03/2018 09:02

I find posts and opinions like this deeply insulting. I work in the pharmaceutical industry. At the moment I am manufacturing a drug which is effectively curing children of cancer (or at least putting them into long term remission, which is about as good as anyone can get). Of course I don’t want them to stay sick. I want them to be totally cured and never get sick again! That’s why I go to work every day!

Also, it costs millions and millions of pounds to get a new drug to market. If pharmaceutical companies did not make a profit, where would that money come from? The government? Charities? You would have a lot lot less research and drug development going on because there would be no money for it.

Last point: anyone who thinks this is all a conspiracy has absolutely no fucking idea just how many people work in this industry and how many regulations there are around what goes to trial and what goes on the market. It is really not easy to get a poorly made or ineffective drug into the market. It really isn’t. Not saying it never happens, people are human and the regulators make mistakes and of course some people in the pharmaceutical industry are lacking in morals, it is a cross section of society after all, but the vast majority are normal compassionate human beings.

BunsForTea · 27/03/2018 09:04

Anyone who works for big pharma slogging their guts out to make sure drugs are as safe as they can possibly be would find this "hilarious"

As the wife of an R&D scientist, I can only agree. It takes years and millions to get new drugs to market.

Catsandkids78 · 27/03/2018 09:06

“Also @Catsandkids78 the fasting and health lifestyle, helps prevent cancer and helps prevent it spreading/reoccurring. It does not and will not treat an active cancer. We need drugs for these, chemo and radio.

Also a recent study that was reported on found that cycling into your 80's helped with your immune system www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-43308729

So it is not being hidden - people are just choosing not to listen”

I didn’t say it helps active cancer - the studies are around fasting during chemo treatment and the benefits that this can have . These trials have been conducted on rats and some patients have tried it out for themselves with interesting results .

Dungeondragon15 · 27/03/2018 09:10

wtaf?!! Do you think that when pharmacists and doctors go to university they are brought in on the conspiracy and they all manage to keep it a secret so noone else knows about it including friends/family. What a ridiculous suggestion.
As for pharma companies (v. different to "pharmacies" btw), why would it be in their interests not to make drugs that cure illness? That is how they make money!! The suggestion upthread that they wouldn't market a drug that cured HIV or cancer is so ignorant. Any company that did that would make a fortune.

bananamonkey · 27/03/2018 09:14

Anyone who works for big pharma slogging their guts out to make sure drugs are as safe as they can possibly be would find this "hilarious"

This this this, having worked in several big pharma companies, people here work incredibly hard. It costs billions to develop drugs that at the end of the day may not work or the benefit is not judged "enough" to be worth taking it to market, despite improving and saving lives, at the end of the process they're at the mercy of decisions made by regulators and payers. This is not meant in a oh poor innocent pharma companies way btw but (most) people genuinely care about patients, that's why they do the job in the first place.

SpringNowPlease2018 · 27/03/2018 09:19

"Everyone i've ever known who's had the flu jab gets the flu within days"

Funny, I don't know anyone who has had that.

Dungeondragon15 · 27/03/2018 09:19

Most pharmacists are employed by community pharmacy chains (Boots, Lloyds) and receive a PAYE salary for their work, around £35,000-£70,000 per year. Some are independent though they are a dying breed.

Not "most" at all. A very significant proportion of pharmacists work in hospital, GP practices, pharmaceutical industry or academia..

SpringNowPlease2018 · 27/03/2018 09:20

No sign of OP?

Dushenka · 27/03/2018 09:26

Watch the film, The Big Secret. Available on Amazon. It will answer all your questions.

Collaborate · 27/03/2018 09:28

There is no part of this thread where it is not advisable to wear a tinfoil hat when reading.

Bloody hell.

Missingstreetlife · 27/03/2018 09:33

Pharmacy is your chemist. Makes a living from dispensing medicine (qualified & knowledgeable pharmacist) home and over counter remedies, cosmetics etc. V helpful ppl, often save you a trip to doctor.
Doctors peddle medicine and order tests willy nilly, which can do harm as well as good. They are not trained to care and treat without. Surgery often helpful and nhs good for that & emergency care, and yes would take drugs if needed.
Big pharma i.e. Companies that make and research medicine have produced welcome treatments for serious illnesses but do so for profit.
Much evidence of fiddling results, playing down side effects, inventing harmful or addictive treatments. Some illnesses better treated by diet and self help (blood pressure, diabetes) but they don't want you to know. So yes they can be corrupt, also charge NHS and poor countries thru the nose.

Dungeondragon15 · 27/03/2018 09:36

Watch the film, The Big Secret. Available on Amazon. It will answer all your questions.

I can't help wondering if that was the point of this thread. To advertise this bullshit and promote alternative medicine? Ironic considering that is the real scam.

littlebillie · 27/03/2018 09:36

I think if you read on American threads people us bicarb and cannabis oils as they can't afford the drugs. I am on a drug with the nhs which I can't afford if I had to buy.

I would die if they tried to cure me thank god for the pharmacy. Industry

Missingstreetlife · 27/03/2018 09:37

And happier to invent medicine that manages illness, so you keep needing it. Long term conditions notorious for not being cured!

littlebillie · 27/03/2018 09:37

I think we are heading into an age of cancer management rather than cure and probably we will be healthier for it

littlebillie · 27/03/2018 09:40

Miss if you do a life threatening illness I think your perspective changes somewhat. The "cure "for my condition kills 75% the drugs keep us all going without side effects

Dungeondragon15 · 27/03/2018 09:41

And happier to invent medicine that manages illness, so you keep needing it. Long term conditions notorious for not being cured!

What bullshit. They would be able to charge far more for a drug that cured something rather than "managed it".

TammySwansonTwo · 27/03/2018 09:44

My mum had terminal cancer. She had two rounds of chemo which bought her an extra year. She also spent over £45k in two years on alternative medicine which did bugger all except give her false hope which crushed her at the end. She’d really been convinced she could be cured.

Who are the conmen here exactly?

MrsHathaway · 27/03/2018 09:46

I'm tangentially involved in pharma development and I can tell you they're fighting tooth and nail to eradicate everything they can.

Pharma R&D is heavily regulated so it costs a bloody fortune - literally millions for each stage of testing even when you've got something you think is going to work. So comments like:

Lithium is the safest most effective drug for schizophrenia yet was unavailable for years as it is not possible to patent it. Pharm companies basically wouldn't go near it as it would make them no money...

both are true and completely miss the point. Would you personally risk millions of pounds and dozens/hundreds of jobs on something which would never pay you back? which you would only ever be able to sell at just-above-manufacturing-cost? Would you fuck.

Which is why the Gates Foundation is so important: they're flooding money into the right places to get the unprofitable work done, to eradicate huge killers such as polio and malaria without needing to be slaves to the bottom line. They aren't free from commercial factors, but it isn't the first consideration.

Scientists don't get into pharma development for money (very few of them ever make any) but because like HCPs they are driven to improve lives and conquer misery.

MrsHathaway · 27/03/2018 09:52

Much evidence of fiddling results, playing down side effects, inventing harmful or addictive treatments. Some illnesses better treated by diet and self help (blood pressure, diabetes) but they don't want you to know. So yes they can be corrupt, also charge NHS and poor countries thru the nose.

You might like to have a little look at International Differential Pricing, where the GDP of a country is used as a factor in deciding how much a drug costs there. So for example a year's supply of Drug A costs a week's average income everywhere, whether that's £500 in the UK or £7 in DRC.