• fckreddit@lemmy.ml
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    20 hours ago

    I hate it how people are willing to trust any shady person in the name of alternative medicine. Sure, regular medicine has it’s flaws, but the solution is better research, not alt medicine peddled by the shadiest people imaginable.

    • pelespirit@sh.itjust.works
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      5 hours ago

      Just like anything else, there are shady doctors, nurses, etc. and there are shady alternative medicine people. The only reason pharma aren’t using herbs and such is because they can’t patent them. It’s easier to make them consistent as well. I could give you a shit ton of articles on both sides of this discussion.

      The MD’s aren’t even being trained to help people anymore. They’re being trained to survive med school and their student loans. Once they get experience, they’re trained how to deal with insurance companies.

      Our healthcare is in a world of hurt so start looking inward first and fix that.

      • AnyOldName3@lemmy.world
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        4 hours ago

        Big pharma absolutely can patent drugs extracted from herbs. The reason you don’t see lots of them is that lots of them didn’t work very well and the ones that did were all isolated and turned into medicine decades ago, so the patents have expired, and they’re generally sold under medicine-sounding names rather than the names of the plant them came from. E.g. Aspirin was originally made from modified willow extract, and was discovered because willow was a known natural remedy and so was a good candidate for further investigation. Also, the requirement that a newly discovered drug needs to be proven to be effective to be licensed is a big hurdle lots of natural remedies don’t manage to clear.

        Even despite that, though, big pharma does sell natural remedies. The difference is that they don’t claim they’re medicine. If they only claim they’re a food supplement or something else that’s only medicine-adjacent, there’s no requirement to prove efficacy.

        • pelespirit@sh.itjust.works
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          3 hours ago

          I don’t claim to know everything, but the way you form these sentences is suspect.

          drugs extracted from herbs

          modified willow extract

          Also, this

          Our healthcare is in a world of hurt so start looking inward first and fix that.

      • MonkeMischief@lemmy.today
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        15 hours ago

        “But this supplement was just researched and developed by an exceptionally clever homeschooling mom who wanted to take on big pharma!”