Pharmacy
2009 Bent Spoon Award Winner: Meryl Dorey & The AVN
At first glance one may be forgiven for rushing to the defence of anyone who is in the sights of skeptics. Does not “skeptic” immediately herald the smarmy smirking of Tony Abbott, Nick Minchin, Steve Fielding, Kevin Andrews and their journalist buddies such as Andrew Bolt and Mistress of Uber-Phobia, Miranda Devine?
To be a skeptic is to be well, a contrarian, a party pooper deservedly insulted on national TV and a beard wearer, right? Wrong. Circumstance has delivered a unique challenge to those who would demand more evidence in the absence of satisfactory evidence to support any claim that asks people to “trust me”. Or indeed, blindly trusting in a belief that on inspection is pointless, costly or harmful. That circumstance is the media reporting of the vocal minority who deny the science of anthropogenic climate change. Denialism is not a request for bipartisan data. It is the reaction to the irrefutable conclusions that arise from evidentiary findings. The subjective inheritance of sound – and yes – at times coldly clinical findings that just can’t match a foot rub from someone who remembers you child’s poem to Santa or the demands of your god.
But let’s keep on topic. Consider this statement from HIV/AIDS, Vaccine, Medication, Antibiotic and Science Denialist Meryl Dorey:
There will come a time – I pray to God that it will happen in my lifetime – when those who have pushed vaccines upon innocent, helpless babies – doctors, pharmaceutical companies, government officials – will be proven to have lied and cheated these instruments of death into our children’s bloodstream. When that occurs, the outcry will be heard around the world and there will not be enough hiding places on the globe for these murderers to hide or enough money to pay for compensation. Of course, it will be too late for the babies, like this poor child, to be saved. But we will be able to take satisfaction from the fact that never again will anyone have to be pushed to poison their child because for once and for all, it will be known as poison and we will all wonder how it was we fell for the vaccine lie for as long as we did.
Meryl Dorey, President, Australian Vaccination Network
AVN Yahoo! group, 17 Dec 2008, message #36449 ¹
¹ Referring to the suspension of Wyeth vaccination in India following the death of an infant with pre-existing cardiac disease. Whilst this is a concern for any ethically minded public health advocate the primary variable here is at worst a breach of India’s vaccine trial guidelines. Distressing as this is, I fail to see how “our children”, “murderers”, “instruments of death”, “poison their child” or “vaccine lie” is even applicable, apart from furthering Ms. Dorey’s fear mongering. An article here is perhaps more realistic.
An image used by Meryl Dorey "to promote informed choice". Nothing in the image is correct and whilst infants can die the AVN talk of enlisting the help of PETA because "science" is cruel to animals. PETA cull 2/3 of 'rescued' animals
What the Australian [Anti] Vaccination Network seek to achieve with such a Peacock Terminology title is the exploitation of vulnerable, anxious, confused and primarily emotionally distraught parents.
It seems even snatching neonates from hospitals, and ensuring the new-born lives a life infected with Hepatitis B is considered a virtue in AVN conspiracy circles. Now, keep in mind the AVN seek to “revolt” against “forced vaccination” [which does not exist] and describe MMR vaccination as “the cause of autism, SIDS, Shaken Baby Syndrome” – indeed any and all childhood illnesses – and thus childhood “death”. Not surprisingly, (A)H1N1 vaccination is “the second holocaust” because the influenza strain in question was “cooked up in a lab by scientists” and the vaccine is a trick to cull the population.
Jane Burgermeister claims she served this “Bioterrorism Suit” via the FBI. There is however, no evidence of this. Nonetheless, if one is deluded enough to believe this one is mere putty for Dorey’s malignant aims.
Please note When Is It OK To Steal Children? Followed by Family Forced Into Hiding Because of Vaccination. You can read more in Legal Update here, and another update on this criminal abuse of a neonate here, and Meryl Dorey’s joy at infecting a new born with a lethal disease is now humbled by… a need for money. This initial, and quite startling, attack on Australian hospital guidelines took place in August/September 2008.
Think about it. Convince the gullible that patients are “sheeple” treated like cattle by evil forces. Break the law, ruin lives, reputations and the careers of any who assisted, all for an eventual cash grab. This occurred again this year, and I shall cover this in depth shortly. Certain legalities prevent one from publishing material ad lib. If your situation as a parent involved a serious, yet preventable, disease transfer at birth would you accept this line in respect to your just born infant?
“This young woman was ready to go into hiding should that be required – as the family last year did when they were also being forced to decide between their child’s health and their freedom to reject the Hep B vaccination.”
Source: Meryl Dorey AVN Yahoo! Message #41001, entitled “A Great Victory For Informed Choice”.
So. Choose between your childs health or your childs illness and death. But, be glad the “interbreeding criminal cartels” that control all media, alien life, governments and pharmaceutical companies say “darn”. Or at least the “anti-choice brigade” – hospital staff, doctors, maternal nurses, etc.
Need I expand more? In her own words, Meryl Dorey admits childhood health comes second to following her orders to boycott something that academically debunks her “twenty years of research”. In the words of her primary educator:
Of course I think that nothing is worth the risk as I know vaccines do NOT give immunity – Sheri Nakken: AVN Member & Educator: October 26th, 2009: AVN Yahoo! Message # 40641
Physicists are studying homeopathy to see if they can figure out how it works but no one is sure yet. We are sure that it works from experience since the middle 1800’s. But how is still a mystery. It probably is something like the energy or vibration of the substance is imprinted in the water solution and works on an energy level in the person. But this is Quantum Physics. It doesn’t matter to us how, but that it does work and we have a long tradition of experience that it does.
Quote from Sheri Nakken web site – AVN promoted & member paid ‘pro-choice’ Online Educator
Obsessed with USA 9/11 type Conspiracy Theories and convinced “interbreeding criminal cartels” that have their roots in Freemasonry control the globe, the AVN on-publish opinion and satirical swipes at “Big Brother”. But they publish them as fact. Natural News is one exceptionally offensive site, that takes an aggressive posture against evidence based medicine.
As noted over at The Quackometer, reasons for advancing the alchemy cum guesswork of 1747 – which is what the Australian Vaccination Network offer in place of vaccination – is complex. Yet quoting from sites who insist – just one example – that Breast Cancer Awareness Month is a con designed to cover up either a.) that all cancer cures are known but less profitable than treatment or b.) that cancer research has had enough time to find a cure thus must forfeit to vitamin junkies who actually do claim to cure cancer, is deceitful. We jail these people on a plethora of charges. How much supporting evidence is presented as defence once in court? Nill.
Because it is so tempting to stop thinking when we see islands of plastic refuse, know global dimming is due to construction and pollutants and extrapolate from the notion that sterile environments do not challenge our immunity, I must point something out. Vitamins, micro-nutrients and electrolytes are required in minuscule quantities. There simply is no less a natural way to ingest these than via pill form. More so, to ingest the equivalent number of pills: glue, talc, iron oxide colouring, pig protein derived gelatin capsules, magnesium stearate, chalk, titanium dioxide, povidone, etc, etc… with microscopic levels of vitamins perhaps, yes perhaps within, has no equivalent in medicine.
Unless one is chronically ill or in need of life long medication such as blood pressure or neurological stabilising drugs the “unnatural” consumer has no chance of ingesting in a lifetime the “poisons” that the “natural” consumer ingests in perhaps under one year. It gets worse. Pharmaceutical trials take account of exact dosing and accommodate the impact of non-drug constituents listed above.
Yet rather than advise consumers that such huge levels of junk haven’t been shown to meet the risk/benefit equation that pharmaceutical companies must meet, the Natural Medicine Industry bluffs us with intuitive tricks such as “drugs are refined and unnatural”. Or draw absurd parallels to our ability to diagnose and label diseases as proof that these are on the rise because of modern living. Leaving aside how we all feel about a polluted planet, I ask again what is more unnatural, refined and dangerous than the vitamin scam of modern living.
Magic detoxification mixtures selling for around $100 AU leave consumers with abnormal Liver Function Tests for weeks post “detox”. Given that the only means to “detox” – it’s a meaningless word derived from oxidative processes [electron transfer] within hepatic tissue via enzymes such as the P450 cytochromes || Wiki || – is via healthy liver, lymph, kidneys we have a demonstrable problem. Once again for the back row. Detoxification is meaningless. “Toxin” is a buzz word used by the Natural Medicine industry to fool you into concluding you need them.
But, is not their overarching principle that modern living in it’s refined state is the cause of all our ills? Even though before medicine became highly efficacious, we died at birth, killed our mothers at birth, were lucky to make it to five or later 12 years of age and walked in our own sewerage.
Which is indeed a mere fraction of why Meryl Dorey won The Bent Spoon Award.
The Australian Skeptics Bent Spoon Award was presented last night at the annual Skeptics’ Convention at the University of Queensland in Brisbane.
The winners were Meryl Dorey and the Australian Vaccination Network, who have campaigned tirelessly to ensure that parents shun vaccination to the detriment of not only their own children’s health but that of others. Testament to the efforts of the AVN are the significantly low vaccination rates on the North Coast of NSW where the AVN is located, which corresponded with a 2008 whooping cough epidemic. Measles outbreaks in QLD and whooping cough epidemics in South Australia have also been attributed to a loss of herd immunity as a direct result of the reduction in the take-up of childhood vaccination.
It’s been a tough year for Dorey who has received considerable mainstream criticism for her campaign of scaremongering and misinformation regarding the safety and efficacy of vaccines. Of note are her continuing false claims that vaccines contain toxic levels of elemental mercury, vaccines cause autism, shaken baby syndrome, SIDS and brain damage, and that vaccines are not responsible for a reduction in communicable disease, rather this is a product of increased sanitation and good food. In August 2009, Dorey and the AVN were the target of a national newspaper advertising campaign, financed by entrepreneur Dick Smith warning parents of Australia not to listen to the false claims of the AVN. In publicity surrounding the publication, Smith criticised the organisation for portraying a public face of “pro-choice” when privately being unequivocally anti-vaccination. In a statement Smith said; “They should put on every bit of their material that they are anti-vaccination in great big words”.
Vaccines: Irrational Fear & The Need To Blame Goes Viral
It is of course, beyond ironic that warmongering Conspiracy Theorists who would nudge unsuspecting citizens toward harming themselves, their nation and primarily their own children, also attempt to then profit immediately from the misery and angst they have cleverly sewn. It is only logical, one presumes, to unconscionably sell to those same people voodoo hysteria and shamanic practices, perversions, bodily function obsessions and philosophies that, if packaged, imported and examined by border security would never see the light of Australian sunshine.
From An Epidemic of Fear by Amy Wallace.
Selected Paragraphs.
So what has this award-winning 58-year-old scientist [Paul Offit] done to elicit such venom? He boldly states — in speeches, in journal articles, and in his 2008 book Autism’s False Prophets — that vaccines do not cause autism or autoimmune disease or any of the other chronic conditions that have been blamed on them. He supports this assertion with meticulous evidence. And he calls to account those who promote bogus treatments for autism — treatments that he says not only don’t work but often cause harm.As a result, Offit has become the main target of a grassroots movement that opposes the systematic vaccination of children and the laws that require it. McCarthy, an actress and a former Playboy centerfold whose son has been diagnosed with autism, is the best-known leader of the movement, but she is joined by legions of well-organized supporters and sympathizers.
This isn’t a religious dispute, like the debate over creationism and intelligent design. It’s a challenge to traditional science that crosses party, class, and religious lines. It is partly a reaction to Big Pharma’s blunders and PR missteps, from Vioxx to illegal marketing ploys, which have encouraged a distrust of experts. It is also, ironically, a product of the era of instant communication and easy access to information. The doubters and deniers are empowered by the Internet (online, nobody knows you’re not a doctor) and helped by the mainstream media, which has an interest in pumping up bad science to create a “debate” where there should be none.
In the center of the fray is Paul Offit. “People describe me as a vaccine advocate,” he says. “I see myself as a science advocate.” But in this battle — and make no mistake, he says, it’s a pitched and heated battle — “science alone isn’t enough … People are getting hurt. The parent who reads what Jenny McCarthy says and thinks, ‘Well, maybe I shouldn’t get this vaccine,’ and their child dies of Hib meningitis,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s such a fundamental failure on our part that we haven’t convinced that parent.”
Consider: In certain parts of the US, vaccination rates have dropped so low that occurrences of some children’s diseases are approaching pre-vaccine levels for the first time ever. And the number of people who choose not to vaccinate their children (so-called philosophical exemptions are available in about 20 states, including Pennsylvania, Texas, and much of the West) continues to rise. In states where such opting out is allowed, 2.6 percent of parents did so last year, up from 1 percent in 1991, according to the CDC. In some communities, like California’s affluent Marin County, just north of San Francisco, non-vaccination rates are approaching 6 percent (counterintuitively, higher rates of non-vaccination often correspond with higher levels of education and wealth).
That may not sound like much, but a recent study by the Los Angeles Times indicates that the impact can be devastating. The Times found that even though only about 2 percent of California’s kindergartners are unvaccinated (10,000 kids, or about twice the number as in 1997), they tend to be clustered, disproportionately increasing the risk of an outbreak of such largely eradicated diseases as measles, mumps, and pertussis (whooping cough). The clustering means almost 10 percent of elementary schools statewide may already be at risk.
In May, The New England Journal of Medicine laid the blame for clusters of disease outbreaks throughout the US squarely at the feet of declining vaccination rates, while nonprofit health care provider Kaiser Permanente reported that unvaccinated children were 23 times more likely to get pertussis, a highly contagious bacterial disease that causes violent coughing and is potentially lethal to infants. In the June issue of the journal Pediatrics, Jason Glanz, an epidemiologist at Kaiser’s Institute for Health Research, revealed that the number of reported pertussis cases jumped from 1,000 in 1976 to 26,000 in 2004. A disease that vaccines made rare, in other words, is making a comeback. “This study helps dispel one of the commonly held beliefs among vaccine-refusing parents: that their children are not at risk for vaccine-preventable diseases,” Glanz says.
The rejection of hard-won knowledge is by no means a new phenomenon. In 1905, French mathematician and scientist Henri Poincaré said that the willingness to embrace pseudo-science flourished because people “know how cruel the truth often is, and we wonder whether illusion is not more consoling.” Decades later, the astronomer Carl Sagan reached a similar conclusion: Science loses ground to pseudo-science because the latter seems to offer more comfort. “A great many of these belief systems address real human needs that are not being met by our society,” Sagan wrote of certain Americans’ embrace of reincarnation, channeling, and extraterrestrials. “There are unsatisfied medical needs, spiritual needs, and needs for communion with the rest of the human community.”
Looking back over human history, rationality has been the anomaly. Being rational takes work, education, and a sober determination to avoid making hasty inferences, even when they appear to make perfect sense. Much like infectious diseases themselves — beaten back by decades of effort to vaccinate the populace — the irrational lingers just below the surface, waiting for us to let down our guard.
Before smallpox was eradicated with a vaccine, it killed an estimated 500 million people. And just 60 years ago, polio paralyzed 16,000 Americans every year, while rubella caused birth defects and mental retardation in as many as 20,000 newborns. Measles infected 4 million children, killing 3,000 annually, and a bacterium called Haemophilus influenzae type b caused Hib meningitis in more than 15,000 children, leaving many with permanent brain damage. Infant mortality and abbreviated life spans — now regarded as a third world problem — were a first world reality.
Today, because the looming risk of childhood death is out of sight, it is also largely out of mind, leading a growing number of Americans to worry about what is in fact a much lesser risk: the ill effects of vaccines. If your newborn gets pertussis, for example, there is a 1 percent chance that the baby will die of pulmonary hypertension or other complications. The risk of dying from the pertussis vaccine, by contrast, is practically nonexistent — in fact, no study has linked DTaP (the three-in-one immunization that protects against diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis) to death in children. Nobody in the pro-vaccine camp asserts that vaccines are risk-free, but the risks are minute in comparison to the alternative.
Pharmacy Diets: Miraculously slash inches off your wallet
From 
© Firesnake Podcasts.
The “pharmacy diet” scam is simply out of control here in Australia. However, I first wish to remind readers of the basic reason why those we pay for sound advice also leap to deceive us via such tacky plays on fear, guilt, anxiety. Greed. Money. Profit. If you happen to reside in the fine Southern continent of Australia you can witness a strange manifestation of consumer exploitation in every neighbourhood pharmacy.
Podcast: Pharmacy Diets [59 min. 23.5MB]
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Tony Ferguson Weightloss: “disgraceful and irresponsible” say independent nutritionists & consumer advocates
This open letter to The Pharmacists of Australia from Australian Skeptics helps clarify what is simple, unadulterated consumer exploitation. At best it is [or rather was, given Aussie pharmacists well proven double standards] an unexpected qualification of legitimacy by mere association with medical science that in part motivated the drafting of such a letter.
Items advocating clearly dangerous and/or useless, ‘new age’, natural [so are lightening strikes], homeopathic, aromatherapeutic, magnetic stimulation, crystal energetic, pyramid power, detoxification remedies, ear candles, similar products or even practices claiming to enhance/maintain/repair/develop or augment in some way or another such vaguely described, yet “essential” bodily, mental or spiritual functions abound within Australian pharmacies. And they abound right next to recognised and proven treatments.
Indeed the placing of demonstrably non efficacious preparations, alongside products with genuine, documented validity deserves scorn in and of itself. The intuitive feeling of trust that accompanies the consumer associating product X with the decades of reliability of product Y in its familiar and comfortable packaging, is a powerful motivator. Minimal thinking and maximal “satisfaction”. You may well have doubted the flushing of “negative energies” through unwilling sphincters as “essential care for the holistic You!” – if not actually impossible – until you saw the Betadine antiseptic ointment nearby.
Legitimacy by association? Isn’t that a bit ambitious? Perhaps. Yet we know that human beings seeking advice or treatment trust – and decide to act upon – advice given by a person wearing a white coat. Correct for other variables and results frequently follow that white coat. We learn to expect valuable advice and respond accordingly.
At worst it is a coldly calculated grab for consumer dollars involving products the pharmacist him/herself mocks and derides because of the junk science involved. I have a friend who manages a pharmacy with the slogan: “Passion, People, Price” – or words to that effect. “I’m a skeptic too”, he announced as I outlined the scam surrounding the Anti-snor “acupressure” ring. But, he went on snorting derisively, that it’s not up to him to advise on “sympathy spending” [I think he meant 'retail therapy'] managing to admit in one breath that his “natural” products were junk but he was still kindly helping customers by allowing the subconscious human need to waste money.
He has a valid point: we can spend our money where we wish. Besides, franchise product choice is not his decision, nor is dissuading customers from spending likely to be a positive career move. Indeed the decision to limit or remove alternative junk from pharmacies won’t come from ranks of staff. It will likely arise at a senior level when industry image matters more than profit. Then a “phasing out” period will follow accompanied by consumer information designed to paint the all-knowing pharmacist as a health professional without peer. Why? At some point the ipso facto professional image of the community pharmacy will begin to erode. Poor competition ensures we remain ignorant of varied approaches, and Pharmacy Guild tactics are ruthless if not brutal when it comes to holding onto their monopoly.
Remember the feverish drive by the Pharmacy Guild against supermarkets stocking pharmaceuticals? Seven out of ten items sold in supermarkets are cigarettes, lied one poster in my local pharmacy. Would you trust your health advice to sellers of dangerous products? Therein lies the irony. The angle chosen by pharmacists was concern for your health. We now know without a percentile point of doubt this too was a scam. Supermarkets are examined for price, cleanliness, product quality, claims on packaging, petrol docket value, plastic bag use and so on. Frequently these topics dominate TV, radio and print media. Pharmacists suffer no such intrusion and this is to our disadvantage.
Still, I value my pharmacist interlocutors advice, enjoy his critical wit and might label his greatest crime as not suffering fools gladly. Dastardly deeds for their own sake is not what I’m arguing. Intentionally harming, placing others at risk or promoting junk science as an end in itself is not the aim of pharmacists. Indeed it is the association between clinical skill and unproven remedies that concerns those of us who advocate understanding evidence over accepting claims. Recently, our morning chat was interrupted. He rolled his eyes dramatically because a scooter driving elderly lady required a bottle of cough syrup located near the dispensary. I had to grin inwardly. The poor lady couldn’t move without mowing down ranks of tacky, flimsy shelving. And what was on this shelving? Jelly beans, novelty desk clocks, gym socks, ear candles, antisnor rings, vitamins, vitamins, vitamins and ample detox kits. Bizarre. To think our pharmacies – aside from our hotels – are the final bastions of legal pre-toxing and now stand under assault from “healthy” scams that could harm you as easily as the Class A drugs kept in the dispensary safe.
In this episode Firesnake examines what appear to be quite useless diet plans, on offer at major pharmacy chains. Of particular note is the pushing of poorly monitored and expensive dietary supplements onto children, the lack of training or skill required by staff and incredibly, the arrogant response by Tony Ferguson – a rogue Pharmacist only too well known for his “independent” money making scams over the years. Tony runs “Weightloss and Wellness Centres”. He also pushes his programmes from Terry White Chemists.
Recently Australian consumer magazine Choice reviewed Pharmacy Diet Plans. The Courier Mail described Choice as “slamming” such plans. Briefly Choice concluded:
- Pharmacy diet plans may help to shed extra kilos quickly, but most fail to deal effectively with the complex broader issues around weight loss.
- CHOICE cannot recommend these programs until consultants improve their training and move beyond the “one-size-fits-all” approach.
Tony Ferguson seized the opportunity. Guessing that media outlets are as fed up – no pun intended – as the rest of us with self styled gurus, Ferguson used his own web site to “reply” then within weeks launched a new TV advertising campaign bursting with positive “testimonials”.
600,000 People Can’t be Wrong but Choice Magazine can’t get it right with weight loss investigation!
Tony Ferguson
“One of Australia’s leading consumer comparison magazines, Choice Magazine, has got it wrong! “says weight loss authority and pharmacist Tony Ferguson.
Renowned for helping Australians make accurate and informed decisions, Choice have unfortunately made a mistake with their review of the weight loss industry including Australia’s pharmacy supported weight loss leader , the Tony Ferguson Weightloss Program. In addition the magazine did not review the entire program , only half of it despite being invited to do so.
Ferguson explains that: “They also ignored the psychological aspects of weight loss in their review. The leading authorities in treating obesity around the world acknowledge that being overweight is much more than a product of eating too much and exercising too little. That is an outdated method of losing weight which has failed Australians for almost two generations now.”
Ferguson is using old evasion tricks here. Firstly, he introduces variables that have nothing to do with the aims of diet programs, thus pleads unfair. Next he uses some Peacock terminology – “The leading authorities in treating obesity around the world…”, basically sound like they agree with Tony although it’s irrelevant and conveniently unreferenced.
You may read Tonys full reply here. Keep in mind the panel of experts assembled by Choice described Fergusons latest scam and Ultra Lite as “disgraceful and irresponsible”. Given these physiologically brutal approaches aim to maximise ketosis [see below] and no warning is forthcoming one must agree.
Choice magazine does have an entry on healthy eating for those interested. Here’s how Choice introduced their programme review:
Our findings confirm these diet plans, if followed closely, will certainly shed the kilos in record time, but are they safe and are customers properly assessed and monitored by the pharmacies? Do these fast-track diet plans address the real issues at the root of the weight problem? And is it the pharmacies themselves who end up profiting the most?
CHOICE investigation
To anonymously assess these programs CHOICE sent three overweight people to a selection of pharmacies offering seven different diet programs, and asked a panel of experts to assess our findings.
All the pharmacy plans involve a weekly visit to your pharmacy consultant and a diet that restricts carbohydrates to some extent. All except Ultra Lite use meal replacements to keep your intake in check. The basics of each program are shown in the table.
Programs we looked at:
- AlphaSlim Pharmacy Weight Loss
- Betty Baxter Complete Weight Management
- Dr. Tim’s Success
- Kate Morgan Weight Loss
- MediTrim
- Tony Ferguson Weight Loss
- Ultra Lite Weight Management
- Xndo Weight Control System
Choice also looked at Meal replacements, standard of replacement, consultant training and ongoing training, claims surrounding weight loss and client suitability – eg; one does not have to be overweight or an adult in programmes other than Dr. Tims Success. This certainly raises serious questions over body image and possible self abuse with such low levels of supervision. Considering the pressure on teens and even children today to conform to the perfect body type, Fergusons plea of “psychological aspects” sounds like a cruel game of mockery. To think a perfectly healthy teen can be supplementing healthy eating with “replacement shakes” on advice from a barely trained part-time consultant is at best careless opportunism on the part of these programmes.
The Choice report looks closely at nutritional value, the upsell of diet pills, flaxseed oil, fiber supplements, vitamins, minerals an so on. In the case of Betty Baxter fiber was so low, constipation is likely. Xndo slap you in the face with $1.60 per drink [called a serve] which is much the same as buying any other commercial drink.
There is ample advice within the Choice report. The decision to appoint independent nutritionists is welcomed and it appears pharmacy diets fail us in almost every manner possible. In fact the highly predictable findings of cheap and tacky equipment and dusty storage areas or corners labelled “consultancy areas”, fits nicely with the dollar focus of Australian Pharmacists in general.
Choice also explain the concept of ketosis, which is the default side effect of starving yourself of proper nutrients. We award Tony Ferguson a CPDCT – Clear and Present Danger to Critical Thought score of 7.0 out of 10. Well done Tony.
Choice explained:
Some organs of your body, such as the brain and red blood cells, need glucose for energy, and if you don’t eat enough carbohydrates to supply them, your body will break down protein – from your muscles if you’re not eating enough protein – as an energy source for these organs.
What are the benefits? Quick initial weight loss (mainly due to fluid loss) may increase your motivation. Some people claim the fluid loss also reduces feelings of bloating. Ketosis can also help make you feel less hungry.
And the downsides? Some undesirable side-effects are mild dehydration, poor athletic performance, nausea, bad breath, risk of blood pressure problems, an increased risk of osteoporosis and muscle and blood vessel damage. It may also make concentrating on mental tasks more difficult.
CHOICE verdict
These programs are of obvious financial benefit to the pharmacies, and a constant stream of short-term clients will shift a lot of product off the shelves. Will you lose weight? If you follow them closely, yes. Will the pharmacy setting provide you with your own highly skilled weight-loss advisor? Our experts think not.
Considering the inadequate training of consultants, little ability to tailor programs and deal with individual circumstances and habits, as well as the lack of close, qualified supervision, CHOICE does not recommend these programs. The current regulations and voluntary codes of practice covering weight-loss programs are insufficient. CHOICE wants to see a national accreditation system, including minimum standards for training, covering all programs, consultants and leaders who counsel people on losing weight.
It’s with genuine effort I find myself holding back from simply abusing the window dressing that is the “pharmacy industry” here in Australia. The truth is, it would do little good and one cannot excuse legislators or ignore the hopeless policies bound in red tape. Presently, Pharmacy Guild members worship at the alter of the dollar and whilst able to promote sound health and science, have clearly chosen to promote a culture of “lock-n-load” profiteering that suits existing Guild restrictions on proprietorship numbers.
There’s a huge, growing, aging, drug dependent market out there. Australias pharmacists long ago decided to limit premises to the precious few who play by the rules and rule by the pay. Woo-woo, junk science and reckless dieting by dollar may well be here to stay.
So, how can we limit or prevent junk science and ‘new age’ rubbish from basking in the integrity of white coated pharmacists? Get medications into supermarkets as fast as is sensibly possible. Faced with competition pharmacists will have fewer choices than placing marketing above medication efficacy, hence ensure optimal consumer health.
With luck concepts modern Alpha Males deem mock-worthy – like integrity – will again be outed as the sure fire advertisement our Super-Sized, Master Cooking, Biggest Losing, Evangelistic nation actually benefits from.
Relevant articles have been bookmarked on del.icio.us and are here.
Gags,
59 min. 23.5MB
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