11

11
7/7/13

I have not explored “alternative medicine” very deeply.  Things such as acupuncture, reflexology, chiropractic treatments, etc. are what I mean by “alternative medicine”.  It is a subject that has always interested me, but I have been pretty fortunate in health, and haven’t had to seek something special out very much.  I once slipped a disk in my back, and went to a chiropractor who fixed me up in that same day.  Most of the skepticism that I hear regarding these alternative methods, is that they don’t actually fix anything.  This sentiment argues that these professionals aren’t going to help you long term, and that they will just make you dependent upon them forever.  This was not my experience with the chiropractor and it has not been my mom’s experience with acupuncture.  In both of our cases we needed only one or a few treatments to cure whatever ailment we had.  Beyond that though, is that in traditional medicine, I think the same argument can be made.  I don’t think anybody can say with a straight face that pharmaceutical companies would rather cure somebody than give them something that allows them to live with a condition, as long as they keep coming back for more.  I remember in the 90’s when there weren’t commercials for pharmaceuticals.  I am not a fan of the constant barrage of ads asking you to ask your physician about drug x.  While there are certainly examples of people becoming aware of a new drug directly from these ads, I still can’t help shake the feeling that the pharmaceutical companies are not really different than street drug dealers.  They don’t care as much about the outcome of their customer, they just want to limit any liability, and then sell as much as possible.  I wish healthcare was something that didn’t have to be a capitalist market, as its sad to see people’s lives compared to a company’s bottom line.