Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM)

Anonymous
June 12, 2011 at 2:14 pm

I have posted these links before. They may look familiar to some of you.

The first, from Mayo Clinic,

[url]http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/alternative-medicine/PN00001[/url]

says this about the second:

“[I]…To make sense of the many therapies available, it helps to look at how they are classified by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), [COLOR=”Red”]the lead agency that funds for scientific research on CAM in the United States[/COLOR][/I]….”

Therefore, the answer to one comment is emphatically, YES, the US Government, in the form of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), does still actively fund research on CAM.

And, let’s don’t talk about the FDA approved cigarettes for years, with no label warning required, ditto for alcohol and the FDA still approves artificial food coloring and allows rat poison (flouride) in toothpaste and drinking water.

Oh, yes, and where did aspirin come from- what’s that you say? A company named Bayer invented it. Maybe so. On the other hand, aspirin, or aspirin like substances were ‘invented’ following studies on the ‘medicinal’ usefulness of willow and other salicylate-rich plants dating, historically, to the days before western medicine. In fact, likely before the Romans conquered what later became England.

Recently the news media made a big deal out of the FDA requiring that the dosage level of a certain statin drug be reduced due to muscle damage.

What the FDA said about that particular statin-, “…Safety Announcement

[06-08-2011] The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is recommending limiting the use of the highest approved dose of the cholesterol-lowering medication, simvastatin (80 mg) because of increased risk of muscle damage….”

Where the FDA said it:

[url]http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/ucm256581.htm[/url]

Gee whiz, if that much of one kind of statin is proven bad for you, do want to believe that a little bit is still good for you? Yeah, let’s use the water analogy, ‘I have to drink water. Yet, give me too much water and I’ll drown.’

And the Government CAM web site is here-

[url]http://nccam.nih.gov/[/url]

Others on this site have reported using alternative ‘stuff’. Others on this site have said something to the effect of ‘why don’t you try this, I did.’

Why such a big stink now? Nevermind, don’t answer that question. It is Rhetorical.

I’ll believe what I want. I’ll share what I believe, sometimes. If you like it, fine. If you don’t, welcome to choose that belief which floats your cork, without trying to convince me otherwise.