Hail the Hippocratic Oath! Approved by the American Medial Association, this document states: “That into whosever house you shall enter, it shall be for the good of the sick to the utmost of your power..”
Never mind that today to be treated, the sick have to go to the doctor’s “house” instead of the doctor coming to see the sick. As for the caring of the sick to the utmost of your power, one might well wonder if all the doctors took the same oath.
A recent article in Life Extension tells us that the FDA is trying discourage, even destroy, alternative websites. According to the LE article, the FDA has initiated a campaign to deceive Congress into believing that the agency needs to “protect” the public from alternative health information on the Internet. At a cost, by the way, of $10 million a year of your tax money.
Here’s the scheme. To “protect” you, the FDA plans to deny American consumers access to innovative therapies, nutrients, and drugs, that could ease pain, heal infirmities, and even extend life–and then make you cough up for the non-information you get.
There is, however, much more at stake than the FDA’s deceitful battle against alternative health products. This Orwellian encroachment on our civil liberties and freedom of information is just another government attempt to keep us from making intelligent, independent decisions about our personal health, well-being, and quality of life in general.
Life Extension further informs us that “the FDA has neither the constitutional authority, the competence, nor the scientific credibility to be given additional power and money to police the Internet.
“The FDA wants, and has always wanted, authoritarian powers, and as much money as it can get from Congress, because it is a political organization, not a scientific one.”
The FDA, by the way, also gone cybernuts. It is considering the expenditure of a million dollars a year (also your tax money) to develop computerized robots that will scan the Internet for “claims” made about alternative health care providers.
Using robotics as electronic policemen, the agency hopes to gather enough information to prosecute.
Finally, the FDA is pushing for a law that forces on-line pharmacies to be “FDA Approved” in order to operate.
Big Brother doesn’t miss a trick.
If the freedom to choose alternative health products and services on the web, or anywhere else, is important to you, contact your Congressman and find out where these proposed FDA infractions of your rights stand. If they’re still being worked on, tell them to scrub this ill-conceived idea. It’s your health we’re talking about here.
“If the doctors of today do not become the dieticians of tomorrow, the dieticians of today will become the doctors of tomorrow.” When the Rockefeller Institute of Medical Research said that about alternative health care they came close to predicting the future.
~ About the Author ~
Jim Moore is a free-lance political writer and is a regular columnist for Ether Zone. A list of works by Jim Moore can be seen at the American Reformation Project website,
Written by Jim Moore, and published on DrKelley.info, July 18, 2002. Embedded links (if any) may no longer be active. (Ed. 01.11.11)
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