Dr. Peter J. Weiss

U.S. Gov­ern­ment Seeks Answers to Health Cri­sis in More Drugs

So, I ask you Pres­i­dent Obama, Kath­leen Sebe­lius and all of our national lead­ers — Do we really need more drugs?

Appar­ently our fed­eral gov­ern­ment has a plan to help develop more pre­scrip­tion med­i­cines accord­ing to this arti­cle in the New York Times.

I guess I shouldn’t be sur­prised, and I’m try­ing not to be depressed.  All I can say is “Pres­i­dent Obama, what are you think­ing?  More drugs?  Really?”

I don’t like to be crit­i­cal, but this is not what Amer­ica needs right now.  You know my refrain — Amer­ica needs more health, less care.

It’s not just me.  Let’s review some facts.

First, it’s not like we aren’t using drugs already.  Here are some details from the recent fed­eral gov­ern­ment report  — Pre­scrip­tion Drug Use Con­tin­ues to Increase: U.S. Pre­scrip­tion Drug Data for 2007–2008:

• Over the last 10 years, the per­cent­age of Amer­i­cans who took at least one pre­scrip­tion drug in the past month increased from 44% to 48%. The use of two or more drugs increased from 25% to 31%. The use of five or more drugs increased from 6% to 11%.
• In 2007–2008, 1 out of every 5 chil­dren and 9 out of 10 older Amer­i­cans reported using at least one pre­scrip­tion drug in the past month.
• In the United States, spend­ing for pre­scrip­tion drugs was $234.1 bil­lion in 2008, which was more than dou­ble what was spent in 1999.

Yet our health con­tin­ues to dete­ri­o­rate, and of course most of our ill­ness is self-inflicted.

More Michelle, Less Barack any­one?

Dr. Julie Ger­berd­ing, for­mer Direc­tor of the Cen­ters for Dis­ease Con­trol and Pre­ven­tion (CDC) said in a Wall Street Jour­nal let­ter, “Seventy-five per­cent of our cur­rent health expen­di­tures tar­get treat­ment for pre­ventable con­di­tions caused by tobacco use, poor diet and inac­tiv­ity, alco­hol and drug use, motor-vehicle crashes, firearms and other risks.”

The title of that Decem­ber 2008 let­ter, writ­ten as Dr. Ger­berd­ing was being asked to resign by the incom­ing Obama admin­is­tra­tion, was “More About Health, Less About Care.”

So, I ask you Pres­i­dent Obama, Kath­leen Sebe­lius and all of our national lead­ers — Do we really need more drugs?

Are you, per­son­ally, look­ing to take more pills?  Have you found good health through more pre­scrip­tion med­i­cines?

Not to be cyn­i­cal, but how much money have you received in cam­paign con­tri­bu­tions from the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal man­u­fac­tur­ers’ asso­ci­a­tion?

It’s time for a gut check.  I think, deep down, you lead­ers know that health doesn’t come from health­care and that America’s health cri­sis comes from how we live. Can you admit that more care is not the answer?

So, just what is the gov­ern­ment going to do to help us have more health and less care?

What will you do to help Amer­ica to more health and less care? Will you say “no” to the health­care lobby?  Will you focus more on help­ing Amer­i­cans to live dif­fer­ently?

Take a look at Mrs. Obama.  She seems on the right track about our col­lec­tive need to change how we live.

More Michelle, Less Barack any­one?