Preventing Future Tragedies
Because the FDA has been subverted by those most in need of its oversight, it has devolved into an agency unworthy of public trust. As a result of its actions and inactions, America is turning into a nation overwhelmed by and addicted to drugs, while billion-dollar profits pour into the pockets of those who so readily manufacture and supply them.
The reasons promoted for use of deadly biochemicals — to alter moods, to “escape” from troubling situations in life, to “live with” problems at work or in marriage, to “manage” one’s child — are based on lies cleverly packaged to appear as scientific fact, using “experts” whose interests lie only in money, not results.
Those in positions of public trust and authority who should be holding up the “Stop” sign to the makers of these substances disposed of that warning long ago, along with their own integrity. And there may be no better example than the Food and Drug Administration of an agency charged with protecting the American people which has abandoned its public mandate.
To solicit or accept “contributions” from the firms one is supposed to monitor destroys independence. The implications of such “aid” are obvious and undermine whatever vestige of objectivity the FDA may claim to retain.
Similarly, the practice of “trading” personnel with the private sector — accepting pharmaceutical employees as FDA staffers and letting them “review” the drugs in which their firms have such a large vested interest — must cease, as must the custom of using individuals with personal interests in drugs pending review in any part of the approval process. In short, the agency needs a thorough fumigation to eliminate conflicts of interest that can only work against the health and welfare of the American people.
Street drugs now recognized as deadly, such as heroin, morphine and LSD, were launched into society as medical drugs. Today Ritalin, Prozac, Demerol, Dilaudid and others — all approved by the FDA — follow their path.
Such legal psychotropic drugs — among them some of the most addictive substances on the market — have been the subject of intense scrutiny by Freedom. Those who rubber-stamp the approval of these drugs are vital players in the psychiatric drugs-for-dollars industry. And they have steadfastly proven their inability to be objective when it comes to such substances — while admitting ignorance of how addicts become addicted.
As an initial matter, such practitioners must be banished from the FDA’s approval process, for here again lies conflict of interest; but, from a broader view, if the agency were to utilize genuine scientific criteria in the examination and approval of such drugs, none would ever arrive on the market at all.
When an FDA exists which plays its role straight and as intended, all Americans and indeed everyone in the much broader sphere will benefit. Driving or flying under the influence of mind-bending drugs would be as illegal as drunk driving, as well it should be. Tragedies such as those which claimed Princess Diana and Don Simpson will be far less common. And our children, and their children, will be less troubled by dealers pushing the most widely abused new street drugs — Ritalin, Prozac and others — on their playgrounds in the years to come.
Continued...
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