Was Hep C and Interferon; Now Patent Medicines

[Guest guest]

That's why I put it in quotes. I remembered your article and I knew it would get

a rise out

of you.

:-)

 

doug

 

, " Bob Flaws " <pemachophel2001

wrote:

>

> At the end of Doug's post, he uses the words " patent medicine. " Some

> time ago I wrote the following article on why I believe we are

> shooting ourselves in the foot when we use this extremely out-dated

> and factually incorrect term. Sorry, it lost its formatting and

> endnotes when copied here.

>

> Why We should Not Use the Term " Patent Medicines "

>

> by

> Bob Flaws, Lic. Ac., FNAAOM (USA), FRCHM (UK)

>

>

> Keywords: Chinese medicine, Chinese herbal medicine, patent medicines,

> ready-made medicines

>

> Most acupuncturists and practitioners of Chinese medicine in the West

> refer to ready-made Chinese medicines (cheng zhong yao) as " patent

> medicines. " For years now I have been arguing against this term. Not

> only is it factually inaccurate, it also stigmatizes our medicines in

> the eyes of those who actually know what patent medicines are. The

> following is a definition of patent medicines I found on the Web:

>

> The words " patent medicine " refer to products that were marketed,

> mostly in the 19th century, as medicines that would cure a host of

> diseases. Many of the diseases which these medicines were supposed to

> cure are still not curable today ? cancer and diabetes, for example.

> Why did people buy these products? Well, given that the access to

> medical practitioners was limited, especially in rural areas, and the

> state of medical technology in the 19th century, who wouldn't buy

> these products? After all, going to your general store and purchasing

> a prepared medicine was a lot easier and a lot more pleasant than

> going to a doctor and having him perform blood-letting!

>

> In other words, " patent medicines " refer to 19th century " snake oil, "

> and the use of this term plays directly into the hands of those who

> would denigrate our medicine as quackery. Why were these 19th century

> ready-made medicines called patent medicines. The explanation is given

> by the same e-source:

>

> In mid 18th century England, some producers of medical preparations

> applied for and obtained Royal Patents for their products. The patents

> protected the owners' rights to the products and gave some prestige to

> the medicines. Robert Turlington was one of the very first to receive

> a Royal Patent for his " Balsam of Life. " Later on, the term patent

> medicine was applied to any of this type of product, whether patented

> or not.

>

> The fact that this term is pejorative and detrimental to the public

> perception of our medicine is aptly demonstrated by the following FDA

> page on patent medicines published under the title, " The Patent

> Medicine Menace. " Because it is the " official " U.S. governmental

> position on patent medicines, I am presenting it here below in its

> entirety. It should be a wake-up call to all those within our

> profession who insist on using this archaic, inaccurate, and

> defamatory term.

>

> Patent medicines have had a long and ignominious history in the U. S.,

> reaching their zenith in the late 19th century. As the population

> became more urban and somewhat more capitalized, a ripe target emerged

> for some post-industrial entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs who would thrive

> in a marketplace best characterized by the dictum, 'caveat emptor'.

> Communications had expanded, and the printed word became a crucial

> venue for the proliferation of patent medicines. The rise of

> advertising in America, not coincidentally, paralleled the rise of

> nostrums. At the same time, the biomedical sciences in this country

> were still in their infancy, and medicine was ill-equipped to deal

> with most diseases. An army of enterprising individuals were prepared

> to step in and alleviate the suffering.

>

> Nostrums permeated American society by the late 19th century. Products

> appealed to exotica, the medical knowledge of Native Americans, death,

> religion, patriotism, mythology (a natural for this industry!), and

> especially new developments in science. There was nothing to stop

> patent medicines makers from claiming anything and putting anything in

> their products, clearly seen in the famous morphine- and alcohol-laced

> soothing syrups for teething and colicky babies. Cancer and arthritis

> cures, baldness remedies, bust developers, manhood restorers ?

> wherever a need existed, patent medicine makers stepped in. They did

> not have a monopoly on the market, though. The ethical pharmaceutical

> industry, those firms that advertised for the most part directly to

> health professionals, sold their share of nostrums as well.

>

> Quacks developed successful marketing techniques, but they also

> promoted their interests in more surreptitious ways. For example, they

> subdued any curiosity in the press with their economic strength. By

> the 1890s, patent medicine manufacturers used so-called " red clauses "

> in the their advertising contracts with newspapers and magazines.

> These muzzle clauses voided the contract if a state law regulating

> nostrums were passed. Thus, not only were many editorials silent on

> the need for such laws, they actively campaigned against them.

>

> But quacks and their trade associations were not able to stifle the

> entire fourth estate. A few muckraking journalists helped expose the

> red clauses, the false testimonials, the nostrums laden with harmful

> ingredients, the unfounded cures for cancer, tuberculosis, syphilis,

> narcotic addiction, and a host of other serious as well as

> self-limited diseases. The most influential work in this genre was the

> series by Samuel Hopkins Adams that appeared in Collier's on October

> 7, 1905, titled " The Great American Fraud. " Adams published 10

> articles in the series which concluded in February 1906. He followed

> this up with another series on doctors who advertised fake clinics.

> The shocking stories of the patent medicine menace were accompanied by

> startling images, such as " Death's Laboratory. "

>

> That same month saw the publication of another work which, more than

> any other single event, spurred on passage of the 1906 act. Socialist

> writer Upton Sinclair published The Jungle, a fact-based novel about

> immigrant life in the meat-packing industry of Chicago. Sinclair's

> shocking and revolting story, verified by government undercover

> investigators, primed the final push for a federal law.

>

> The first federal Food and Drugs Act was passed four months later. The

> exposés of muckrakers like Adams and Sinclair had a major impact on

> passage of the bill, as did the untiring work of the General

> Federation of Women's Clubs, state food and drug officials, the

> American Medical Association, and the American Pharmaceutical

> Association. Most notable among the reformers was the head of the

> Bureau of Chemistry of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, Harvey

> Washington Wiley, who stumped for remedial legislation since his

> arrival in Washington in 1883 (though Wiley was much more concerned

> with food supply). The law prohibited adulteration and misbranding of

> food and drugs, and though it had many shortcomings, it was arguably

> the pinnacle of Progressive Era legislation. It did not put quackery

> out of business; that still thrives. But it brought some disclosure

> and accountability into the marketplace, an important first step in

> consumer protection.

>

> At this point in time, Chinese herbal medicine is experiencing an

> image problem. There have been the deaths from kidney failure in

> Europe and the U.S. due to aristolochic acid, there has been the

> discovery and broadcasting of the adulteration of a number of Chinese

> ready-made medicines with Western scheduled drugs, and, most recently,

> there has been the FDA banning of Ma Huang (Herba Ephedrae) and Ban

> Xia (Rhizoma Pinelliae Ternatae) from all dietary supplements. As the

> FDA has made clear in public communications, if this last ban is made

> to stick, it plans to ban other substances from dietary supplements,

> including all of the citrus family of herbs, such as Chen Pi

> (Pericarpium Citri Reticulatae), Qing Pi (Pericarpium Citri

> Reticulatae Viride), Zhi Ke (Fructus Citri Aurantii), Zhi Shi (Fructus

> Immaturus Citri Aurantii), and Fo Shou (Fructus Citri Sacrodactylis),

> due to these herbs' inclusion of the medically active ingredient

> sinephrine. Ready-made Chinese medicines sold in the U.S. are done so

> legally as " dietary supplements " under DSHEA (the Dietary Supplement &

> Health Education Act) even though, in actuality, that is not what they

> are. At the moment, we need all the good press and PR we can get.

> Therefore, I believe we should immediately jettison our use of the

> term " patent medicine " and switch to the direct English translation of

> what these medicines are called in Chinese, cheng zhong yao, prepared

> or ready-made Chinese medicines.

>

> Ready-made Chinese medicines includes all those Chinese medicines

> which are available in ready-made form, such as pills, capsules,

> tablets, powdered extracts, tinctures, medicated oils, and plasters,

> whether made in Asia or in the West. Several years ago, the government

> of the People's Republic of China realized that ready-made Chinese

> herbal medicines had a problem with perceived quality. Currently,

> quality control is job #1 of the Chinese medical division of the SDA,

> the State Drug Administration, China's equivalent of the FDA. The

> Chinese herbal business represents $25 billion dollars per year of

> income to the PRC, mostly in hard currencies from countries such as

> the U.S. Germany, and Canada. In fact, the U.S. accounts for 15% of

> this total, more than domestic Chinese sales. So the U.S. market is

> extremely important to the rulers of the PRC, and they are doing

> everything they can to insure that access to this cash cow is well

> protected. For instance, by governmental fiat, all Chinese drug

> manufacturies must be GMP certified by the end of this year, and China

> will be the first country in the world to institute Good Agricultural

> Procedures (GAP, 2007) which have been specifically designed for the

> Chinese herbal industry. Further, American distributors and

> manufacturers of ready-made Chinese medicines have taken great strides

> in the last several years to insure quality control on this end. These

> companies now routinely require testing on every batch of every

> medicine with set standards for microbial, heavy metal, and pesticide

> residue contamination. In addition, all these American companies will

> be required by the U.S. FDA in the near future to comply with GMPs,

> and already all companies selling ready-made Chinese medicinals in the

> U.S. must meet FDA labeling standards for herb identifications, etc.

> on their packaging.

>

> The point that I am trying to make is that the ready-made Chinese

> medicine industry in the U.S., China, and Taiwan has greatly improved

> quality control over even just five years ago, but we prescribers and

> consumers continue to spread a false perception of the poor and even

> dangerous quality of these products by their erroneous labeling as

> " patent medicines. " I believe that, in order for this medicine to

> survive in an increasingly hostile regulatory environment, we, as a

> profession, need to make a concerted effort to abandon this out-dated

> and pejorative label and switch to the more correct and neutral term

> of prepared or ready-made Chinese medicines. If we continue using this

> out-dated and erroneous label, we will only have ourselves to blame

> when the FDA attempts to regulate us out of business.

>

> Copyright ? Blue Poppy Press, 2004. All rights reserved. To see the

> original article with its formatting and endnotes, go to:

> www.bluepoppy.com in the Free Articles section.

>

>

>

, " "

> <taiqi@> wrote:

> >

> >

> > > , " G Hudson " <crudo20@>

> wrote:

> > > >

> > > > I don't want to hijack the thread here... but would this interaction

> > > > with interferon also apply to MS patients getting interferon?

> > > >

> > > > Geoff

> >

> > I can see MS and interferon having the exact same issues.

> >

> > To pick up on some of Misha's comments, the hospital I observed in

> didn't use Chai Hu as

> > they thought it was too damaging to the liver. If I can say that

> they had a subsititute I

> > would say they were big on Mei Gui Hua, and I've learned to

> appreciate it as well.

> > The one thing I can say about Chai Hu, is if it does increase

> interferon levels

> > then why not use it when safe to help fight the virus? After all,

> one of my patients may be

> > going on a super low dose of interferon. Still I haven't put Chai Hu

> in my " patent " formula

> > that I had made up in

> > bulk.

> >

> > doug

> > > >

> > >

> >

>