Suffering? Getting old? The pharmaceutical industry wants to help. Every night on TV, photogenic actors frolic with photogenic grandchildren, or lounge in bathtubs gazing into the setting sun, telling emotion-laden tales of 30-second Madison Avenue cures: E.D.? Low T? R.A.? COPD? Dry eye? Sneezy? Wheezy? Queasy? There’s a drug for that.

And all the consumer needs to do – all together, now – is “Talk to your doctor.”

But there are a few things the ads don’t mention: Low-cost alternatives to the high-cost drugs featured in the ads. Lifestyle changes that could make drugs unnecessary. Damaging side effects that may not be discovered until a drug has been on the market for a while.

Less obvious is the fact that when consumers do show up to talk to their doctors, the drug industry got there first. Read more. John Webster, SR

My 82-year-old  mother takes a bewlidering number of medications. It really concerns me. I don't take any regular medication-- not even vitamin suppliements.

Do you take prescribed meds? Why or why not?

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