The criminal justice system often fails victims of sexual abuse. In these situations, you may be able to hold your abuser responsible through a civil lawsuit. Survivors of sexual abuse have important rights under the law. Many of these rights have only been enacted recently, and so a lot of people don’t know about them. ….
Continue ReadingSearch Results for: expert testimony
Zantac warnings offered early hint of big problems with Big Pharma practices
Big Pharma’s slavish devotion to maximizing profits and “enhancing shareholder value” has led industry executives to shove the manufacture of their products to far-flung shores. The dubious consequences of these moves have become clear not only with common, over-the-counter medications but also — with potentially tragic results — with drugs needed in the war on….
Continue Reading‘Any One of Us’ shows harsh realities and hope for spinal cord injury patients
Extreme sports may be to blame. Or it might be a falling tree, an error with a surgery, or an auto wreck. As the title of the tough, direct, and new HBO documentary makes clear, “Any One of Us” might suffer from a calamitous spinal cord injury (SCI). The 1-hour and 25-minute work by first-time….
Continue ReadingMarijuana May Not Be A Shrieking Menace, But It Has Real Harms For Young & Old
Dear Reader, Recent archeological finds show that pot was hot as far back as 2,500 years ago (in far western China). For such an ancient drug, you would think by now we’d know everything there is to know about it. Yet mythology runs rampant to this day, as Americans seem to have busted one set of marijuana….
Continue ReadingBeware: Quest for beauty can come at too high a cost
Dear reader, At what price beauty? How about $16.5 billion — that’s what Americans forked over in 2018 for 17.7 million procedures to alter their appearance. They paid for bigger breasts, more ample bottoms, tauter tummies, sculpted noses and more. They suctioned the plump out of thighs, hips, arms, necks, and chins, and toned up the skin. To better their looks, patients let themselves….
Continue ReadingAll about vaccines: What you and your family need and why
Dear reader, America’s worst outbreak of measles in a quarter-century — racing toward 1,000 confirmed cases nationwide and with no signs of slowing— has brought to the fore the counter-factual arguments over vaccinations. The controversies would be easier to resolve if grownups relied on medical science and centuries of experience. The facts lead to one overwhelmingly confident….
Continue ReadingDoctors, Big Pharma and FDA ripped for bungling control of potent painkillers
A steady flow of news reports shows how our nation’s opioid crisis can be fairly blamed on just about every actor in the medical field that should have known better: Big Pharma, doctors, hospitals, and regulators. It’s been a toxic mix of incompetence, indifference and out-and-out deceptive conduct that produced the epidemic that now claims tens….
Continue ReadingHarsh reminder of opioid peril: A single smuggling bust seized fentanyl enough for 144 million fatal overdoses
If anyone around doubts still the threat that the opioid crisis poses to the nation, a drug bust involving a vegetable truck in Arizona should provide powerful persuasion: Federal agents, suspicious about the vehicle’s floor, loosed a drug-sniffing dog, resulting in the seizure of not just 395 pounds of methamphetamines but also 254 pounds of….
Continue ReadingHundreds of supplements for diet, muscle, and sex are tainted with risky drugs
Same story, new data, and a message that needs repeating: Over-the-counter supplements — sold as safe alternatives to prescription drugs for weight loss, muscle building, and sexual enhancement — may be risky and not beneficial to your health. Indeed, many of them are adulterated with strong prescription drugs. As the Washington Post reported of a….
Continue ReadingMedicaid costs soaring? Blame Big Pharma’s big-dollar state-level campaigns
Uncle Sam long has allowed states to set the rules governing how Medicaid works, and a dozen or so of them have decided, with the purported goal of increased fiscal rectitude, to impose harsh rules to force poor, sick, disabled, and aged program participants to work more or to seek employment. But taxpayers might be….
Continue Reading