Irving Kirsch, PhD from Harvard Medical School tells how antidepressants get approved by the FDA and why it is a flawed system.

Only Two Positive Drugs Studies Needed for Approval, While Negative Trials Ignored

He notes that drug companies only have to provide two studies showing positive results to get a drug approved regardless of how many trials failed to show any benefit.

“The FDA requires two adequately conducted clinical trials showing a significant difference between drug and placebo,” Kirsch writes.

“But there is a loophole: There is no limit to the number of trials that can be conducted in search of these two significant trials.

“Trials showing negative results simply do not count.

“Furthermore, the clinical significance of the findings is not considered.

“All that matters is that the results are statistically significant.”

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"Oncologists and others pretend that they can cure 60% of cancers when nothing of the sort is true," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

"Annual mammography to detect breast cancer is a needless expense and pain with no effect on all-cause mortality rates," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

"[H]ighly respected corporations and federal government agencies conspired to dispose of fluoridated waste products in our drinking water. A minor benefit to baby teeth was magnified out of proportion, and long-term side-effects were not even considered, then denied when found," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

Typical background ionizing radiation is not only harmless, but actually beneficial notes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

"EDTA chelation does retard or reverse atherosclerosis with improvements in edema, wound healing and in walking distance before pain," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself.

"This chapter [in my book] also showed the first example that mainstream medicine does not 'fight fair' in debunking alternative treatments any more than in promoting mainstream treatments," Kauffman notes. Read the entire article | Email this article

"[E]xtreme exercise causes heart failure and other injuries, quite the opposite of preventing them," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

"[N]o long-term trials exist on the effect of red wine specifically on all-cause mortality [that is, that red wine reduces the risk of death]" writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself.

One to three alcoholic drinks per day has a slight protective effect against cardiovascular disease, but this does not extend to other causes of death Kauffman notes. Read the entire article | Email this article

The basis for using cholesterol-lowering drugs is not based on science notes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself.

"Low cholesterol levels are dangerous; high ones usually are not," Kauffman writes. Read the entire article | Email this article

"Advice to eat low-fat diets, especially low in saturated fat and cholesterol... has no basis whatever," writes Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself.
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Daily aspirin prevents heart attacks, yet it does NOT reduce mortality in men, and typical doses of aspirin INCREASE mortality in women according to Joel M. Kauffman, PhD, the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year, and How to Protect Yourself. Read the entire article | Email this article

An analysis of many studies found that cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins INCREASED THE RISK OF DYING by one percent over 10 years.

This according to an excellent Letter to the Editor by Joel Kauffman, PhD, Professor of Chemistry Emeritus from the University of the Sciences of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania that was published in the Wall Street Journal on May 25, 2003. Read the entire article | Email this article