Posted by jane d on October 14, 2012, at 2:47:50
In reply to Lou's Little Shoppe-death-o-meter, posted by Lou Pilder on October 13, 2012, at 21:09:25
Or are you?
You're a smart guy. I think you know what those numbers really say.
They say that of the people who have bothered to report something bad happening while they took the drug (which is only a tiny percentage of users to begin with) x percentage died. It does not say they died BECAUSE of the drug. It certainly does not say that x percentage of everyone who takes the drug dies. None of these drugs confer immunity from accidents, cancer, heart disease or aging. People continue to die from all the things they would have died from before.
To be meaningful you would need to show that more people died while taking a specific drug than would have died otherwise. Rarely, there are statistics like that. Usually the drug gets pulled from the market or gets a warning. An example would be risperdal in the elderly who have dementia which is now a black box warning.
Why not stick to honest criticisms of these meds. And if you believe that religion is always a better choice than meds you're allowed to believe that too - but I do think those arguments should be taken over to the faith board.
poster:jane d
thread:1028372
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20121009/msgs/1028602.html