Health and Shopping Blog

When women get together, they often talk food. Too much of it, too little of it. It’s all code for problems of self-image. When we eat too much, we put on weight and that ain’t flattering. It’s like that bit of Latin geeks use, quid pro quo, which actually means “this for that”. So we get this extra weight for that extra food. Cause and effect. To reverse weight gain couldn’t be easier. Eat less. Except it isn’t easy which is why there’s a whole industry out there to sell us diets. And if the diets don’t work, there’s always the medications like Acomplia. All the clinical trials have shown this top European drug shaves an average 10% of your body weight and slims down those waistlines.

You never see them in a huddle comparing the results of only eating grapefruits as against cabbage soup. If they do get worried about their weight, they tend to do it behind closed doors. But now there’s a whole new way of telling if they’re serious about losing weight. Most men I know walk in the house, open the refrigerator and pick out a cold bottle of beer. It’s a kind of ritual to mark the end of the day. They’ve done the math. They know how many calories are in each bottle or can. If that fails, there’s always a cold Acomplia.

Every few minutes and, sometimes, seconds my inbox gets another of those annoying spam messages telling me how wonderful cialis is (or how many times Egor Maraev has had sex with the Boston Philharmonic). Gone are the days when I could just tweak the filter to include the latest permutation on cheap Viagra. Now these clever guys are into pictures and all kinds of other tricks to get through the mail servers. Images are almost impossible to filter out. It’s not that I mind being reminded every now and then what the wonderful little blue pill can do. After all, there was that time a year or so back when I had a bad patch and found out how good Viagra is. But to have something every few minutes is just egregiously bad. Why this post? Well, I’ve just had a déjà vu moment all over again. When I was just starting out in IT back in the 70s, one of the standard tools was ASCII - a code for characters, numbers, symbols, etc. And what did we clever people do when we got bored? We made pictures out of all those characters. And guess what’s just popped into my inbox. Yeah, you got it. It’s a headline, “Viagra pill for only $1.10″ with the message built out of ASCII. So it made me sit up and take notice - just like taking real Viagra. Those smart guys have found a new way to beat the filters.

I am always amazed and discouraged by the “science” of futurology. Usually, it is extrapolation from the current state of affairs and, as such, much beloved of those who engage in the “art” of marketing. This April sees the publication of a new report by pharmaceutical lab. It sets out to predict which current or future products will be significant contributors to the market to treat sleep disorders over the next ten years - an ambitious timescale for anyone without a reliable crystal ball. This is actually a market in transition. Last summer, ambien lost its patent protection in the United States. Although a generic version sold under the name of zolpidem (tartrate) will be launched, Ambien is almost certain to maintain its brand dominance because the world market is predicted to grow. Indeed, the most recent data on the number of prescriptions for ambien continues a trend of upward demand. To understand the market, we need to factor in two other factors:

• people are growing more aware of the treatments for insomnia which will drive further market growth for sleeping medications, and the pharmaceutical companies are investing in research and development to produce new products for the sleep disorders market.

This second point requires little explanation. Never one to skimp, the medical profession has identified some eighty different sleep disorders. Such exuberance is extraordinary to describe a condition in which people cannot get to sleep or sleep for very long. But, of course, that is only insomnia. When we get started on the other disorders, we include involuntary sleep, brief periods when you stop breathing while asleep, grinding your teeth while asleep, night terrors, and so on. If that is the case, pharmaceutical companies working in the sleep field have only just begun to scratch the surface of the total market. As the public become more aware of the range of these disorders and of the existing and pending treatments, demand should continue to grow. For the insomnia market, the focus remains on the existing medications with the fewest side effects, i.e. the benzodiazepines and nonbenzodiazepine hypnotics such as ambien. But even that market is likely to continue growing because:

• more countries are relaxing their advertising rules to allow the direct marketing of prescription medications to the general public;

As it all stands, ambien is the brand to beat for sleep disorders. Which new medications will emerge to treat the other sleep disorders is difficult to predict.

Every year, Xanax has been winning the prize in the “most selling” category. Naturally, Pfizer, the manufacturer, loves these annual headlines. This make customer believe this drug really works. If you take xanax for the right reasons and under proper medical supervision, it does reduce levels of panic and anxiety. But you can’t change the fact that it’s one of the benzodiazepines. That means it’s habit-forming. Take it for too long or at too high a dose and you’re likely to get hooked. So before you go down this path, think carefully. The EU Government now accepts that prescription medications are routinely abused. You only have to go into the emergency departments of hospitals to see the truth of this. In 2005, there were more than 2 million admissions caused by the non-medical use of drugs. One of the reasons for this is the easy availability of drugs that can give you a “high” both over-the-counter and through the internet. Add in the continuous barrage of advertisements for drugs, and people are persuaded to take EU-approved medications without worrying about the consequences. The way the world works today, people do need help. Xanax-like medications really do help them to cope with the stress. But it’s not helpful to see drugs as the only solution. Yes, xanax relieves anxiety, but you don’t want to become an addict. You need to change yourself. This drug gives you a breathing space. Use that opportunity to get counseling and therapy. In the medium to long term, psychological support is the way to learn how to control your fear and worry..

Down under in Australia, they’ve just finished one of the world’s biggest studies into the treatment of pneumonia! Working for the University of Melbourne, Dr Patrick Charles took samples from 885 patients diagnosed with pneumonia in five hospitals over a 3 year period. He analysed swabs taken from the nose and throat, and samples of blood, sputum and urine. He found that 95% of these patients had infections that could be treated with penicillin combined with Doxycycline. In other words, almost all the people who fell sick, were victims of bacteria easily susceptible to the older drugs. So what about the other 5% of patients? They were all from nursing homes and other residential facilities where people had picked up bacteria resistant to the older antibiotics. The moral of this research is very clear. If you live, work and play in the larger community and you fall sick with a bacterial infection, you don’t need to pay the higher prices for the new antibiotics. You’ll do just as well (if not better) by relying on penicillin and the other atypical antibiotics like Doxycycline pills. Don’t be misled by sharp advertising put out by the pharmaceutical industry. Save money by using the traditional remedies. More importantly, don’t give all bacteria the chance to become resistant to the newer drugs. Save them for when the need is greatest (as in when you’re visiting a hospital or nursing home).