Posted on 01/04/2004 8:00:56 AM PST by Wolfie
BAN ON EPHEDRA: RUSH TO JUDGEMENT
The beginning of the end for naturally produced ephedra was probably the death last spring of a baseball player who was overweight, had liver disease and high blood pressure and was practicing in hot weather.
And, oh yes, reports about all of this tell us, he had taken a dietary supplement that included ephedra.
It's a fault of democracy that a dramatic incident can be more compelling to the public mood and political instincts than carefully weighed scientific data or a rational assessment of comparative risks, and it is therefore no surprise that the Bush administration has announced a ban on the product when it is derived from herbs.
Do not suppose, however, that it is thereby a given that public health will improve. Ephedra products really do help people lose the fat that diminishes their well-being to the tune of thousands of premature deaths each year. And, some commentators have pointed out, the demonstrated dangers of these products are less than the dangers of any number of other commonly consumed drugs and chemicals, including aspirin and the caffeine you swallow with your coffee.
Especially if you disregard the directions for use, the stimulation from ephedra products can contribute to such scary afflictions as strokes.
Care is needed, as is the case with virtually all activities in this life, and federal requirements for warning labels would have made great, good sense.
Instead, the government is acting to ban the products within months, denying people the right to make some judgments on their own.
If consumers had that right, they might note that millions of people have consumed billions of ephedra-containing pills each year to no ill effect and, in at least some cases, to beneficial effect.
They might also come to the elementary conclusion that the coincidence of the taking of the pills with illness or death is no more a proof in itself of cause and effect than a rooster's crowing can be assumed to prompt a sunrise.
Perhaps, if challenged in court, the administration will show that it has more reliable data of unacceptable risk than various publicized studies have so far put on the table. The suspicion of the moment has to be, first, that the action is driven more by politically unacceptable headlines, and, second, that there's not a whole lot of hand-wringing in the administration about still another failure to treat Americans as responsible, free adults at least as intelligent as those who would dictate their choice.
Call me cynical.
Tia
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What do you know about how Prozac was introduced?
Tia
According to reports in the media, Mr. Bechler had the following risk factors for heat stroke:
1. a prior history of heat illness episodes while in high school - which heightens the probability of reoccurring incidents;
2. a family history of sudden death following exercise (his half-brother died of an aneurysm at the age of 20 after overheating from playing baseball);
3. a history of hypertension and liver problems;
4. he had not eaten solid food for a day or two, in an apparent attempt to lose weight;
5. he was apparently not adequately acclimatized to training in the heat and humidity of South Florida;
6. it appeared that he was wearing two or three layers of clothing during workouts, again, in an attempt to lose weight;
7. he was overweight and did not have a high enough fitness level to make it through conditioning drills; and,
8. he was allowed to exercise until he collapsed with a core temperature reportedly of 106° F before being removed from the field.
Sounds like he did most of the damage to himself!
Tia
Thanks for the all caps, I can also hear you in lower case.
Now, my point is that some manufacturers have been adding ephedra to innocuous items such as sports drinks and sports bars, and people (like me) have unknowingly ingested ephedra with really terrible and frightening reactions.
I maintain to this very minute that I was poisoned without my knowledge or consent. The effects were that serious, and I seriously thought I was going to die. I sat out the worst of it in a hospital parking lot. I'm sorry you can't seem to grasp that.
I don't care where you get your ephedra or when or how you take it. I just don't ever want it in my system again, and especially under the circumstances I've described above. Because I am 100 percent certain that others have had the same experience. And I have no reason to disbelieve that others may have died from it.
Just as abuse of allopathic drugs but they don't want to elaborate on that alothough they are being forced to - Rush prescribed pain killer situation. The truth is also that allopathic drugs damage your liver while most natrupathic approaches do NOT and get at the root problem. As for me, If I want it, I can easily get it over the internet.
Sorry, no cigar.
Not long before this incident, I'd spent two months trekking in the Himalaya, consistently above 12,000 feet altitude.
Sedentary?
You say that like it's a bad thing.
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