In the field of medicine, the Food and Drug Administration is the most influential organization in the world. Many nations look to the FDA for leadership and advice. Unfortunately, that power has amplified the damage done by the Washington DC-based, mammoth bureaucracy. Many leading experts in the food and healthcare industry agree: the FDA is responsible for an immeasurable amount of pain and suffering world-wide. According to the FDA, around 862,000 people have died because of FDA-approved drugs, vaccines, and devices since 2005. However, also according to the FDA, their statistics are definitely far from accurate.
A former FDA Commissioner even admitted to underreporting numbers by as much as 100 fold!
The FDA underreports their numbers
The Alliance for Natural Health USA has cataloged a vast amount of research on the subject of underreporting:
- Dr. David Aaron Kessler was FDA Commissioner from 1990 to 1997. In 1993, he told the Journal of the American Medical Association that only 1% of serious adverse events are reported.
- An analysis by Wald and Shojania found that only 1.5% of all adverse events result in an incident report. Additionally, only 6% of adverse drug events are identified properly.
- Jerry Phillips was the associate director of the FDAs Office of Post Marketing Drug Risk Assessment. He wrote in JAMA, In the broader area of adverse drug reaction data, the 250,000 reports received annually probably represent only 5% of the actual reactions that occur.
Alliance for Natural Health, USA
- Jay Cohen extensively researched adverse drug reactions. He noted that because only 5% of adverse drug reactions are reported, there are in fact 5 million medication reactions each year.
- A Japanese team investigated data mining of the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System. They determined that the average reporting rate was only 6%.
- Gary Null wrote a book called Death by Medicine. In it, he reported on iatrogenic acts. Those acts are defined as adverse events induced unintentionally in a patient by a physician. Null said reports indicate as few as 5% and no more than 20% of iatrogenic acts.
Translating the numbers
According to the research above, only 1%-20% of serious adverse events are actually reported. The math? The FDA is responsible for as many as 73 million deaths since 2005.
To be sure, the true number of dead is likely substantially less than 73 million. However, the number of deaths that FDA-approved drugs, vaccines, and devices have caused is astronomically higher than most Americans would ever imagine.
A personal, human element can sometimes be lost when looking at statistics of large numbers of dead people. What do these statistics look like at the individual level? At least one powerful story of suffering that the FDA is responsible for made it to the big screen.
Even Hollywood knows the FDA is responsible for untold misery
Normally, Hollywood is more than ready to shower the federal government with praise. Theyve done their bidding for decades. Not this time.
You may have seen Dallas Buyers Club. Its an emotional, critically acclaimed film staring Matthew McConaughey. It was based the true story of Ron Woodroof, an AIDS patient.
Actor, Matthew McConaughey
Woodroof contracted the virus from either intravenous drugs or unprotected sex. One day, doctors finally tested him. They told him he was dying. The doctors put him on FDA-approved drugs. He started dying faster. At 511, McConaughey got down to around 143 pounds to play the staring role.
Through much research, Woodroof discovered a non-FDA-approved drug that extended and in some cases, saved the lives of AIDS patients. He started taking the incredibly helpful, unapproved drugs himself. Then, he started selling them to others who were suffering. He was able to help a lot of people.
The FDA harassed, sued, and eventually shut down Woodroof. They even resorted to stealing his property.
Shortly before Woodroof died, the FDA finally let him legally take the drug theyd spent seven years trying to suppress.
The FDAs corruption and ineptitude are insurmountable
The FDA prevents terminal patients from getting helpful drugs, botches food safety, helps to increase the price of drugs, and creates chaos and confusion in the marketplace of medicine.
The FDA is responsible for part of the culture of corruption that has engulfed Washington DC for over a century. Good people like Ron Woodroof have valiantly tried to fight back. Occasionally, a lone DC politician will stand up and try to reform the behemoth agency. Like an animal fighting for its survival, the FDA smothers reform efforts with lobbyists, lies, and propaganda.