HERBS OR DRUGS?

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Consider your Choices

By K.C. Compton Illustration by Brian Orr and Karen Rooman

Is your hair thinning in all the wrong places? Take Viri-Locks twice a day and say goodbye forever to male pattern baldness. Has halitosis made you a social outcast? BreathLess could be just what the doctor ordered to sweeten your breath, save your teeth and change your life. No longer the life of the party? Hooo, boy. You may have Festive Activity Disorder (FAD). Ask your doctor if MoodBGone is right for you.

People who pay attention to print and broadcast ads probably are convinced that a prescription drug exists to cure any ill—even illnesses they didn't realize they had. The same consumer might conclude that herbal medicines are worthless—or dangerous, in fact, if the knitted brow of the television news anchor is any indication. "A new study reveals St. John's wort no more effective than a placebo in treating depression . . . "

Most news anchors missed the revelation in that same study that the prescription drug Zoloft also was no more effective than a placebo. They didn't follow up the story to discover that the study itself is now on trial, its protocol questioned even by one of the leading scientists who helped initiate it.

Much larger concerns about pharmaceutical medicines growl and huff outside the studio door, but few members of the mainstream media seen able to tear themselves away from the party line (pharmaceutical drugs good, Herbs weird) long enough to investigate.

The issue isn't whether the best choice is synthetic pharmaceuticals or natural herbs—the answer to that question is as individual as the compounds and the illnesses being considered. The issue is why the American public can't get its hands on enough well researched, unbiased information to even make informed choices.

In 1997, the Food and Drug Administration decided to allow pharmaceutical companies to advertise prescription drugs using" their specific names and the conditions they treat. And the rush was em: In 2001, according to a recent article in The New York Times, the ding companies spent $19.1 billion on promotional campaigns, including $ 2.7 billion—yes, billion—for advertising aimed directly at you and me, not physicians. The article quoted a report from the U.S. General Accounting Office stating that spending on consumer-directed adversities rose at a far greater rate than spending on drug research. In the future. we may not have many new treatments for disease, but we can count on lots of new, great-looking television and Internet ads. Stay tuned.