Racketeering in Medicine: The Suppression of Alternatives

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Summary: A must read for anyone about the "big business" of Medicine
Review: An excellent book, shows how alternative therapies are suppressed and how only drugs and surgeries are allowed to receive approval. It is a wake-up call for those people that need a reminder of the imperfect nature of man and how money/power can overwhelm a doctor's true desire to help the general population's health.

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Summary: TELLS IT LIKE IT IS
Review: I could have wished for better, more focused writing, as this book wanders around a lot -- but Dr. Carter provides plenty of examples of useful therapies that we don't get to try because Big Pharma can't profit from them. He shows how our "free enterprise" medicine is driven by profit and how large special-interest organizations (drug companies, insurance companies, government agencies, big bucks charities and especially, the AMA) determine what kind of treatments are considered "legitimate."

He shows how the government's requirements for testing new (and old, but never "scientifically" tested)) treatments, along with the almost fanatic belief in double-blind trials keeps good therapies from public use. Many other countries sanction these therapies, but in the US, allopathic medicine - led by the AMA -has a virtual monopoly on providing health care.

Since Dr. Carter wrote this book, the situation has improved a bit for alternative treatments, but overall, health care in the US is stagnant and disastrously expensive. If we had a system where the incentives were for delivery of good, cost-effective care for everyone, we would get fewer bypass operations, take fewer pills, and get fewer high-tech tests. But we'd be much better off as a society than we are with our bloated, overpriced profit-driven health care environment that mainly benefits big drug and insurance companies and highly-paid providers and executives.

The most shocking revelation in the book is how local medical societies team up with government to persecute providers who use unorthodox treatments. The medical profession claims it uses hearings to weed out bad doctors, but it seems these local medical societies mostly go after doctors who might have a treatment (like EDTA chelation) that doesn't cost enough. AMA doctors, hospitals, and even insurance companies would rather do a $30,000 operation than let someone suffering from clogged arteries have a $3000 treatment.

We Americans pay obscene (and unsustainable) amounts of money for health insurance only to be denied payment for treatments we may choose for ourselves. These denials of payment and persecutions of pratitioners are the actions of a monopoly protecting its own financial interest.

When will the American people demand a change? Wake up, America! You do not have the best medical care in the world, just the most expensive.

Rating:
Summary: Yes, science and reason is a conspriacy!
Review: I found this book to be a most informative read. To those that think there is no conspiracy to halt or suppress alternative treatments , I have experienced this first hand as a german doctor in the US to further his education has had his visa revoked because he has used alternatives taught in his country and in many surrounding countries , yet his wife is allowed to stay until her education is paid for. This man donated time to a free clinic and is highly respected in our town.He has helped many people with herbal and alternative treatments including EDTA Chelation , but in peer revue was chastized by local doctors who were losing patients.BUY this book and find out for yourself....take your own health in your own hands....DON'T blindly follow orthodox medicine.......RSN

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Summary: Excellent Information!
Review: I have been reading various books on alternaitve medicine for years, and this one sticks out as one of the top five in my library about how the AMA, FDA and pharmaceutical industry has for years tried to discredit alternative,less expensive, less invasive and often times more effective modalities of treatment.

James Carter does not just sensationalize but documents quite clearly the evidence behind his assertion. He clearly shows that the governing bodies of modern general or "accepted" medicine have a vested interest in supressing these treatments and making sure that most average folks never know about them. This book is well worth reading as it offers ways to empower the reader to find out more and to participate in the decision process concerning their own healthcare.

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Summary: A vociferous and articulate warning
Review: Racketeering In Medicine: The Suppression Of Alternatives by physician and health issues consultant James P. Carter is a sharply worded expose of just how the financial bottom line is warping and skewing the manner in which medical treatments are researched, tested, and approved. A vociferous and articulate warning against the undue influence of pharmaceutical companies, and the suppression of the benefits of less costly alternative treatments, Racketeering In Medicine is a stimulating account of a very real problem present in American health care today and should be mandatory reading for health care activists, health care policy makers, and health care providers.

Rating:
Summary: Yes, science and reason is a conspriacy!
Review: This book is an excellent example of the paranoia that grips people who don't understand the standards of science and reason. The author could well go on to write another book on the "conspiracy" of the criminal justice system that keeps us all poor by cracking down on bank robbers. After all, the banks have lots of money so why shouldn't we just go there and get some whenever we want? In like fashion, sCAMsters claim they have an "alternative" to scientific standards of medical care and complain when they are unmasked as charlatans and frauds.

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Summary: Bogus pseudo-science, paranoid conspiracy theories
Review: This has to be pretty much the most worthless book I've ever encountered. It details a vast "conspiracy" against the American people on the part of every reputable scientist who has ever walked on this earth (as vs. Dr. Carter's tame circle of quacks, who are of course perfect in Dr. Carter's estimation despite the fact that their so-called "studies" violate every principle of double-blind controlled research). If you are an adherent of wishy-washy new age "therapies" or you believe that the U.S. government is covering up the "fact" that UFO's are visiting our planet, you'll love this book. If you know a single bit of science, buy this book only for the comic effect.