Medicated nation: Part one

This was originally intended to be a one-part article; however, with the extensive amount of information, and the different types of legal and addictive mead's (from Oxycontin, to Lipitrex) I have decided to split this into three parts; firstly, discussing the general atmosphere of an over medicated nation. The second installment will focus solely on diet pills (such as Lipitrex) and the final installment will close with a summation of the overall problem. As always your comments and points of view are always appreciated.

I would also like to add that I do recognize the wonderful achievements our pharmaceutical industry has made. However, as with most things, where there is a pro, there is a contra.

Medicated nation: Part One - Be careful with that ice-pick Eugene

Imagine being strapped down to a dentist-office-like chair, and seeing a man enter with nothing but an ice-pick shaped device in his hands. He stands over you, and forces your eyes open: whatever the terror, you will be forced to watch every agonizing minute of it. There is no anaesthesia, but that's OK, you wont feel anything in a minute anyway. The doctor jams the ice-pick into your right tear-duct, and hammers it about an inch and a half into your skull. He then begins to move the pick back and forth, then repeats the process with your other eye.

What I have described is not a heinous murder from a Clive Barker flick, but rather a once-legitimate medical procedure known as a lobotomy. The procedure was first used by Dr. Walter Freeman in 1936, and this procedure was administered to between 40,000, and 50,000 Americans between 1936 and the late 1950's, after this barbaric procedure was finally banded in the United states.

The lobotomy was used to subdue unruly patients. And it worked blissfully too. The lucky recipients would spend the rest of their sordid days living in a near catatonic state, that is, if you can call it "living" at all. Though there are now fewer than 50 brain-surgeries a year (and none of which are lobotomies) have we truly put an end to this tyranny, or have we only wrapped it in prettier wrapping paper?

The War on Drugs: If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

In the United states alone, it is estimated that over 10 million people are on some form of legally prescribed psychoactive drug. More than 13 for every 1,000 children under the age of 18 are on some form of psychoactive drug in the United States. The Number one prescribed psychoactive drug for young people is Ritalin, a stimulant used for children diagnosed with ADD. One resonating problem we run into is the high number of children that are misdiagnosed as having AD/HD. The symptoms match the normal behaviors to growing adolescents too closely to make an accurate diagnosis at a young age. And don't our children have enough problems as it is without putting them on a substance that is speeds molecular little brother? If that wasn't alarming enough, in the January 16, 2006 edition of TIME magazine, reporter Belinda Luscombe took the stuff for a week doing research and reported that while she was being super-productive, she felt agitated at everyone, and said that she began to lose her personal attachment to people, seeing them mostly as roadblocks rather than human-beings.

With new drugs expected to hit the market soon, one with the slogan do you feel just OK?, are we moving closer to our Utopian society, or something out of Huxley's nightmare? Are we using these prescription medications simply as a way not to feel, or to negate personal responsibility (from emotion)? Have we found the cure for the Human Condition? Can we really be free if we are chained to so many drugs? Are we playing god? Or rather, do we now think we are god? What do you think?

Cody R. Hobbs

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