“Best in the World” Health Care?

The United States is often touted as having the best health care in the world. A recent opinion piece, “Health Care in America Is the Best in the World,” praises the virtues of our modern medical system.

The United States leads the world as a juggernaut of medical research and innovation. More Americans have received the Nobel Prize in medicine than Europe, Canada, Japan and Australia combined... Half of the top 10 diagnostic or therapeutic innovations in the past 50 years have come in whole or in part from the US, along with 75% of the top 30. When it comes to pharmaceuticals, half of the top 30 blockbusters have come from the United States alone. For generations, the United States has been a shining beacon of health care hope, paving the way to healthier, longer living and whose entrepreneurial milieu has led to innovations enjoyed worldwide. While greater scrutiny over the past few decades have highlighted areas for improvement, the market never lies and recognizes that America is still the best place in the world for health care.[1]

But is there a darker side to this widely praised medical system?

Before the 1900s, numerous conventional medical beliefs and practices embraced by medical men had the potential to be lethal. These medical men of the time wielded a range of toxic medications, including calomel (mercury), phosphorus, strychnine, opium, laudanum (opium and alcohol), arsenic, cyanide, chloral, morphine, and jalap (a potent purgative), among others, that were essential tools in their medical arsenal.[2],[3],[4]

A recognized method for treating illnesses was commonly called the “hot regimen.”[5] In this method, individuals afflicted with a disease would be covered with numerous smothering blankets, encouraging copious sweating with the aim of eliminating excessive bodily fluids; alternatively, patients might be immersed in a hot bath. This therapeutic fashion viewed light and fresh air as detrimental, leading to patients being kept in darkness whenever feasible, with minimal ventilation.

Standard and commonly accepted medical procedures of that time included bleeding patients to the point of fainting, withholding even a single drop of cold water, depriving patients of light and fresh air, and promoting catharsis, which involved inducing forceful and abundant bowel movements through the use of cathartics.[6]

“Medicine has never been developed into anything that can properly be called a science; and many eminent physicians have said so repeatedly. It has always been nothing but experiments, called an art, but never a science. If one does not have a very great respect for such, it is nothing against the individual. Sixty years ago [1840s,] and for a long time before that, it was the fashion to bleed for almost every ailment that a man might have. If one had a bilious attack, he was bled; if he had a fever, he was bled; if he had a local inflammation, he was bled; and so on all through the ailments human beings are heir to. He was bled if the pulse was too slow, and bled if the pulse was too fast.”[7]

“Less than thirty-five years ago [1850] millions of human beings up to that time had gone to untimely graves, begging piteously for a cup of water to cool their parched lips, while the burning fire of fever was consuming their lives. Doctors in those days said: “Cold water is death; do not give a drop. Give the patient a dose of calomel and a spoonful of warm water.” Not only were fever patients denied cold water—nature’s remedy—but light and pure air were also denied them; and they were drugged with calomel; physicked with jalap [a strong purgative], depleted of their life blood by the lancet, and starved until they gave up the ghost—a tribute to this medical delusion.”[8]

By the late 1800s, many doctors recognized how deadly medicine had been and still was. Millions had suffered and died at the hands of the “best” medicine of the time. Bleeding and toxic medications killed the first president of the United States, George Washington.[9]

That the lancet, which has destroyed in America, many more than have been destroyed by the yellow fever, put a period to the existence of General Washington, no one can doubt.[10] — Wm Cabbett

“For upwards of twenty-three centuries to starve, bleed, purge, and torture, had been the all but exclusive business of the man of medicine.”[11] — Samuel Dickson, MD.

“Physicians have slain more than war. As instruments of death in their hands, calomel, bleeding, and other medicines, have done more than powder and ball. The public would be infinitely better off without professed physicians.” — Dr. Eliphalet Kimball, New Hampshire, author of Thoughts on Natural Principles.[12]

Mankind has been drugged to death, and the world would be better off if the contents of every apothecary shop were emptied into the sea, though the consequences to the fishes would be lamentable. The disgrace of medicine has been that colossal system of self-deception, in obedience to which mines have been emptied of their cankering minerals, the entrails of animals taxed for their impurities, the poison-bags of reptiles drained of their venom and all the inconceivable abominations thus obtained thrust down the throats of human beings suffering from some fault of organization, nourishment or vital stimulation.[13] — Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes

The science of medicine is barbarous jargon, and the effects of our medicines on the human system are in the highest degree uncertain, except that they have already destroyed more lives than war, pestilence and famine combined.[14] — Dr. John Mason Good

Thousands are annually slaughtered in the quiet sick-room. Governments should at once either banish medical men, and proscribe [condemn] their blundering art, or they should adopt some better means to protect the lives of the people than at present prevail, when they look far less after the practice of this dangerous profession, and the murders committed in it, than after the lowest trades.[15] — Dr. Frank

I incline to the belief that bleeding is injurious and unnecessary. There is, I am sorry to say, as much empiricism in the medical profession as out of it. Instead of investigating for themselves, medical authors have copied the errors of their predecessors, and have thus retarded the progress of medical science, and perpetuated error. The drugs which are administered for the cure of scarlet fever and measles, kill far more than those diseases do. I have recently given no medicine in their treatment, and have had excellent success.[16] — Professor B. F. Barker, MD

But these were times of old, well before our “science-based” medical system with a glorious assortment of exceptional doctors and hospitals. Indeed, medical deaths are a thing of the past. Or are they?

In a 1974 study, authors found that an estimated 140,000 patients died, and 1 million were hospitalized in 1971 due to adverse drug reactions.[17]

In 1996, study authors found an estimated “79,159 to 198,815 deaths” from Drug Related Problems (DRPs).[18]

In November 1999, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released a report where “experts estimate that as many as 98,000 people die in any given year from medical errors.”[19]

A 2000 article published in the Journal of the American Medical Association showed that people are dying from the medical system – 12,000 from unnecessary surgery, 7,000 from medication errors, 20,000 other hospital errors, 80,000 from hospital-acquired infections, and 106,000 from properly used medications.[20] That’s 225,000 people who died from a system that was supposed to help them.

A 2008 study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 142,000 “bad reactions to antibiotics, mostly allergic ones, send people to U.S. emergency rooms” yearly.[21]

The 2010 Department of Health and Human Services report showed that 15,000 hospitalized Medicare patients a month “experienced an event that contributed to their deaths.”[22] That’s 180,000 deaths yearly due to an adverse medical event in just the Medicare system. In addition, “13.1% of Medicare beneficiaries experienced adverse events classified in the four most serious harm categories... resulting in prolonged hospital stay, events resulting in permanent harm, events requiring life-sustaining intervention, and events contributing to death.” These severe harms were approximately 130,000 per month or over 1.5 million yearly.

In 2013, a Journal of Patient Safety study estimated that “a lower limit of 210,000 deaths per year was associated with preventable harm in hospitals... the true number of premature deaths associated with preventable harm to patients was estimated at more than 400,000 per year. Serious harm seems to be 10- to 20-fold more common than lethal harm.”[23]

A 2013 paper in the Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics showed that:

“…2.7 million hospitalized Americans each year have experienced a serious adverse reaction. Of all hospitalized patients, 0.32 percent died due to ADRs (Adverse Drug Reaction), which means that an estimated 128,000 hospitalized patients died annually, matching stroke as the 4^th leading cause of death. Deaths and serious reactions outside of hospitals would significantly increase the totals.

An analysis conducted in 2011, based on a year of ADRs reported to the FDA, came to similar conclusions: Americans experienced “2.1 million serious injuries, including 128,000 patient deaths.”

The public health impacts are even greater when milder adverse reactions are taken into account. Given estimates that about 30 ADRs occur for every one that leads to hospitalization, about 81 million side effects are currently experienced every year by the 170 million Americans who use pharmaceuticals. Groups such as pregnant women, elderly patients, and those who are taking multiple medications are especially at risk.”[24]

In 2016, a study by Johns Hopkins published in the British Medical Journal showed much the same:

“We calculated a mean rate of death from medical error of 251,454 a year using the studies reported since the 1999 IOM report and extrapolating to the total number of US hospital admissions in 2013. We believe this understates the true incidence of death due to medical error because the studies cited rely on errors extractable in documented health records and include only inpatient deaths.”[25]

In 2023, a study found that “with the number of substances on the market, it is conceivable that mistakes can be made when practitioners prescribe or dispense drugs. Added to this is the high risk of interaction between substances. Each year, in the United States alone, 7,000 to 9,000 people die as a result of a medication error. ”[26]

In 2023, a study examining diagnostic errors showed that “an estimated 795,000 Americans become permanently disabled or die annually across care settings because dangerous diseases are misdiagnosed. Just 15 diseases account for about half of all serious harms, so the problem may be more tractable than previously imagined.”[27] Commenting on the report, “Misdiagnosis of disease or other medical conditions leads to hundreds of thousands of deaths and permanent disabilities each year in the United States, according to a report published this week. About 371,000 people die and 424,000 sustain permanent disabilities – such as brain damage, blindness, loss of limbs or organs or metastasized cancer – each year as a result.”[28]

In 2005, a study determined that between 88,000-140,000 excess cases of serious coronary heart disease probably occurred in the United States over the market life of Vioxx.

“An estimated 88,000-140,000 excess cases of serious coronary heart disease probably occurred in the United States over the market life of rofecoxib. The US national estimate of the case-fatality rate (fatal acute myocardial infarction plus sudden cardiac death) was 44%, which suggests that many of the excess cases attributable to rofecoxib use were fatal [38,720-61,600].”[29]

So, how many have died in our modern era from medications and flaws in the “health care” system? It’s difficult to say as health organizations don’t keep track. The CDC doesn’t even show medical error as the third leading cause of death in their leading causes of death. It’s nowhere to be seen.

Over the last 50 years (since 1971), as many as 7 million (using a base of 140,000 deaths annually – drug reaction deaths only) or 20 million people (if you use a base of 400,000 deaths annually) or 12.5 million (if you use a base of 250,000 deaths annually in the BMJ study in 2016) in the United States died from the medical system. That is a range of 7 to 20 million deaths from our modern medical system over the last 50 years.

The total number of dead in the United States from wars from the Revolutionary War to the present is close to 1.3 million. So, the number of American deaths from the medical system in the last 50 years is 5 to more than 15 times more than all Americans that have died in all wars combined. Is this modern “best in the world” medicine? Where are the CDC, NIH, FDA, and WHO to warn the public of this continuously unfolding deadly disaster?

[crickets]

Where are our politicians calling attention to this? Instead, politicians often praise these failed institutions. Do you agree the medical system and all these health agencies are the best they can be? And where is the media? CNN, MSNBC, Fox? Where is the clarion call? Where is the outrage?

[crickets]

So, can you trust any of these massive institutions? Government officials? Heads of medical organizations? Are any of these systems really interested in your health? Has the entire system been corrupted by power, ego, and huge profits? Do you think any of these institutions really care about you and your family?

Do we need to rehaul our whole concept of “health care” and make it really about the people’s health and not base it on mega institutions primarily concerned with billions in profits?

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of innocent people continue to be injured and killed without anyone noticing or really caring. Millions of families suffer and bury their dead, with the dead being laid to rest without justice, ceremony, or monuments. The deaths and injuries continue in deafening silence.

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[1] Khaled Dajani, “Health Care in America Is the Best in the World,” Fair Observer, November 3, 2021.

[2] Samuel Dickson, MD, The Principles of the Chrono-Thermal System of Medicine, 1861, London, pp. 165-166.

[3] “Honest Confessions of Weakness,” Journal of Osteopathy, vol. IV, no. 5, October 1897, Kirksville, Missouri, p. 228.

[4] Matthew Joseph Rodermund, MD, Fads in the Practice of Medicine, and the Cause and Prevention of Disease, 1901, p. 32.

[5] John Mason Good, MD, The Study of medicine: Empyesis Variola Smallpox, vol 1, 1864, New York, Harper & Brothers, Publishers, pp. 639-640.

[6] Alexander Milton Ross MD, Fallacies and Delusions of the Medical Profession, 1888, Toronto.

[7] Dr. R. Swinburne Clymer, MD, PhD, Vaccination Brought Home to You, 1904, Terre Haute, Indiana, p. 11.

[8] Alexander Milton Ross MD, Fallacies and Delusions of the Medical Profession, 1888, Toronto.

[9] Worthing Chauncey Ford, The Writings of George Washington, vol. XIV., 1798-1799, G. P. Putnam's Sons, pp. 255-256.

[10] J. B. Lewis MD, “Address Delivered Before the Illinois State Eclectic Medical Society,” The Chicago Medical Times, 1871, p. 262.

[11] Samuel Dickson, MD, Glasgow, The “Destructive Art of Healing;” or, Facts for families, Second Edition, 1855, London, pp. 5-6.

[12] Dr. Eliphalet Kimball, Thoughts on Natural Principles, 1867.

[13] “Honest Confessions of Weakness,” Journal of Osteopathy, vol. IV, no. 5, October 1897, Kirksville, Missouri, p. 228.

[14] Thomas R. Hazard, Civil and Religious Persecution in the State of New York, 1876, Boston, p. 102.

[15] Russell Thacher Trall, MD, Water-cure for the Million, 1860, New York, p. 11.

[16] Russell Thacher Trall, MD, Water-cure for the Million, 1860, New York, pp. 7-8.

[17] Robert B. Talley, MD, and Marc F. Laventurier, “Drug-Induced Illness,” August 19, 1974 Journal of the American Medical Association.

[18] Jeffery A. Johnson and L. Bootman, Drug-related morbidity and mortality and the economic impact of pharmaceutical care, Journal of Managed Care & Specialty Pharmacy, January/February 1996, pp. 39-47.

[19] Linda T. Kohn, Janet M. Corrigan, Molla S. Donaldson, “To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System,” Institute of Medicine, 2000.

[20] Barbara Starfield, MD, MPH, “Is US Health Really the Best in the World?” Journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 284, no. 4, July 26, 2000, pp. 483–485.

[21] “Study finds 140,000 bad reactions to antibiotics,” Reuters, August 13, 2008.

[22] Adverse Events in Hospitals: National Incidence Among Medicare Beneficiaries, Department of Health and Human Services, November 2010, pp. 18-19.

[23] James, John T. PhD, A New, Evidence-based Estimate of Patient Harms Associated with Hospital Care, Journal of Patient Safety, September 2013, pp. 122-128.

[24] Donald W. Light, et al., “Institutional Corruption of Pharmaceuticals and the Myth of Safe and Effective Drugs,” The Journal of Law Medicine & Ethics, September 2013, pp. 590-600.

[25] Professor Martin A Makary, “Medical error—the third leading cause of death in the US,” British Medical Journal, May 2016.

[26] Rayhan A. Tariq, et al., “Medication Dispensing Errors and Prevention,” StatPearls, May 2, 2023.

[27] David E Newman-Toker, et al. “Burden of serious harms from diagnostic error in the USA,” British Medical Journal Quality and Safety, July 2023.

[28] Deidre McPhillips, “Diagnostic errors linked to nearly 800,000 deaths or cases of permanent disability in US each year, study estimates,” CNN, July 19, 2023.

[29] David J. Graham, MD, et al., “Risk of acute myocardial infarction and sudden cardiac death in patients treated with cyclo-oxygenase-2 selective and non-selective non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs: nested case-control study.” Lancet, January 25, 2005.