Snake Oil Salesman or Consumer Advocate?
I was flipping channels a couple of days ago, and I came across an infomercial for a book about natural cures— I think it was on one of the health channels. Since I’m interested in that sort of thing, I watched for a couple of minutes. I didn’t see anything on the talk that made me want to run out and buy the book, but I thought the idea that there are natural cures for almost anything was probably pretty sound. It lines up with my personal beliefs, anyway. So, it was interesting that today while I was searching for articles to blog about, I came across this article. Apparently, this book has become a best seller, which may be a problem for Kevin Trudeau, since the FTC has been carefully watching him after accusing him of fraud in the past. Supposedly, he is banned from doing infomercials, so I’m not sure why he was on the one I saw yesterday. Anyway, it made me think about the question of who can we trust when it comes to our healthcare. Do we trust the drug companies, give the recent discoveries about Merck’s Vioxx? Do we trust the FDA, given the number of drugs they later have to pull off the market? Authors with no medical background who claim to have the cures for all the world’s ills? Web sites? It is a quandry. Let me know what you think.
