Health for Sale -- The Wizard of Oz in the Crosshairs

Dr. Mehmet Oz is being pilloried by some physicians for his advocacy programming which they think is often filled with unproven junk science and are calling for Columbia University to take him off its medical staff.  I link the Huffington Post article here and below.

 

I do not have a strong opinion on GMO food, one of the subjects of the doctors' objections to Dr. Oz programming but I do have strong opinions on transparency and scientific testing of products especially food and pharmaceuticals that one ingests into one's body.  I am for strict governmental regulatory transparency of the testing of them.

 

Dr. Oz claims his positions fall into the "free speech" category and he will continue to broadcast them.  I think free speech is not the issue since it is not the government limiting his constitutionally protected free speech but it is the demand by certain physicians that he cease advocacy for those things that are not proven scientifically efficacious through the replication of rigorous scientific testing and methodology. 

 

Free speech is a ruse.  No one is limiting Dr. Oz’s freedom to speak.  He may say anything he wants but when one is allegedly a man of science one cannot say the earth is flat.  In other words, one cannot say and should not say a certain pharmaceutical therapy is a magic bullet, for example, for weight loss when it has not been studied sufficiently or even studied at all.  It is NOT his free speech right which is at issue but his touting of alleged "cures" for ailments the study of which does not meet the strict standards of scientific testing.  Dr. Oz’s fountain of valid scientific information first aired on the Oprah show eventually, in my opinion, devolved often into junk science. 

 

Our fast food nation wants a fast working magic pill and cure for everything especially for weight loss.  They do NOT want to do the hard work and diligence required to lose weight. There is no substitution in pill form that will do what calorie cutting and exercise will but, admittedly, it is hard to perfect and many fail.  

 

When one touts this pill or that as a magic bullet which has not been proven as such it becomes a charlatan’s lie that makes the purveyors of them very very rich and the buyers of them poorer.  Those who often cannot afford it but are star struck by fame and cult of personality will spend money they do not have on products that do not work.  I believe Dr. Oz devolved from his first excellent shows on Oprah into a technologically glitzed up version of the snake oil salesmen of yore who alleged that his tonic would be a cure all for everything but when analyzed was, in truth, only alcohol which cured nothing but surely did make people feel no pain.

 

Until Dr. Oz provides rigorous solid scientific study and proof for the pharmacological treatments for which he advocates or the positions he takes he loses me.  In fact, he lost me a long time ago.  It is no accident that the preponderance of his viewers are women and gullible ones at that because after all a famous, charismatic medical man must know it all and save them. 

 

I say to his viewers and to Oprah enthusiasts too:  QUESTION EVERYTHING because EVERYTHING in this nation is for sale!

http://money.cnn.com/2015/04/21/media/dr-mehmet-oz-accusations/index.html

The Democratic Party is the ONLY Party that regulates.  2016 is the last chance cafe to switch the leadership of this nation from the 1% to the rest of us.  VOTE!