The federal government really is going through with its ban on over-the-counter asthma inhalers — sometimes the only ones readily available in emergencies — because of the minute CFC emissions for which they are responsible. [Mark Hemingway, Weekly Standard, Atlantic Wire; earlier]
7 Comments
its for mother earth, don’t you know.
The lives of asthma sufferers is far less important than those of non-endangered polar bears.
Have you ever thought as to why we have to go to the government and ask for medication? The US led the way with government controlled access to medicine in 1912 and it has become worse with time. I am a physician and over the years have come to feel that all medications, especially pain medicines, should be available on request. This is not such a strange thought, a number of countries such a Spain and India are not strong at all on control of medications and they seem to not be suffering, at least from excessive use of drugs. But on a more fundamental level, are we really a free society if we strictly control access to medicine and control of all aspects of ones care. I know of doctors that have gotten into serious difficulty for prescribing 60 pain pills after a surgery rather than 20 or 30. I know of patients that are truly in pain and can not get adequate relief because of efforts by the DEA and state control. Consider what would happen if we dropped our dictatorial control of medication (other than assurance of quality). We would have less use for doctors, less medical cost, gangs and terrorist would have a significant cut in income, the burden for assurance of quality health care would shift from the doctor to the individual and thus the liability issue would become much less. From my view, 40 years in the business, a libertarian view of medical care would be fare superior than what we currently have.
In the 80’s my squadron shared a hangar with DEA. One of the DEA agents said something that I’ll never forget. “If they would just legalize drugs, it would take the big money out of it. Once that happened, use would drop down to a manageable level. The problem is that there is too much money to be made selling them and there is too much money to be made in fighting them. Both sides own Congresscritters so nothing sane will ever be done.”. This kind of applies to what david is saying.
There are many countries, including advanced ones in Europe, where things like antibiotics are available over the counter without prescription, and they seem to be able to handle it without calamity.
It has often been claimed that environmentalism is a religion, one that substitutes nature for God. And just as traditional religion has often claimed that man should be sacrificed to God, environmentalists implicitly (and sometimes explicitly) think that man should be sacrificed to nature. This ban on over-the-counter asthma inhalers is a perfect example – the health of asthma sufferers is to be sacrificed to nature.
“… antibiotics are available over the counter without prescription”
Really bad idea there. Overuse and misuse of antibiotics is why we end up with things like MRSA. Antibiotics are very good for very specific situations, but very bad when directions aren’t followed precisely, and when used when not appropriate.
BTW, I heartily agree with your second comment concerning environmentalism becoming religion. Well stated.