The 12 Remedies They Can't Patent

The 12 Remedies They Can't Patent

This essay works in two registers: one for patent law, drug-trial economics, and the pharmaceutical industry’s own admissions, and another for what substances do in the body. The body is treated as a self-regulating organism that draws, eliminates, repairs, and restores when given support. In that frame, substances are aids, not things that “treat diseases” or “fight pathogens.” The essay argues that naturally occurring substances cannot be owned, while synthetic analogues, delivery systems, and novel formulations can. It also makes the economics brutally plain: a pivotal Phase 3 trial can cost between twenty million dollars and three hundred million or more, and total capitalized development can run between one and two and a half billion dollars. The result, the essay says, is that no rational actor funds the trials that would establish efficacy for unpatentable remedies, and the absence of evidence is then mistaken for proof that they do not work. Castor oil is the poster child here: it has been in continuous medicinal use for at least three thousand years, sits in pharmacies, and is currently prescribed for nothing it actually does, with the old drawing action missing from the label.

Gobble's Take: If a remedy can’t be patented, it often can’t be financed into “proof,” which is a tidy little way for the market to declare a verdict before the trial even starts.
Source: Perplexity Search (community news)

Complementary and Alternative Medicine for Health Professionals

Synovitz obtained a nursing degree in 1964 and worked for 12 years in various nursing positions. She then continued her education at Western Illinois University, earning a bachelor’s degree in School Health Education with a minor in Art Education in 1981 and a master’s degree in health sciences in 1985. From 1981 to 1985, she taught at Robert Morris College in Carthage, Illinois, in the Medical Assisting and Applied Sciences Associate Degree program, and from 1985 to 1989 she taught at WIU in the Department of Health Sciences. She later moved to Ohio and earned a PhD in Curriculum & Instruction/Health Education from Kent State University in 1993, where she was awarded Dissertation of the Year in the College of Education. After that came four years teaching at Northern Illinois University, then a move to Louisiana, and 22 years in the Department of Kinesiology and Health Studies at Southeastern Louisiana University, where she served as undergraduate and graduate coordinator and as a university Senator.

Gobble's Take: This is the kind of resume that says “integrative” without ever needing to say it out loud.
Source: Perplexity Search (evergreen)

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