The Medicine Men
Dr Vernon Coleman
Before 1975 it was generally agreed that the medical profession and the public had reason to be grateful to the pharmaceutical industry which had, after all, produced a variety of new drugs which could be mass produced and made available to millions of patients at a time.
And then in 1975, everything changed with the publication of a book entitled `The Medicine Men’. It was my first book and it caused a storm. The BBC’s main evening television programme devoted 20 minutes to the book and the Guardian newspaper serialized it. (Gosh, those were different days). I travelled the country talking about the book on radio and television, just about every major newspaper ran a review, the paperback was piled high at railway station bookstores and I became Public Enemy No 1 for the medical profession and the pharmaceutical industry.
Here are a few paragraphs from the introduction to the book which is now 50-years-old:
`Most of the information reaching doctors about new drugs comes from the drug companies. The information is basically promotional material: it is necessarily biased. The drug companies, anxious to have a share in the huge international market for drugs, put a great deal of pressure on doctors to prescribe their products. They spend more on promotion to doctors than they spend on research.
As well as selling drugs for prescription only, many companies also produce drugs to be sold in pharmacists' shops. These medicines are advertised just as enthusiastically and dishonestly as medicines were advertised a century ago. But today some of the medicines sold in chemists' shops contain powerful ingredients and can therefore be dangerous.
Patients themselves seem to have an insatiable demand for medicines. They put a great deal of pressure on doctors to prescribe drugs and the result is that far too many drugs are prescribed. Because members of the public do not realise how powerful these drugs are, they often forget to take them as instructed and instead take them when and how they feel like doing so. The results are not infrequently fatal, for modern drugs, being powerful, can also kill.
It is not only when taken incorrectly, however, that drugs can kill. Drugs can also kill and cause damage when taken exactly as the doctor ordered. During recent years, many thousands of patients have died as a result of taking medicine prescribed for a fairly mild condition. The thalidomide tragedy made it clear to us all that medicines can be dangerous, but it did not seem to have any effect on the great yearning for tablets.
Among the many new diseases discovered in the last few decades there are many drug-induced ones - diseases we would have never known had it not been for the powerful drugs we have made. It has been reported many times that over 10 per cent of the people who take medicines suffer severe side-effects. Even that wonder drug, penicillin, kills thousands of people every year.
We are all to blame. The drug industry is too ready to gloss over unfortunate results and conveniently to forget about dangerous side-effects. Doctors are too ready to prescribe and too lax in deciding whether the risk of the illness really justifies the risk of the medicine. And patients are too determined to take medicine regardless of whether they really need it, and too shy about making sure that they are only given medicines which have been well proven and which are safe and reliable. Doctors are too ready to prescribe new and untried drugs, and patients are too ready to take them. Thousands die every year because of errors made by manufacturers, doctors and patients themselves.
Medicines would be among our most useful tools if only we would use them carefully. Used carelessly and unnecessarily they can be one of our greatest curses.’
In the rest of `The Medicine Men’ I explained the background, virtues and faults of the drug industry. I explored the dangers involved in testing new drugs, I investigated the way in which patent (over the counter) medicines were being promoted to the public and I looked at the way that drugs were being sold to doctors. I described how dangerous drugs could be (including vaccines and weight reducing drugs), explored the problems of prescription drug addiction and warned about the dangers of drug resistant bacteria caused in part by the widespread use of antibiotics in farming.
In a final chapter I warned that we should be cautious about exaggerating the potential value of drugs sold for psychological problems.
The Medicine Men was my first book. It is not exaggerating to say that it changed the course of my life. And I am rather proud of the fact that it changed the way people look at doctors, prescription drugs and drug companies. For years it was quoted endlessly in books and articles – until the medical establishment and the drug industry eventually managed to have the book suppressed (and me widely censored).
The Medicine Men was out of print for many decades. It is now available again as a paperback. For details of the book CLICK HERE
Copyright Vernon Coleman May 2025
Home