Pharmageddon First Edition

by David Healy (Author)

42 customer reviews

ISBN-13: 978-0520275768

ISBN-10: 0520275764

Why is ISBN important?

Have one to sell? Sell on Amazon

Added to

Unable to add item to List. Please try again.

Share <Embed>

Buy new

$23.04

Only 11 left in stock (more on the way).

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.

This item ships to France. Want it Thursday, Oct. 4? Choose AmazonGlobal Priority Shipping at checkout. Learn more

List Price: $29.95
Save: $6.91 (23%)

26 New from $23.04

Select delivery location

Turn on 1-Click ordering

More Buying Choices

26 New from $23.04 32 Used from $5.99

58 used & new from $5.99

See All Buying Options

Free Two-Day Shipping for College Students with Amazon Student

This searing indictment, David Healy’s most comprehensive and forceful argument against the pharmaceuticalization of medicine, tackles problems in health care that are leading to a growing number of deaths and disabilities. Healy, who was the first to draw attention to the now well-publicized suicide-inducing side effects of many anti-depressants, attributes our current state of affairs to three key factors: product rather than process patents on drugs, the classification of certain drugs as prescription-only, and industry-controlled drug trials. These developments have tied the survival of pharmaceutical companies to the development of blockbuster drugs, so that they must overhype benefits and deny real hazards. Healy further explains why these trends have basically ended the possibility of universal health care in the United States and elsewhere around the world. He concludes with suggestions for reform of our currently corrupted evidence-based medical system.

Frequently bought together

Total price: $79.81

These items are shipped from and sold by different sellers. Show details

Buy the selected items together

This item:Pharmageddon by David Healy Paperback $23.04
Only 11 left in stock (more on the way).
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime: How Big Pharma Has Corrupted Healthcare by Peter Gotzsche Paperback $39.78
Only 2 left in stock - order soon.
Ships from and sold by Wordery Specialist.
Selling Sickness: How the World's Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All Into Patients by Ray Moynihan Paperback $16.99
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details

Customers who bought this item also bought

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

This shopping feature will continue to load items. In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading.

Peter Gotzsche

80

Paperback
$39.78
Ray Moynihan

90

Paperback
$16.99
H. Gilbert Welch

246

Paperback
$14.48
Gwen Olsen

88

Paperback
$13.34
Robert Whitaker

456

Paperback
$15.30
David Healy MD…

12

Paperback
$40.09

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Healy’s contrarian streak and sharpness make this a disturbing, well-documented indictment that echoes many others in recent years, and one worth heeding.”

(Publishers Weekly 2012-01-30)

“Powerful. . . . Healy exposes the secrets that enable drug companies to circumvent protections. . . . And he also offers a solution.”

(Human Givens 2012-12-01)

"We owe respect to David Healy for his knowledge, diligence and idealism. This and his other writings require expertise and courage..."

(E. James Lieberman Metapsychology Online Reviews 2014-03-11)

From the Inside Flap

"This meticulously documented book makes extraordinary claims with far-reaching intellectual and practical ramifications. It is the most powerful critique of the contemporary medical-industrial complex that I know."―Andrew T. Scull, author of Hysteria and Madness: A Very Short Introduction

“This book shines a bright light on the pharmaceutical industry (and American healthcare) in the same way that Silent Spring called out the chemical industry and Unsafe at Any Speed called out the automobile industry. Pharmageddon is Healy's most important book to date. It will make a real contribution toward healing our sick system of pharmaceutical-driven medicine and helping doctors provide better care for their patients.”--Elizabeth Siegel Watkins, author of The Estrogen Elixir and On the Pill

“In this startling book, David Healy argues that 'evidence-based' medicine―and a healthy dose of corrupt science―has led modern medicine off a cliff. His book is provocative, challenging, and informative, and ultimately it serves as a powerful manifesto for rethinking modern medicine.”--Robert Whitaker, author of Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America

"Like a good detective story, Pharmageddon weaves together the history of modern medicine, the evolution of clinical trials and statistical analyses, changes in international patent laws, privatization of clinical research, blurring of the line between academics and industry, and the enabling role of medical journals. If you want to learn how to protect yourself (or your patients) from medical commercialism and how medical practice can be re-directed back toward its true mission, this book is a must read."―John Abramson, author of Overdosed America

See all Editorial Reviews

Product details

Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: University of California Press; First edition (March 12, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0520275764
ISBN-13: 978-0520275768
Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.8 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 42 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,073,643 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #129 in Books > Business & Money > Industries > Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology
- #300 in Books > Textbooks > Medicine & Health Sciences > Administration & Policy > Health Policy
- #559 in Books > Textbooks > Medicine & Health Sciences > Medicine > Special Topics > History

Would you like to tell us about a lower price?
If you are a seller for this product, would you like to suggest updates through seller support?

Be the first video

Your name here

Customer reviews

Write a customer review

See all 42 customer reviews

Top customer reviews

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

David D.

Food for nightmares

October 23, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

A fascinating but damning indictment of the pharmaceutical industry and its compromised regulation. I'm surprised we don't hear more about this sorry state of affairs in the mainstream media. Then again, while Big Pharma have not been so good at producing new or safe drugs over the last few decades, they have been very successful at silencing their critics, and they enjoy immense budgets when it comes to advertising and PR. In fact, most of them now spend more on marketing than they do on research and development, which speaks volumes. It is incredible how many old drugs get rehashed and re-marketed for different purposes, even when they are known to be unsafe or ineffective. Medical professionals should read this book. Sadly, the majority of drug training most of them receive is from pharmaceutical representatives! The expression 'foxes in the hen house' springs to mind. Moreover, a lot of doctors are in the pay of Big Pharma as 'Influencers' or 'Thought Leaders'. In other words they are paid under the counter to push drugs, and they are not obliged to declare this immoral clash of interests. It is important to note that Healy is not anti-drug. They have their place. However, there is no escaping the fact that Big Pharma today represents many of the worst aspects of crony capitalism.

3 people found this helpful4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Comment

Stuart Shipko

Elegantly describes the dysfunctional aspects of pharmaceutical based research reports and marketing.

August 25, 2014

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Well referenced and also with abundant common sense and strong historical background, this is a book elegantly describes the dysfunctional aspects of pharmaceutical company research and marketing..

It is unique that he writes about the behavior of the practicing physicians, referred to as primary consumers. While the drug companies provide tainted research data, and no raw data at all, to prove efficacy, physicians have blindly accepted directives based on poor data.. However, physicians have been so conditioned to follow "evidence" based directives that they don't think to weigh possible adverse effects into clinical decision making.. Healy describes the physicians as hypnotized. He is so right, and this is so frightening. While a psychiatrist, Healy shows how this is happening in specialties besides psychiatry.

I loved the rich historical perspectives and the story telling of events leading into our current Pharmageddon. To his credit, he does not just point out the problem: he is part of the solution : His RxISK.org website helps patients and their doctors to research and report drug side effects - providing an alternative source of evidence, in our evidence based medicine era.

Its a good read.

8 people found this helpful9 people found this helpful

Helpful

Comment

Sandra

Revealing what really goes on with pharmaceuticals

August 27, 2014

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

David Healy wakes you up to the realities of drugs. How every aspect associated with them is about corporate profit, and how masterfully the public is manipulated. For the most part, particularly with blockbuster drugs, they do not do what we are taking them for - and the pharma companies KNOW this. The corporations take regulations intended to protect the public and twist them around completely, so that the companies are able to use marketing practices that deceive both doctors and patients. After reading this book, I'm even more positive that I will never take drugs that are designed to prevent/manage chronic health conditions. It's all about the money.

7 people found this helpful8 people found this helpful

Helpful

Comment

Sue A. Freivald

What you don't know CAN hurt you.

March 11, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Particularly in the light of the school shootings - which all seem to have a pharmacology connection, Dr. Healy's book is especially timely and pertinent. He opens a window into the actual processes involved in testing and getting approval for drugs. The unintended consequences and the life-changing side effects that are not either well known, or even when well known, made known to the consumer can be horrific. Read it. Protect yourself and your loved ones. I have purchased over a dozen copies over the past few years to share with friends and family. As a retired health care professional, I can attest to the accuracy of his assessments. Protect yourself. Educate yourself. Pharmageddon is a good start.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Comment

Jerry Woolpy

Big Pharm’s wants versus the Health Needs of the Rest of Us

November 6, 2013

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Big Pharm’s wants versus the Health Needs of the Rest of Us
Review : Pharmageddon, by David Healy
This book explains why, despite paying the highest costs among developed nations, we in the US are experiencing relatively poorer and poorer mortality and morbidity. It is because we have created a health care system that bypasses the diagnostic gaze of experienced physicians in favor of consensus checklists leading to prescriptions for patented drugs that are no better and often more dangerous than their expired patent antecedents. In the 1970s, in an effort to make medicine more evidence based and to make drug companies more accountable, we mandated thousand-subject clinical trials prior to the release of twenty-year exclusive patent prescription drugs. The trials were expensive and so when drug companies agreed to sponsor them it seemed like another good idea. What was not anticipated was that these trials then became a marketing tool rather than a scientific experiment. With the drug companies in charge, they controlled the experimental designs and they owned the data. They could and did withhold negative results, manipulate experimental and control groups to maximize the appearance of effectiveness and assure that side effects would never reach statistical significance. They defined effectiveness by how their product worked on a disease regardless of other effects including mortality. They were able to keep in patent a series of billion dollar blockbusters that were only a few persons per thousand more effective than their antecedents while ignoring their declining safety. They co-opted physicians to recommend their products by convening consensus groups that were not given accessed to the actual data, by rewarding them handsomely, and by ghostwriting their publications. The guidelines so produced—by relatively innocent physicians—resulted in requirements for these drugs reinforced by potential lawsuits for hospitals and clinics that did not prescribe them. No reasonable provisions were made to collect questionable outcomes from either patients or physicians. In fact the medical society and its journals systematically ignored or belittled any efforts to call attention to dangerous side effects. We became of nation where the fourth leading cause of death in hospitals is the iatrogenic application of patented drugs.
Jerry Woolpy

5 people found this helpful6 people found this helpful

Helpful

Comment

Set up an Amazon Giveaway

Amazon Giveaway allows you to run promotional giveaways in order to create buzz, reward your audience, and attract new followers and customers. Learn more about Amazon Giveaway

This item: Pharmageddon

Set up a giveaway

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1

This shopping feature will continue to load items. In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading.

Ray Moynihan

90

Paperback
$16.99
David Healy

13

Paperback
$21.76
Gwen Olsen

88

Paperback
$13.34
David Healy

9

Paperback
$33.27
David Healy MD…

12

Paperback
$40.09
H. Gilbert Welch

246

Paperback
$14.48