When we give government the power to make medical decisions for us, we in essence accept that the state owns our bodies.”
― Ron Paul
Human health is the human experience. It is both a cause and an effect. When we feel better we do more, and when we are able to accomplish more we feel better. Illness is one the ways that affects our health but also the many restrictions, laws and the very structure of our medical cartel that runs health care in this country inflicts additional pain and suffering that is totally unnecessary.
Medical Freedom is simply human freedom expressed in the production and consumption of products and services that improve human health. Laws, government regulations, employer insurance schemes, medical licensing, the FDA and all the various other means of restricting consensual exchange between individuals for the purposing of “feeling better” and “living longer” has created a ridiculously expensive and overwhelming complex system that punishes the very people its been sold to help, sick people.
I have been in and out of hospitals for the past 28 years. I have personal experience with chronic pain, surgery and the ever encroaching hand of government in my health care decisions. I reject the need of politicians and so called experts that benefit by commoditizing my suffering. That has to stop. Whenever anyone talks of “healthcare” you should be suspicious. What is lacking in all of these debates is the term getting healthier or feeling better. We don’t talk about “hunger care” when discussing farmers growing food.
Medical laws were created in this country and were sold as a way to “protect” people like me. When in reality all it has done is to make my life more difficult when merely living is extremely difficult. One example is the management of chronic pain. Reporters and politicians, police officers, district attorneys and others involved in the addiction, prison or pharma industry are in the news all the time talking about the scourge of opioid use. I have taken literally thousands of pain pills in my life and I continue to take them because I hurt a lot. I am eternally grateful for opioid pain pills. If they didn’t exist I would have killed myself when I was 12 or I would have died due to shock to all the pain caused by the bowel obstructions and most recently the horrific pain of pancreatitis.
Pain pills or pain medicine are derived from the poppy plant. It is simply a plant that miraculously creates a substance that provides pain relief. It is truly remarkable. I should be able to grow poppies in my garden and make poppy tea which humans have been doing for thousands of years. But instead I need a permission slip from a government licensed health consultant (doctor) and go to a pharmacy that has the pills on the shelf locked up behind a counter. Not only do I have to get the permission slip I now have to deal with state law on top of federal law in concert with restrictions by the insurance company. And on top of all this my personal information is now in a government database. I never consented to have my information accessed by the government for my “protection”. This is a clear violation of the 4th amendment.
What madness is this? It all boils down to the fundamentals of human freedom. The question every person, especially those who are chronically sick need to ask themselves: do you own your own body and your mind? Our system, the government, the big pharma companies, the DEA, the FDA, the police, and the licensing boards all believe you do not. It is set up to usurp your self-ownership and farm it out to your doctor, your pharmacy, drug companies and the alphabet soup of government divisions.
I believe that I own my body and my mind and that I have an inherit right to ingest whatever substances I choose to in order to feel better and live longer. I will not be right all the time. Life is inherently dangerous and I will always have limited knowledge when making choices. This also applies to the so called experts as well. Science is open ended. The current medical system is set up to convince you that they have all the answers and they are omnipotent when it comes to which drugs which are good and which are “bad”.
The entire prescription / pharmaceutical / FDA / DEA /Medical college system is a cartel set up to allow the sale of dangerous drugs which would never be allowed if the FDA didn’t rubber-stamp them. If we didn’t have an FDA then companies would be totally at the mercy of internet reviews, independent analysis of their drugs and would be liable for killing people just like anyone else who sells a dangerous product.
Right now their liability is limited. They get the FDA rubber stamp and this allows them to rake in huge profits until the dangerous side effects begin killing and injuring people. By the time the lawsuits roll in they have already made a hundred times what it will cost them to settle the lawsuits. And drugs like Cannabis, MDMA, psilocybin, and DMT are illegal even though they have been show to be extremely safe and more beneficial then what they are peddling.
Medical Freedom isn’t something we talk about because the debate is always about access to “healthcare”. When is the last time you heard a politician talk about individuals becoming healthier? They don’t. They simply want more and more people in the healthcare system. The same government that designs the road system, the tax system, the public education system and the wars across the world are the same people designing and implementing our “healthcare system”.
Why is it that the more government fails the more people want from it? The food pyramid debacle is the perfect example of what the true priorities are for the government and its corporate partners. Many experts now blame the food pyramid and the low fat scam as part of the massive rise in diabetes and metabolic syndrome.
Food is a massive part of living a healthy life and the government purposely funded studies and supported research that showed sugar was good and that we should all be eating tons of wheat, corn and soy. And you know who receives massive subsidies from the government? You would be right if you said soy, corn, wheat and sugar producers.
Medical Freedom is the concept that you have the right to make choices devoid of corrupt government and corporate entities who want to treat sick people like a commodity. Medical Freedom simply means exercising your sovereignty over your body and your mind. Prescription Drugs should all be legalized as well as so called illegal drugs. Pharmaceutical companies will have to survive the legal challenges and the public review process along with the private entities that will emerge to test the validity of their claims.
I believe that once the FDA is stripped of their power of appointing which pharmaceutical company will reap billions of dollars in profits, the focus will turn from treating “diseases” and the chronically ill as a commodity to treating the chronically ill as human beings and treating the whole individual.
It is time to reclaim our right to go into a store and buy what we choose without the government, academics, people in white coats or who have a badge on their chest deem necessary. In a world in which Medical Freedom is respected we would still seek out health consultants and follow treatment recommendations. But the parent/child paradigm between the government and the ill would end. The consumer would be the one in control and have the ultimate say. And if you didn’t want to have a health consultant you would be free to follow a treatment program you see fit.
We’ve been lied to about Cannabis as a medicine by the government. The NIH actually holds two patents on cannabinoids that they list as effective for treating over ten different diseases and symptoms. The idea that the DEA who is financially incentivized to keep Cannabis a schedule 1 drug is criminal. The time to reassert our right to Medical Freedom as a natural expression of our innate rights due to our self-ownership as a human individual.
I’m struggling now with idiopathic pancreatitis. I’ve had this pain for decades but it went undiagnosed until the last few years. They are not sure why I have it or what we can do to prevent it from destroying my pancreas. I’m exploring having stem cell therapy to reverse the disease process. I should have the right to try what a majority of doctors might seem as dangerous or unproductive if I deem it to be a worthwhile risk.
Every decision we make is personal. When we are sick we don’t need the force of government involved to limit what are choices are in finding what we believe will be the most effective treatment for us to feel better and live longer. It doesn’t matter whether its vaporizing Cannabis, ignoring the food pyramid or trying experimental treatments that are now are considered dangerous or foolish but in the future could very well become the standard for care.
When you are sick you do not need artificial laws limiting your choices and limiting your access to natural, safe and effective plants and chemicals that have a chance to help individuals feeling better and living a longer life. Pain, inflammation and disease are terrible and life altering. I want every politician to know, every drug maker, and every one who seeks to commoditize my suffering that I am a human being who owns himself and I demand my Medical Freedom! I call all of those who are suffering with chronic illness to do the same.
Brad Miller
healthier2day.com 