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This might surprise you, but we don't actually fully understand how most drugs work. Not just common OTC drugs, either, but also complex synthetic drugs used fo
by atombender 4y ago
This might surprise you, but we don't actually fully understand how most drugs work. Not just common OTC drugs, either, but also complex synthetic drugs used for things like autoimmune disorders, preventing organ rejection, and so on. Not just drugs that have been in use since the inception of modern medicine, but also about brand new drugs.
Often we have some idea how they work and what the internal end result appears to be, but the pathways that the drug seems to work on aren't fully understood. So we know the drug does something to that pathway, but it is to some extent a black box for us. But the fact that the drug operates on the pathway also opens new avenues for the scientists to gain a better understand of that pathway.
Modern medicine is optimized for end results. If a drug appears to work, the "how" is of secondary importance. We can always figure that out later. Sometimes we find stuff in nature, for example, like chemicals produced by fungi or bacteria, and we discover that they have medicinal properties. They nevertheless get productized as drugs, even when we don't fully understand them or the pathways they target.
- mistrial9 4y ago> Modern medicine is optimized for end results except thousands of common herbal remedies are replaced by patent medicine with legal controls, because $MONEY
- atombender 4y agoWhich ones?
- fundatus 4y ago> except thousands of common herbal remedies are replaced by patent medicine with legal controls, because $MONEY Except they are not being replaced? Just like in the good old days™ you can still get out and collect the herbs you're looking for. It's just that nowadays we know that component X of a herbal remedy actually does the job so you just buy that in tablet form (or whatever) instead eating of the whole thing.
- mistrial9 4y ago> get out and collect the herbs you're looking for. on the small chance that you are not being sarcastic.. Our city here has >300,000 residents.. and most cities nearby are paved. Where do the herbs come from ?
- gumby 4y agoPeople will collect them for you and sell them in bottles in the shops, you know.
- John23832 4y agoThey're still not being replaced... Not sure what you're getting at. If there is a flower in the Amazon with "heal all" properties, but it's only found in the Amazon, do you fault the company that creates a pill form and sells it in France? Big Pharma has it's problems, but it's done wonders for the availability of medicines for the vast majority of people on Earth.
- waboremo 4y agoThe same place herbs have always come from. If you don't want to step outside of your city or visit the local farms/greenhouses, then import. You can also import seeds, but it's up to you to ensure the seeds are the right ones and they have the proper environment they need to grow, and then the right tools to actually process those herbs in the "traditional" ways (or in your own experimental ways I suppose). Herbs aren't magic you know, you've come across many if you've walked through any trail. Although I wouldn't blindly go picking anything and everything you see, some are toxic!
- elteto 4y agoIf anything the pseudo-scientific, barely regulated industry of "herbal" and "natural" remedies and supplements is booming right now and has been for two decades at least. Nobody is replacing anything, you can buy whatever you want.