Drugs

PHARMACEUTICAL COMMERCIALS 

Has anyone been paying attention lately? We are inundated with commercials to help you get through the pain and agony of everything from heart attacks to hemorrhoids. There is nothing wrong with this until you start paying attention to the side effects the drug have on you. 

One ad for clearing up dry eyes says a side effect may be a burning sensation in the eyes. I don't know about you, but when my eyes burn, they water, and isn't that the purpose of this drug? To produce eye liquids that end the dry eye syndrome? How about just peeling an onion and saving yourself the cost of the prescription? 

Another sleep inducing medication says it may cause drowsiness so you shouldn't operate heavy machinery after taking it. If I were an insomniac, I wouldn't take the thing until bedtime and by then it's too late to remember to move the bulldozer out of the driveway so the wife can get her car out in the morning. The medication is supposed to put you to sleep, so isn't causing drowsiness a good thing?

By the time you've seen the ad and listened to all the negative side effects, you have to wonder if the cure isn't worse than the affliction its supposed to get rid of or ease. I especially like those that tell you a possible side effect might be death. Gee doctor, give me a double dose of those. I'm glad I have a regular job, because if all I did all day was watch TV and worry about all the aches, pains and ailments they tell me I might have, I wouldn't have time for anything else. I know our everyone is aging daily, but how many of these ads throw unwarranted fear into someone who might be a borderline hypochondriac? I don't even like taking aspirin, though I will take Pepto-Bismol once in a while, but I realize there are people out there who genuinely do require some meds. However, on the whole I have to wonder just how we have survived for so long before modern medicine came along to tell us just what all ails us. It's a mystery to me and a lot of others, I would think.