Disease mongering is what the pharmaceutical and medical device businesses do in order to make money - to push questionable drugs, surgeries, potions, gimmicks and generally unnecessary (but profitable) treatments. The first step in disease mongering is to create a definition for a disease that will encompass a large portion of the population - be that a market for osteoporosis drugs, cholesterol drugs, vaccines - or other unnecessary treatments.
Doctors then sell the relative rather than absolute benefits. It's a great way to fool patients, to make them think there is a huge benefit - when the benefit is actually miniscule and the product possibly dangerous.
McDougall says doctors need to stop going along with this. In this classic talk from our 2005 Expo, McDougall doesn't hold back. He won't be involved in pushing useless treatments - it's unethical. Unfortunately, it's the norm for many doctors.
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