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July 4, 2005
Six hours in the
airport…
Surrounded by
restless, cranky children and their restless, cranky parents…
Our flight is
delayed again…and I have finished my book.
This is the time
when boredom overtakes good manners, and I begin to read the newspaper
in the hands of the woman across the aisle. My eyesight is just good
enough to pick up the headlines:
Massive Drug
Recall Spurs Questions
I have two hours
in the airport to find a way to move into the seat next to the woman
and finish reading the story over her shoulder. It only takes five
minutes. Next to her, a restless business executive rises, checks his
watch, and heads for the nearest lounge. I slip into his seat and
begin reading.
The massive drug
recall announced on the front page of USA Today papers is
actually spawned in a small New Jersey community. Able Laboratories
has suddenly pulled off the market millions of doses of drugs.
The Food and
Drug Administration (FDA) has announced “serious concerns” that drugs
produced by Able Laboratories “were not produced according to quality
assurance standards.” Over 295 products are included in the recall.
Drug
recalls…food recalls…medical device recalls…the FDA website list of
recalls, withdrawals and alerts in the last 60 days is five pages
long. Consumers are told to beware of bed systems, sulfites in dried
vegetables, Mariani brand fancy golden raisins, undeclared soy nets in
Catherine’s Finest Pecan Caramel Clusters, BetacTM, pet treats,
implantable cardiac defibrillators, Elegant Gourmet cookies, Xigris,
almonds…and more.
A recall of raw
almonds due to reports of Salmonella Enteriditis in 2004 alone
necessitated the recall of over 40 products from companies around the
world: Royal Food International, GKI Foods, Sahadi Fine Foods, Apple
Valley, Fort Fudge Shop, Jeppi Nut and Candy Company…and more.
And it should be
no surprise that recalls can launch a flurry of lawsuits. At
www.finddruglawsuits.com consumers are told “Lawyers
Investigating.” You can click on the link and “find out about the
drug recall. You may be able to get Cash back!” The list of “cash
cows” over the years is extensive: Accutane, Celebrex, Ephedra, Fen-Phen,
Lamisil, Viagra, Vioxx…and more.
Whole industries
have collapsed as their products are challenged. Cigarettes, once the
chic statement of Bogart and Bacall, after a twenty year campaign
succeeded in uncovering the truth of research hidden and denied by
tobacco companies, are now called “cancer sticks” on late night
television.
Protecting
billions of dollars of corporate profit, the temptation to hide
product defects is enormous. Yet, truth does eventually surface…as
Ford found out. Court cases documented that
between 1971 and 1978, the Ford Pinto was responsible for a number of
fire-related deaths. Ford puts the figure at 23; critics say the
figure is closer to 500.
The auto
manufacturer did manage to survive the litigation, but not before
being ordered by a California jury to pay a record-breaking judgment
of $128 million.
With such an
extensive record of drug and product recalls in America, one must
wonder why discussions of abortion remain so simplistic. “Are you for
abortion? Or against it?” Did we ever ask, “Are you for tobacco? Or
against it?” We simply laid out the facts about tobacco and let
people enforce the truth, if needed, through the courts.
Are you for the
Pinto? Or against it? How can you know the answer to the question
unless someone tells you the truth about the design flaw in the fuel
tanks that causes them to rupture and explode into fire, killing the
people you love?
Abortion is more
than politics. It is a product. It is a product that has survived
without question over thirty years in America. It is sold to
consumers as a wonderful solution to their problems.
Yet, when a
courageous editor is willing to challenge the liberal bias of his
industry, stories expose the underbelly of abortion that many wish to
deny. Women die from abortion, both surgical and chemical. Babies
survive from abortion, even if maimed.
Abortion is
linked to high rates of infertility, fueling a billion dollar industry
for women who finally do wish to bring their pregnancies to
term. And battles over the link of abortion to breast cancer are
clouded by the knowledge that even scientists and researchers can hide
the truth about products for the sake of the corporate bottom line.
Don’t be
surprised if one day, when we are able to discuss abortion and the
complexities of what it means to have courts protect the sale of this
surgery because they are “for abortion”…don’t be surprised if one day,
the truth rises from the ashes of people who suffered because we
failed to ask the right questions.
An abortion
recall…it’s not as far-fetched an idea as you might think.
June 25, 2004
Unplanned Joy
January 15, 2005
The Pregnant Elephant in the Room
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