Anyone have any ideas on why the placebo effect is growing stronger?

[Celebration]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=222x68495

I posted in health, but I think this might make for a good discussion here. Are people getting better at the "intention" part of healing themselves? If the placebo effect is actually getting stronger, there has to be a reason.

I find this fascinating.

[stellanoir]

1. Dunno. . .Just a guess or perhaps a hope.

Reinforcement of mind over matter in these times may just help to ultimately discredit big pharma's sometimes toxic and chronic drug pushing and block their alleged nefarious plans to overtake, regulate and control herbal supplements and vitamins distribution and sales.

/tin foil

lol

[Celebration]

2. I think it might be

the recent explosion of intention based therapies, combined with the "100 monkey" idea. As intention in healing is being used more and more, and taught at various workshops, people who have been exposed to them, as well as people who have not, have "learned" to use intention to heal.

[Matariki]

3. The article is focused on anti-depressants.

I don't think it means anything really in that depression and feelings of well being aren't objectively measurable.

Now, if these studies involved drugs that reduced tumors or some such measurably physical symptom, it would be far more interesting and noteworthy.

[Why Syzygy]

4. That's the focus

but it isn't limited to anti-depressants.

MK-869 wasn't the only highly anticipated medical breakthrough to be undone in recent years by the placebo effect. From 2001 to 2006, the percentage of new products cut from development after Phase II clinical trials, when drugs are first tested against placebo, rose by 20 percent. The failure rate in more extensive Phase III trials increased by 11 percent, mainly due to surprisingly poor showings against placebo. Despite historic levels of industry investment in R&D, the US Food and Drug Administration approved only 19 first-of-their-kind remedies in 2007—the fewest since 1983—and just 24 in 2008. Half of all drugs that fail in late-stage trials drop out of the pipeline due to their inability to beat sugar pills.

The upshot is fewer new medicines available to ailing patients and more financial woes for the beleaguered pharmaceutical industry. Last November, a new type of gene therapy for Parkinson's disease, championed by the Michael J. Fox Foundation, was abruptly withdrawn from Phase II trials after unexpectedly tanking against placebo. A stem-cell startup called Osiris Therapeutics got a drubbing on Wall Street in March, when it suspended trials of its pill for Crohn's disease, an intestinal ailment, citing an "unusually high" response to placebo. Two days later, Eli Lilly broke off testing of a much-touted new drug for schizophrenia when volunteers showed double the expected level of placebo response.

I hope you all will stop by the Heatlh forum and recommend this. There are a lot of DUers who unrec theads like this.

[Celebration]

5. oh, hey that would be cool

It is at plus one now. It's probably really five minus four, or something like that.

[get the red out]

10. I recced it

And saw it only had one recc at the time. I guess the science fundys got to it. Can't whack their science god without making them as mad as if you stole the bucket of chicken from a Baptist picnic. }(

[Why Syzygy]

12. Science fundies .

who believe they are the CHOSEN to their god. They are just as irrational, compulsive and domineering as any other religious fundie.

When you take a step back, by putting the more hostile ones on "ignore", their irratinality really stands out.

[get the red out]

14. The personality similarities

The personality similarities between most abrasive science fundies and religious fundies always strikes me as glaring.

[Matariki]

11. You're right. I read that too quickly and missed the part about Parkinson's and Crohn's

Interesting, although I'd want to see more data before forming an opinion.

[get the red out]

6. Multiple reasons IMO

Some diseases are pretty much made up and marketed by big pharma to go with the pills they have. The pharmaceutical companies have been known to "fudge" their in-house positive results (to put it mildly). Some of these drugs have such terrible side effects that perhaps nothing at all is better for the entire physical being (just a guess there based on my own past experience).

And of course, people may be tuning in to the universal power and finding some help for themselves. I have experienced this for myself also.

[Celebration]

7. there is also a slim area of efficacy

In the original Prozac and SSRI studies, they only barely beat out the placebos. They had to run huge trials to show any kind of statistical significance. It ended up being that half the people got better on placebos, and about two thirds got better with the medication.

Yet, now, apparently, these approved drugs are hard pressed to show ANY difference from placebos.

Here is what I think is happening-- the thoughtform of antidepressant medication is in the ether, ready to be drawn upon by our auric fields, and used as needed. Of course, I am just speculating. I don't have proof.

This happens the opposite way with diseases. Diseases FIRST show up in our energy fields, before they are actually manifest in the body, and sometimes they never make it that far. If someone has a fear of a disease, it tends to draw it into the auric fields. I mean, it is weird. So, lots of people will test "weak" for AIDS or Lyme Disease or any of a number of things. Their auric fields are actually picking up the energy of the disease from the ether, while their bodies don't have it. Naturally that leaves them more susceptible to it if they happen to be exposed in the traditional way.

Again, no proof. This is just the way my mind is working these days.

[winyanstaz]

9. I just wanted to say that you are absolutely correct ...

in that disease shows up in the energy field first and then manifests in the physical body.
We can also see death in the aura before the body actually dies. It is a pale silvery grey tint.

[winyanstaz]

8. The human mind is much more powerful than it is given credit for.

I also believe that as we are once again drawing closer to the milky way and as the end of the Age of Pieces approaches that we are drawing closer to the inner planes and Spirit as well. (the veil (vibration rates between the planes) is getting "thinner")
All things start in the Spirit and end on earth.
For example, although I have been seeing auras and energy fields for many years now, lately I have been seeing the patterns between the fields a lot more.
Although I have been manifesting things for many years as well..it seems to be much faster that things show up on the whole now as well. I find I need to be much more aware of my thoughts and when I am not, I am often regretting that I was not paying more attention to my self-talk. (see my post about my poor little fish rainbow)
Those patterns of energy swirling around objects by the way..remind me of the swirls that the ancients drew on cave walls..they remind me of fingerprint swirls where the energy moves around a physical object. I have also seen those same swirls on the energy plane itself.
I also believe as more awaken in consciousness that as a group our thoughts gain more power.
Now might be a good time to have people suggest group visualizations for the planet as a whole.

[bigmonkey]

13. This seems like a good test case for the confirmation of ascension.

That is, one would expect that the ability to effectively manifest might slowly spread and increase among the humans if the ascension process is gradual with respect to that ability. Something that will eventually be obvious must become obvious either gradually, intermittently, or all at once, it seems to me. Perhaps, at least in this area, it's happening gradually.

That said, double-blind testing likely leaves some modalities out, namely any that can't be double-blind tested. I remember a controversy over DMSO (dimethyl sulfoxide) and its ability to reduce arthritis symptoms. Even though it gave people who could find no other relief their lives back, the fact that it creates a garlicky taste in the mouth within minutes of external application made it impossible to double-blind test it, so it couldn't get FDA approval.

I don't know anything about DMSO's side-effects, so don't hurt me! I just remember this puzzle in the process of certification seemed very interesting at the time (back in the 70s, I think).