Promoting Natural Health

I’ve recently subscribed to a popular health newsletter. It’s a pretty basic layout with a feature article surrounded by text advertisements and finished up with a Q&A. I have to say that I’m all for anyone that provides options other than the lies promoted by pharmaceutical companies and the irresponsibility of mainstream medicine. But it seems this newsletter is a lot hype, too—supplements promising miracle cures, secrets about hidden “killers,” etc.

Yes, you’ve got to make a buck. And these natural health promoters are providing alternatives to surgery, chemotherapy, and physical and emotional anguish. That’s a good thing. But their tone has a decided air of National Enquirer to it that gives me a little insight into why Big Pharmaceutical is raking in the dough, while natural health companies are still largely unknown.

Yes, sales letters have been proven to work. If I read long enough, even I’m convinced to subscribe, to believe almost anything. And this is certainly not to say that the cures and miracles promised aren’t deliverable. But I’m talking about awareness here, about education and raising the standard for individual responsibility in this country so we can start demanding it from our health care providers and food sources.

Hype and hypochondria don’t encourage that, if you ask me.

Pay attention next time you see a commercial for Viagara or Paxil or Lunesta. Yes, those drugs work for many people. Yes, there is a lot of hype surrounding them and a lot of doctors irresponsibly recommending them, and as a result there is untold damage to the bodies of people who use them. But the commercials are professional and intelligent; they appeal to the emotions of reasonable, sensible people who are looking for reasonable, sensible answers so they can get on with their lives. These commercials don’t exist to put fear into the minds of their consumers; they exist to create comfort. They aren’t “unbelievable” cures; they’re the most reasonable, sensible thing in the world.

It’s time natural and preventive health promoters started to live up to this standard. Because natural healing is, literally, the most natural thing in the world. It’s reasonable and sensible, much more so than putting a bunch of chemicals in your body that only “manage” symptoms while creating a host of others. And I think we should start treating it as such.