The Third Leading Cause of Death
March 1st, 2008The third leading cause of death in the United States is doctors. This may be a surprise to you as it was to me when I first heard it. According to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA Vol 284, July 26, 2000), there are currently more than 250,000 deaths per year from iatrogenic causes, an unusual word that means “induced in a patient by a physician’s words or actions.” The published breakdown for 1999 is as follows: 12,000 unnecessary surgery, 7000 medication errors in hospitals, 80,000 infections in hospitals, and 106,000 non-error, negative effects of drugs. Not included in this figure are the estimated 80% of the 570,000 cancer deaths that are attributable to cancer “therapy,” resulting from a weakened immune system, often leading to death from pneumonia or other infections which the body is not strong enough to fight off.
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