I find it odd how the liberal masses carry on endlessly about how “it’s my body” and how they should have the final say about what’s done to it, what goes in or out of it.  Then in the same breath, these people seem to also believe that more government is the answer, because when they do, sooner or later the gov decides it wants to control your body. Of course, it’s all for your own good… they’re just here to protect you. But what if you don’t want to be saved from yourself?

John Stossel writes about such government “nanny-ism”.

We’ll hear from people like Bruce Tower. Tower has prostate cancer. He wanted to take a drug that showed promise against his cancer, but the Food and Drug Administration would not allow it. One bureaucrat told him the government was protecting him from dangerous side effects. Tower’s outraged response was: “Side effects — who cares? Every treatment I’ve had I’ve suffered from side effects. If I’m terminal, it should be my option to endure any side effects.”

Indeed. I fail to see what they are saving him from. The cancer will kill him, so if this adult of sound mind makes the decision that he wants to try some new drug that could save his life, why shouldn’t he be allowed to? How much more miserable can it make his life? And why isn’t it up to him to make that choice for himself? I already have one mother, I don’t need another.

Dr. Alan Chow invented a retinal implant that helps some blind people see (optobionics.com). Demonstrating that took seven years and cost $50 million dollars of FDA-approved tests. But now the FDA wants still more tests. That third stage will take another three years and cost $100 million. But Chow doesn’t have $100 million. He can’t raise the money from investors because the implant only helps some blind people. Potential investors fear there are too few customers to justify their $100 million risk.

Way to kill innovation.

It gets worse.

The Drug Enforcement Agency’s war on drug dealers has led them to watch pain-management doctors like hawks. Drugs like Vicodin and OxyContin provide wonderful pain relief. But because they are also taken by “recreational” drug users, doctors go to jail for prescribing quantities that the DEA considers “inappropriate.” As a result, pain specialists are scared into underprescribing painkillers. Sick people suffer horrible pain needlessly.

Think I exaggerate? Check out the website of the American Association of Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) (aapsonline.org). It warns doctors not to go into pain management.

[…]

The DEA told us that good doctors have nothing to worry about. But … the DEA’s cherry-picked medical experts persuade juries that they should jail any doctor who administers higher doses of pain relief than the DEA’s zealots think appropriate. News of those jail terms spreads. Doctors learn to be stingy with paid meds.

But it’s all for our own good, right? Who are these bureaucrats to say what’s appropriate for me? Why isn’t that between myself and my doctor?

All drugs involve risk. In a free country, it should be up to individuals, once we’re adults, to make our own choices about those risks. Patrick Henry didn’t say, “Give me absolute safety, or give me death.” He said “liberty.” That is what America is supposed to be about.

Unfortunately America is no longer that. People seem to want safety over all things, and we’re willing to give up everything in vain hope of achieving it.