#us medical industry

[thanakite]

My neurologist today straight up stated that the reason it's so hard to get an EDS diagnosis is because the doctors straight up don't want to diagnose it (in part because there isn't really a treatment for it)

He even acknowledged that he'd like to look into a diagnosis for himself (he dislocates very easily) but knows that it is such a difficult diagnosis to get that it hasn't been worthwhile for him to take the steps yet

Like... Y'all that is so bad and so abundantly concerning (like for me this is funny and accurate and everything, but at the same time...) Doctors that don't diagnosis EDS are straight up saying that doctors who do diagnosis simply do everything in their power to avoid actually providing diagnosis, like what if they did this for cancer?

"Oh well, that type of cancer isn't treatable so we are just going to keep avoiding diagnosis and bumping you around from doctor to doctor, but will never acknowledge that you have cancer because that's better for us!"

Absolutely fucking ridiculous

#eds #ehlers danlos syndrome #chronic pain #us medical industry #the us medical industry #us medical system #us healthcare #us health system

[intersectionalpraxis]

It's not "going to be a good outcome" if his patients don't "align with his values" -you mean people who don't align with your genocidal apologism and zionist terrorist agenda have the potential to be harmed during their surgeries??

That medical license needs to be revoked.

You can also report him here:

One of my friends is a nurse, and has had to treat people and work with staff who are racist pieces of shit, but she would be the one losing her job/be isolated if she tried to address it with her management team. Seeing zionists like him proudly say he would use his position of power to hurt and abuse people... just despicable.

Also update: to the recent anon who was berating me in my inbox for 'labeling him a zionist' I did a little more research on him, and this is my update for those interested in reading my follow-up.

He's pro-Israel and was in Jerusalem with his family when the October's 7th attack happened. Here is some more context:

#feminist #social justice #free palestine #settler violence #current events #united states #medical abuse #medical industry #medical bias #the zionist entity #zionist occupation #zionism #plastic surgeon #us imperialism #western imperialism #new york

[tikkunolamresistance]

stop hiding behind a fake Jewish identity you fucking Nazi piece of shit. If you really had a point to make then you would say it upfront without needing to trick people into thinking that you're so mentally damaged that you'd cheer on the murder of your own people.

Totally unrelated but you know who else cheered on the murder of Jews?

Same guys currently arming Israel and funding all those birth-right trips, yknow? The ones convincing Jews we’re only safe in Israel? You know who we mean right, starts with “United”? The place that ignored the Warsaw Ghetto, made like 2,000 daily news reports on the Nazis leading up to the actual Holocaust but somehow didn’t intervene until millions were killed? Not quite got it yet…? Another clue: CIA reported major Oil acquisition in Israel? Current President of said nation once said they’d need to “invent” and Israel if there were not already one?

I’ll let you figure it out <3

#free palestine #palestine #anti capitalism #anti imperialism #anti zionism #we really do not care about you cry baby zionists #grow a spine #you bootlick the nations that ignored us #you bootlick the nations that sat back and watched us beg for help #you bootlick the nations that welcomed nazis into their medical and science industry

[whorejolras]

i'm saying it. i don't think joly would work in a hospital. i think his medical career would be informed by his politics + radicalisation and his + his friends regular drug use, he would be outraged at how the medical industry handles drug users, also at the medical industrial complex in general, so he would find a reputable community led harm reduction organisation to work for 🫶🏻

#joly #it also works because the idea that modern les amis wouldn't all have a million jobs and volunteer roles in community organising #and you know... do direct community action to support people... instead of just little hypothetical meetings where they debate hypothetical #problems.... #that idea is so bullshit and i know it's written by people who only have indoor people problems and don't realise most radicals actually do #things... but still it annoys me #and he would hate working in a hospital #not that the harm reduction work wouldn't be stressful and high intensity too but he would rather it for the love of community #also it wouldn't be hard because as a disabled person he would already be radicalised against doctors and medical industry in general #les amis #les mis #mine #i realise as a disabled drug using cane user i could #write joly really really well #the best joly scene is in world ain't ready where in one scene he's so excited for the battle of the bands dancing around yelling and stuff #then they pick him up and he's like 'tonight is a sitting night' URGH that's so real it almost made me cry #anyway joly feelings good morning

[jacksprostate]

Treatise on why No, the doctor just giving the narrator of Fight Club (full name) his requested sleep medication or sending him to therapy would not have Fixed Him

Firstly, saying giving him the insomnia meds would’ve fixed him ignores the reason he has insomnia in the first place. He is so deeply upset by his place in society that he literally cannot sleep. Drugging him to sleep would not change that. That, of course, is the easy, quick response.

But with regard to therapy? The biggest flaw is that it ignores a central tenet of the book. Part of what tortures the narrator and drives him to invent Tyler is that his feelings about this collective, systemic issue are constantly reduced to a Just Him thing. His seatmates ask what his company is. He’s the only one upset at the office. He gets weird looks if he says the truth of what he does. People will do anything in their power to pretend he is the issue, as an individual, because it is far scarier to consider the full implications of the systemic issues implied by what he is saying. Everyone treats it as if the issue is him, so he goes insane. He does anything to get someone to say, holy shit, that’s fucked up, what you’re a part of is wrong. In an attempt to feel any sort of vague sympathy and catharsis, he goes to support groups to pretend to be dying, because then at least people don’t habitually blame him for his anguish. 

Saying therapy would fix him ignores that his problems are not individual. They are collective. It’s the reason the entire story resonates with people! Something deeply, unignorably wrong with society, where people would rather blame you for bringing it up than try and address it, because it feels impossible. I don’t blame people for this, really, because it IS scary. It’s terrifying to sit and feel like you’ve realized there’s something deeply, deeply wrong, but if you say something, people will get mad at you since it’s so baked into everything around you. Or, even if they agree, it’s easier to deal with the dissonance by pretending it’s individual.

And it’s not like that’s not the purpose therapy and medications largely serve, anyway. Getting into dangerous territory for this website, but ultimately, the reason the narrator was seeking medication was because it’s a bandaid. A very numbing bandaid. For these very large, dissonance causing problems, therapy does very little. Medications do what they always have, and distract you with numbness or side effects. It’s a false solution. He is seeking an individualized false solution because he has been browbeaten with the idea that this is an issue with him alone, when it's plainly clear it's not. 

Don't get me wrong. Obviously he has something wrong with him. But it's a product of his situation. It is a fictional exaggeration of a very real occurrence of mental illness provoked by deep unconscionable dissonance and anguish.  There is a clear correlation between what happens and his mental state and his job and how isolated he is. 

The thing is, even if he were chemically numbed, I do think he would’ve lost it regardless. Many people on meds find they don’t fix things. For reasons I’ll get into, but in this case because even if numbed or distracted, once you’ve learned about deep, far reaching corruption in society, it’s very hard to forget. Especially if, in his case, you literally serve as the acting hand of this particular variety. He’s crawling up the walls. 

So why do people say this?  Well, it's funny I guess. Maybe the first time or whatever. But also, often, they believe it, to a degree. Maybe they've just been told how effective therapy and meds are for mental illness, they believe wholeheartedly in The Disease Model of Mental Illness, maybe they themselves have engaged with either and have considered it successful. Maybe they or someone they know has been 'saved' by such treatments. 

But in all honesty.... What therapy can help with is mentality, it's how you approach problems. For issues on a smaller scale, not meaning they are easier to deal with my any degree, but ones that are not raw and direct from deep awareness of corruption; these are things that can be worked through if you get lucky and get an actually good therapist who helps build up your resiliency. But when your issue is concrete, something large and inescapable? It's useless. At best it can help you develop coping mechanisms, but there is a limit for that. There is a point where that fails. To develop the ability to handle something like this requires intense development of a comfort with ambiguity and dissonance and being isolated and a firm positioning of your purpose and values and and belief in wonder and all the other shit I ramble about. The things that the narrator lacks, which lead him to taking an ineffectual death knell anarchist self-destruction path. Therapy, where the narrator is, full of the knowledge of braces melted to seats and all the people that have to allow this to happen? It fails. 

And meds — meds are a fucking scam. We know the working mechanism of basically none of them, the serotonin receptor model was made up and paid its way into prominence. We have very little evidence they're any better than placebo, and they come with genuinely horrific side effects. Maybe you got lucky. I did, on some meds. On others? I don't remember 2018. The pharmaceutical industry is also known for rampant medical ghostwriting, and for creating 'off-label' uses for drugs that have gained too many protests in their original use, then creating a cult of use to then have 'grassroots' campaigns for it to be made a label use (ie, legitimize their ghostwritten articles with guided anecdotes). 

The DSM itself is basically a marketing segregation plot. It's an attempt to legitimize the disease model by isolating subgroups of symptoms to propose individualized treatments for subgroups that are not necessarily all that separate. But if the groups exist, you can prescribe more and different medications, no? Not to mention, if you use the disease model, you can propose that these diseases are permanent, or permanent until treated, considered more and more severe to offset and justify the horrific side effects of the medications. Do you know why male birth control doesn't really exist? Same reason. They can justify all the horrible side effects for women, because the other option is pregnancy. For men, it's nothing. 

And they're not bothering to invent new drugs without side effects. When they invent new drugs it's just because the last one got too bad of a name, or they can enter a new market. Modern drugs don't work any better than gen1 drugs. They still have horrific side effects. At best, the industry will shit out studies saying the old one was flawed (truth) so they can say this new gen will be better (lie). They're doing it with ssris right now. 

Fundamentally, the single proposed benefit of any of these drugs is that they numb you. To whatever is torturing you. It's harder to be depressed if you can't feel it, or if you just can't muster the same outrage. Of course, there is people who find that numbness to be helpful, or worth it. But often, it's stasis. For the people who have problems that can be worked on, it serves as a stopgap to not actually work on said problems. The natural outcome of the disease model is stagnation for those whose need is to develop skills and resiliency. It keeps them medicalized and dependent on the idea that they're diseased and incapable. Profitable. Stuck in the womb. 

I’ve been there. It’s easier, to wallow, and resist growth because it’s difficult and painful and unfair and cruel and you can think of five billion reasons to justify your languishing. But don’t listen to anyone who tells you you’re just permanently damaged, no matter how nicely they word it, no identity or novel pathologization, no matter how many benefits they promise, especially if they swear up and down some lovely expensive medications with little solid backing and plentiful off-label usage and side effects that’ll kill you. Some days it feels like they want us all stuck in pods, agoraphobic and addicted to the ads they feed us to isolate the markets for the drugs they’ve trained us to beg them to pump us with. Polarization making it as easy as flashing blue light for go, red like for stop, or vice versa. I worry about the kids, for fucks sake. That’s a bit dark and intense, and I apologize. But I want you (generic) to understand, there is a profit motive. Behind everything. And they do not mean well. They do not care about your mental health or your rights or your personhood or your growth. They care about how they can profit off of you.

For those struggling with immovable, society problems, like the narrator grappling with how his job fits into and is accepted by society while his rejection and horror in the face of it does not, it can work about as well as any other drug addiction. Your mileage may vary. From what I've seen, recovering from being on prozac for a long time can be worse than alcohol. They put kids on this shit. They keep campaigning for more. Off label, again. A pharmaceutical company’s favorite thing to do has to be to spread rumors of someone who knows someone who said an off label use of this drug helps with this little understood condition. Or, in the case of mental illness, questionably defined condition. And like, damn, I know I'm posting on the 'medicalization is my identity' website so no one will like all this and has probably stopped reading by now, but yall should be exposed to at least one person who doubts this stuff. Doesn't just trust it. Because I mean, that's the thing right?

It's so big. What would it mean, for this all to be true? Yeah, everyone says pharmaceutical companies are evil and predatory and ghostwriting, but to think about what that really entails. Coming back to the book, everyone knows the car lobby is huge and puts dangerous vehicles through that kill people. What does it mean if the car companies all hire people to calculate the cost of a recall and the cost of lawsuits? No one wants to think about the scale that means for people allowing it or the systems that have to be geared towards money, not safety like they say. Hell, even Chuck misses the beat and has the narrator threaten his boss with the Department of Transportation. And shit, man, if every company is doing this, you think Transportation doesn't know? That they give a fuck? You're better off mailing all the evidence to the news outlets and hoping they only character assassinate you a little bit as they release the news in a way that says it's all the fault of little workers like you, not the whole system. Something something, David McBride, any whistleblower you feel like, etc. 

So I don't blame you, if your reaction is "but but but, that can't be right, people wouldn't do it, they wouldn't allow it" or just an overwhelming feeling of dread that pushes you to deny all of this and avoid thinking about it. Just know, that's in the book. That's all the seatmates on the flights. That's all his fellow officemates. It's easier to pretend, I know.

But think about, how the response fits in with the themes of the book. The story, as a movie too. What drives the narrator’s mental breakdown? How would you handle being in his position? How would you handle being his seatmate? It’s easy to say you’d listen. But have you? Have you had any soul wrenching betrayals of how you thought society worked? How about a betrayal by the thing that promised to be the fix of the first? Can you honestly say you wouldn’t follow that gut instinct, saying follow what everyone says, that person must just be crazy, evil, rude, cruel, whatever it is that means you can set what they said aside?

For a lot of people, they can do that, I guess. Set it aside. Reaching that aforementioned state of managing to cope with the dissonance and ambiguity and despair is very hard. The narrator made the Big Realization, but he couldn’t cope. He self-destructed. Even when people don’t make the big realization consciously, they’re already self-destructing. It’s hard to escape it when it feels easier than continuing anyway. When it feels like the only option,

Would therapy fix the narrator of Fight Club? Would meds fix the narrator of Fight Club? No. He knows too much. All meds will do, by the time he’s in the psych ward, is spiritually neuter him. A silly phrase, but really. Take the wind out of his sails. 

Is he fixed if he doesn’t try to blow up town? If he just shuts up and settles in and stops costing money? If he still can’t cope with the things he’s unearthed? Do you see how this is a commentary in a commentary in a commentary?

Fight Club is an absolutely fascinating story because of this. The fact that it addresses the fallout of knowing. The isolation. The hopelessness. The spiral that results from a lack of hope. This is, I think, what resonates most with people, even if not consciously. Going insane because you’ve discovered something you wish you could unknow. It’s a classic horror story. Should our society be lovecraftian evil? I don’t think so. 

Do I think changing it will be easy? No. Lord knows a lot exists to push people who make these sorts of Realizations towards feelings of individuality and individualized solutions and denial and other distractions and coping methods. And to prevent people who make One realization from expanding on it and considering further ramifications. Fight Club itself gets into this; the isolation of men being a strict part of the role society shapes for their sex leaves them very vulnerable to death fetishes, in a sense, and generally towards self destructive violence. It helps funnel them away from substantial change and towards ineffectual change. Many things, misogyny, racism, serve to keep people isolated from one another, individualized, angry, and impossible to work with. Market segregation; god knows even appealing on those fronts has become such a classic ploy that companies do it now, the US military frames its plundering that way, etc. 

I’ve wandered a bit but ultimately, my point is this: Fight Club is a love letter to the horrors of critical thinking, and the importance of not falling into the trap of self destruction and hopelessness in the face of it. The latter is why Tyler was an anarchoterrorist instead of anything useful. The latter is why it was a death cult. It’s important to work through the horrors of critical thinking so you can do it, and stand on the other side ready to believe in each other. It’s worth it.

#fight club #my writing #uh. sorta #If you disagree with me it's fine btw. That's a given for me but I realize that's not usual for this website #my big desire is always to provoke thought and get people to think about why they think things #not necessarily to get them to agree with me. though obviously like any person i enjoy that #it was nice to type this out #also #aside from the prozac withdrawals mention and my own experience w memory loss (hilariously not even the most major of my beefs with the #medical industry! or even just the mental health industry! but its an easy nonoffensive one so #anyway i kept it nonspecific because if you go specific it becomes easier for people to just go 'oh well its That that's the problem and i #dont need to reflect at all on my drug/condition/issue/etc' #which ppl will anyway ofc. but yk #maybe theyll find it easier to ignore without the horrific specific examples but i want to leave it broad because 1. doing research and #going past the first thing you find and confirmation bias stuff is good 4 u #second. it's better imo to leave it more open for people to try and apply it broadly #whew ANYWAY #a bonafide Rant #i shouldve put #anti psychiatry #in the first few tags. i havent really looked on tumblr to see what the community 4 that is like on here because it feels like an oxymoron #on this website #but im sure it probably exists even if its used for smth else #(please change)

[x-other-souled-x]

No. Nope.

Using language that systems may also use in a medical setting to describe their expereinces and go through treatment is not appropriation. Full stop.

There is no culture being exploited, unless you want to argue that the medical-industrial complex is a closed culture somehow.

Which I have definitely seen posts saying something dangerously close to this, and I urge you to not base your entire sense of self on the guys making money off of you. Even if they're helping, there's intentional siphoning of money from poor patients.

Secondly, language is a tool used to communicate. Words exist as "bodies" to a concept, and sometimes this concept is interpreted a little differently from person to person. There are a lot of words that mean several different things depending on the context. The most important thing is the setting which they're used in. A good ammount of medical terms are also words that are used by laymen in other contexts, meaning something different.

A system is a group of interrelated parts working together as a whole.

An Operating System (OS) is a system of code and software that tells the hardware what to do in order to make your computer run. There's agricultural systems, government systems, the solar system itself. Are these things appropriating the medical-industrial complex by existing as parts that make one whole thing work?

And before anyone splits hairs about this, I am not equating human life to computers or the government. These are examples of things that are literally defined AS SYSTEMS. The main takeaway you should be having here is that system is a broad term with many many applications outside of the medical-industrial complex. That one institution does not own the word nor the concept of being multiple parts (headmates/alters/whatever) working together.

The concept still exists and system still is a word outside of a medical context.

In other words, people would have eventually came to the conclusion of calling themselves systems regardless of if it was used in a medical context or not. It's not hard to put 2 and 2 together, to see parallels in concepts and expereinces and decide those words work just fine. Thank you for coming to my TEDtalk.

This is a post online, made by a trauma-formed system. I'm not going to have the time and foresight to cover every little nuance, and I don't care to be pedantic and pick apart small case instances. At the end of the day, this does not actually matter to how I live my life, how I get therapy, how we as a system have to work together. Endos using terms that are also used in a medical setting (but also used outside of medical settings) is not harmful to me in any way. And quite frankly, I think anti-endo witchunting has done more damage to us as a system trying to figure out how to navigate life than any endo friendly post has. I'm not arguing semantics, I'm going to go live my life and go outside and do my job and pay my bills like everyone else.

All this discourse around stealing terms and what you can and can't call yourself is so seriously unimportant in the grand scheme of things. You all sound so comfy and privileged to be worried about something so trivial as a word or three that is used in multiple contexts accross human language.

#syscourse #<- once again tagging bc yall need to see this and read it and really get it into your heads #im tired of boring terminology “”debates“” #theres no debate language exists and people use it too bad so sad #theres more important things to talk about #LIKE THE EXPLOITATION OF THE VULNERABLE IN THE MEDICAL INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX MAYBE ?????

[decolonize-the-left]

Can't stop thinking about the aces study and how much more prone to illness that women and BIPOC are.

Higher risk for heart issues, diabetes, high blood pressure, even cancer, STDs, pregnancy troubles, mental illness....

Like it's right there in our faces why.

Systemic oppression is literally making us sick. En masse.

How many of us have family with health issues? How many of us inherited our own issues from family? From our mothers specifically?

It is personal. It's so personal that it's in our homes, our DNA. I don't care how many people try to deny it or say we should get over it cuz it was "ancient history"

No it isn't. And they're still profiting off of us and killing us except now it's through our medical bills and insurance and shitty healthcare that won't cover what you need to survive. (And we don't make as much as our white/man counterpart either)

And everyone is affected by that.

It's comic book evil. Like for real. This is like some cartoon villain shit.

They degraded our health and now make us pay just to stay alive and at any point can just say "no" if they don't feel like we're worth the care we need.

Guess who needs care the most? People sick the most. Guess who that is.

And with the aces study... They can't claim to not know anymore. But no. Nobody is even acknowledging it. Nobody has acknowledged this truth for a long time because there was no proof and now that there is? Everyone who can do something about it pretends not to see

#every time i look at my health im reminded of that study and how me and my body deserved better #i didnt have to be like this and neither did a lot of u #this was done to us #and its being perpetuated by the medical industry and politicians who profit off them

[coochiequeens]

I've posted many times before about how surrogacy exploits vulnerable women and turns their babies into commodities. This article is about the impact of the fertility industry on the children themselves.

‘I slept with my half-sibling’: Woman’s horror story reflects loosely regulated nature of US fertility industry

By Rob Kuznia, Allison Gordon, Nelli Black and Kyung Lah, CNN | Photographs by Laura Oliverio, CNN

Published 10:00 AM EST, Wed February 14, 2024CNN — 

Victoria Hill never quite understood how she could be so different from her father – in looks and in temperament. The 39-year-old licensed clinical social worker from suburban Connecticut used to joke that perhaps she was the mailman’s child.

Her joke eventually became no laughing matter. Worried about a health issue, and puzzled because neither of her parents had suffered any of the symptoms, Hill purchased a DNA testing kit from 23andMe a few years ago and sent her DNA to the genomics company.

What should have been a routine quest to learn more about herself turned into a shocking revelation that she had many more siblings than just the brother she grew up with – the count now stands at 22. Some of them reached out to her and dropped more bombshells: Hill’s biological father was not the man she grew up with but a fertility doctor who had been helping her mother conceive using donated sperm. That doctor, Burton Caldwell, a sibling told her, had used his own sperm to inseminate her mother, allegedly without her consent.

But the most devastating revelation came this summer, when Hill found out that one of her newly discovered siblings had been her high school boyfriend – one she says she easily could have married.

“I was traumatized by this,” Hill told CNN in an exclusive interview. “Now I’m looking at pictures of people thinking, well, if he could be my sibling, anybody could be my sibling.”

Hill’s story appears to represent one of the most extreme cases to date of fertility fraud in which fertility doctors have misled their female patients and their families by secretly using their own sperm instead of that of a donor. It also illustrates how the huge groups of siblings made possible in part by a lack of regulation can lead to a worst-case scenario coming to pass: accidental incest.

In this sense, say advocates of new laws criminalizing fertility fraud, Hill’s story is historic.

“This was the first time where we’ve had a confirmed case of someone actually dating, someone being intimate with someone who was their half-sibling,” said Jody Madeira, a law professor at Indiana University and an expert on fertility fraud.

A CNN investigation into fertility fraud nationwide found that most states, including Connecticut, have no laws against it. Victims of this form of deception face long odds in getting any kind of recourse, and doctors who are accused of it have an enormous advantage in court, meaning they rarely face consequences and, in some cases, have continued practicing, according to documents and interviews with fertility experts, lawmakers and several people fathered by sperm donors.

CNN also found that Hill’s romantic relationship with her half-brother wasn’t the only case in which she or other people in her newly discovered sibling group interacted with someone in their community who turned out to be a sibling.

At a time when do-it-yourself DNA kits are turning donor-conceived children into online sleuths about their own origins – and when this subset of the American population has reached an estimated one million people – Hill’s situation is a sign of the times. She is part of a larger groundswell of donor-conceived people who in recent years have sought to expose practices in the fertility industry they say have caused them distress: huge sibling pods, unethical doctors, unreachable biological fathers, a lack of information about their biological family’s medical history.

The movement has been the main driver in getting about a dozen new state laws passed over the past four years. Still, the legal landscape is patchy, and the US fertility industry is often referred to by critics as the “Wild West” for its dearth of regulation relative to other western countries.

“Nail salons are more regulated than the fertility industry,” said Eve Wiley, who traced her origins to fertility fraud and is a prominent advocate for new laws.

Accountability in short supply

More than 30 doctors around the country have been caught or accused of covertly using their own sperm to impregnate their patients, CNN has confirmed; advocates say they know of at least 80.

Accountability for the deception has been in short supply. The near-absence of laws criminalizing the practice of fertility fraud until recently means no doctors have yet been criminally charged for the behavior. In 2019, Indiana became the second state, more than 20 years after California, to pass a statute making fertility fraud a felony.

Even in civil cases that have been settled out of court, the affected families have typically signed non-disclosure agreements, effectively shielding the doctors from public scrutiny.

Meanwhile, some doctors who have been found out were allowed to keep their medical licenses.

In Kentucky, retired fertility doctor Marvin YussmanMarvin Yussman admitted using his own sperm to inseminate about half a dozen patients who at the time were unaware that he was the donor. One of them filed a complaint to the state’s board of medical licensure when her daughter – who was born in 1976 – learned Yussman was the likely father after submitting her DNA to Ancestry.com.

“I feel betrayed that Dr. Yussman knowingly deceived me and my husband about the origin of the sperm he injected into my body,” the woman wrote in a letter to the board in 2019. “Although I realize Dr. Yussman did not break any laws as such, I certainly feel his actions were unconscionable and depraved.”

In his response to the medical board, Yussman said that during that era, fresh sperm was prioritized over frozen sperm, meaning donors had to arrive on a schedule.

“On very rare occasions when the donor did not show and no frozen specimen was available, I used my own sperm if I otherwise would have been an appropriate donor: appropriate blood type, race, physical characteristics,” Yussman wrote.

He added some of his biological children have “expressed gratitude for their existence” to him and even sent him photos of their own children. Yussman, who noted in his defense that he didn’t remember the woman who made the complaint, said his policy decades ago was to inform patients that physicians could be among the possible donors, though neither he nor the complainant could provide records that clarified the protocol.

The board declined to discipline him, citing insufficient evidence, according to case documents. Reached on the phone by CNN, Yussman declined to comment.

The story that really put fertility fraud on the national radar was that of Dr. Donald Cline, who fathered at least 90 children in Indiana. Cline’s case spurred lawmakers to pass legislation that outlawed fertility fraud but wasn’t retroactive, meaning he was never prosecuted for it. But he was convicted of obstruction of justice after lying to investigators in the state attorney general’s office who briefly looked into the case. Following that conviction in 2018, Cline surrendered his license. Cline’s lawyer did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Netflix followed up with a documentary about Cline in 2022 that inspired two members of Congress – Reps. Stephanie Bice, an Oklahoma Republican, and Mikie Sherrill, a New Jersey Democrat – to coauthor the first federal bill outlawing fertility fraud. If passed, the Protecting Families from Fertility Fraud Act would establish a new federal sexual-assault crime for knowingly misrepresenting the nature or source of DNA used in assisted reproductive procedures and other fertility treatments. The bill has found dozens of backers – 28 Republicans and 20 Democrats – amid a renewed effort to push it on Capitol Hill.

In this March 29, 2007 file photo, Dr. Donald Cline, a reproductive endocrinologist and fertility specialist, speaks at a news conference in Indianapolis.Kelly Wilkinson/The Indianapolis Star/AP/File

A group of advocates including Hill plans to go to DC to champion the bill on Wednesday.

To be sure, passage wouldn’t mean that any of the dozens of doctors who have already been accused of fertility fraud would go to prison, as the crime would have occurred before the law existed. But the measure would provide more pathways for civil litigation in such cases.

The push to better regulate the fertility industry isn’t without critics. It inspires unease – if not outright opposition – from some who fear any industry crackdown could have the unintended effect of making the formation of families less accessible to the LGBTQ community, which comprises an outsized share of the donor-recipient clientele.

“I think we should pause before creating additional criminal liability for people practicing reproductive medicine,” said Katherine L. Kraschel, assistant professor of law and health sciences at Northeastern University. “It gives me great pause … to say we want the government to try to step in and regulate what amounts to a reproductive choice.”

Some experts also point out that the advent of take-at-home DNA tests by companies such as 23andMe and Ancestry has pretty much stamped out fertility fraud in the modern era.

“To my knowledge, the majority of fertility fraud cases took place before 2000,” said Julia T. Woodward, a licensed clinical psychologist and associate professor in psychiatry and OBGYN in the Duke University Health System, in an email to CNN. “I think it is highly unlikely any person would engage in such practices today (it would be too easy to be exposed). So this part of the landscape has improved significantly.”

But activists in the donor-conceived community still want laws, in part to provide pathways for civil litigation, and also to send a message to any medical professional who might feel emboldened by the lack of accountability.

“Let’s say arguably that it doesn’t happen anymore,” said Laura High, a donor-conceived person and comedian who, with more than 600,000 followers on TikTok, has carved out something of a niche as a fertility-industry watchdog on social media. “Pass the f**king legislation just in case.

“Why not just out of the optics – just out of a, ‘Hey we’re going to stand by the victims.’ Let’s just do this. We know it’s never going to happen anymore, but let’s just make this illegal.”

Victoria Hill and her two children play with toys in the living room of her mother's house in Wethersfield. Laura Oliverio/CNN

‘You are my sister’

The lack of a law in Connecticut appears to have been a stumbling block for a pair of siblings seeking recourse for what they allege is a case of fertility fraud.

The half-siblings – a sister and brother – sued OBGYN Narendra Tohan of New Britain in 2021, saying he deceived their mothers when using his own sperm in the fertility treatments.

He has derailed the suit with a novel defense, arguing successfully that it amounts to a “wrongful life” case, which typically pertains to people born with severe life-limiting conditions and isn’t recognized in Connecticut. Tohan, who is still practicing, did not return an email or call to his office seeking comment. The siblings are appealing the ruling.

Madeira, the expert in fertility fraud from Indiana University, called the “wrongful life” decision absurd.

“In fertility fraud, no parent is saying that – no parent is saying I would have gotten an abortion,” she said. “Every parent is saying, ‘I love my child. I just wish that my wishes would have been respected and my doctor wouldn’t have used his sperm.’”

And then there is Dr. Burton Caldwell, who declined CNN’s request for an interview. One of his apparent biological children decided to sue him last year, even though she knows it will be an uphill battle without a fertility fraud law on the books. Janine Pierson and her mother, Doreen Pierson, accuse Caldwell – who stopped practicing in the early 2000s – of impregnating Doreen with his own sperm after having falsely told her that the donor would be a Yale medical student.

Half-sisters Alyssa Denniston, Victoria Hill and Janine Pierson pose for a portrait in Hartford, Connecticut. The three of them say they — and at least 20 others — all share a biological father, Dr. Burton Caldwell. Laura Oliverio/CNN

Janine Pierson, a social worker, thought she was an only child until she took a 23andMe test in the summer of 2022 and was floored to learn she had 19 siblings. (That number has since grown to 22.)

“It was like my entire life just came to this screeching halt,” she told CNN.

When she learned through one of her siblings that Caldwell was the likely father, Pierson said she immediately phoned her mom, who was stunned.

“We both just cried for a few minutes because it just felt like such a violation,” Pierson said.

Pierson said she decided to pursue the lawsuit even though she knows the lack of a fertility-fraud law in Connecticut could pose a challenge.

“It shouldn’t just be, you know, the Wild West where these doctors can just do whatever it is that they want,” she said.

Hill is watching her newly discovered half-sister’s case closely.

For her, the first surprise was learning the dad she grew up with wasn’t her biological father.  Although her mom had told her when Hill was younger that she’d sought help conceiving at a fertility clinic, she also said – falsely – that the doctor had used her dad’s sperm.

When Hill learned that the biological father appeared to be Caldwell a few years ago, she contacted lawyers to inquire about filing a suit, but was told she doesn’t have much of a case, so she didn’t pursue it. Now, she said, her statute of limitations is about to expire.

Last year, Hill was hit with another shattering revelation.

In May, she and her three closest friends were celebrating their 20-year high school reunion over dinner.

She was sharing the tale with them of how she learned about her biological father. Everyone was captivated, except one person – her former boyfriend. He looked like he was turning something over in his head. Then he noted that his parents, too, had sought help conceiving from a fertility clinic.

A couple months later, in July, as Hill was leaving for a summer vacation with her husband and two young children, the ex-boyfriend texted her a screenshot showing their 23andMe connection.

“You are my sister,” he said.

Fertility industry regulations in US lax relative to other countries

Hill’s high school boyfriend isn’t the only person she knew in the community who turned out to be a sibling.

“I have slept with my half-sibling,” Hill said. “I went to elementary school with another.”

What’s more, Hill said, back in the early 2000s, she lived across the street from a deli in Norwalk she often went to that was owned by twins who she later learned are her siblings.

Pierson, too, discovered recently that she’d crossed paths with a sibling long ago. She said she has a group photo from when she was a kid at summer camp that shows her on a stage and a boy in the audience. In 2022, she learned that he is her older half-brother.

“Within 20 feet of one another, and we have no idea,” she said.

In general, the bigger the sibling pool, the greater the risk of accidental incest – regardless of whether fertility fraud came into play.

“I don’t date people my age. I can’t do it,” said Jamie LeRose, a 23-year-old singer from New Jersey who has at least 150 siblings from a regular sperm donor, not a doctor. “I look at people my age and I’m automatically unattracted to them because I just, I go, that could be my sibling.”

With this in mind, activists also often advocate for laws that cap the number of siblings per donor – and that do away with donor anonymity. (Neither of these restrictions are included in the proposed federal bill.)

Other countries have instituted such regulations. Norway for instance limits the number of children to eight; Germany, to 15. Germany and the UK have banished anonymity at sperm banks.

The United States government has no such requirements – and the professional association that represents the fertility industry wants to keep it that way.

“What we have not done very much in this country is pass regulations about who gets to have children,” said Sean Tipton, the chief advocacy and policy officer for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine. “If you’re going to say you should only be able to have 50 children, that’s fine. But that should apply to everybody. It shouldn’t apply just to sperm donors.”

Regarding the concern among donor-conceived people about accidental incest, Tipton added, “if you want to be sure that before you have children with somebody, you can run DNA tests to make sure you’re not related.”

The ASRM, which often clashes with donor-conceived activists, has not taken a stance on the federal bill, Tipton told CNN.

The organization does offer nonbinding guidelines that address concerns about incest, recommending for instance no more than 25 births per donor in a population of 800,000.

Although most of the donor-conceived people who spoke with CNN for this story said they wanted to see legislative change, they also described an emotional aspect of the topic that no new law or regulation could begin to quell: a yearning to better understand one’s origins and identity. For Pierson, it was this desire, coupled with a mix of anger and curiosity, that compelled her to pay Caldwell an unannounced visit one day in 2022 – weeks after she’d learned he was most likely her biological father.

Confronting Caldwell

“I woke up that day and I had decided I didn’t want to call him,” Pierson said. “I didn’t want to give him the opportunity to say no. So I just drove directly to his house from work.”

Pierson, who lived in Cheshire at the time, describes an experience that was equal parts surreal and awkward.

After an hourlong trip, she pulled up to a large, stately house with a long driveway not far from the Connecticut coast. When she knocked on the door, nobody answered. But when a neighbor stopped by to drop something off, Caldwell opened the door. Seizing the moment, Pierson introduced herself. He let her in.

Laying eyes for the first time on her biological father, Pierson, 36, saw a man in his 80s with a slight tremor due to Parkinson’s, sporting a blue golf shirt.

He invited her inside and they sat at his dining room table.

Caldwell, she said, didn’t seem surprised – likely because Hill had made a similar visit a couple of years earlier.

“He was not in any way apologetic,” Pierson said, but she added that he did not deny using his own sperm when working in the 1980s at a New Haven clinic. She said Caldwell confessed that he “never gave it the thought that he should have … that there would be so many (children), and that it would have any kind of an impact on us.”

Pierson said Caldwell asked her questions that gave her pause.

“One thing that really has always bothered me is that he asked me how many grandchildren he had,” she said. “And he was very curious about my scholastic achievements and what I made of myself. … Like how intelligent I was, basically.”

She said their conversation ended abruptly when, looking uncomfortable, Caldwell stood up, which she took as a signal that the visit was over. Before parting ways, she asked if he would pose for a photo with her. He consented.

“I knew it would be the only time that I actually ever had that opportunity to take a picture,” she said. “Not that I wanted like a relationship with him in any way because – it was just like mixed of emotions of, you know, like, I despise you, but at the same time, I’m grateful to be here.”

Janine Pierson displays a selfie she took with Caldwell on her phone in Hartford, Connecticut. Pierson took the photo during a visit with Caldwell in 2022 and it is the only photograph she has with him. Laura Oliverio/CNN

#usa #Fertility industry #Burton Caldwell #Fertility fraud #huge groups of siblings made possible in part by a lack of regulation #Accidental incest #Most states have no laws against fertility fraud #huge sibling pods #unethical doctors #unreachable biological fathers #a lack of information about their biological family’s medical history #Nail salons are more regulated than the fertility industry #At least 80 doctors have used their own sperm to impregnate their patients #Marvin Yussman #Dr. Donald Cline fathered at least 90 children #Protecting Families from Fertility Fraud Act still hasn't passed into law #wrongful life #OBGYN Narendra Tohan is still practicing #Large sibling pods in the same community #Norway limits the number of donor conceived children to eight #Germany limits donor conceived children to 15 #Germany and the UK have banished anonymity at sperm banks

[isaacsapphire]

The entire concept of and social enshrinement of "physician assisted suicide" is bizarre. It's taking something that is so easy that idiots can do it with random objects, and both the indigent and the elite are very capable of acquiring quantities of drugs sufficient to pleasantly achieve and making it socially palatable to the middle class by involving the medical industrial complex.

#i don't tag for that anymore #gentrification #class in the US #medical industrial complex #original post #culture war #no war but culture war

[thanakite]

Latest Update on my “Trying to Get an EDS Diagnosis Saga”

Called the newest place we sent a referral to, to hopefully set my appointment only to be informed that it was rejected because they sent it for “Chronic Pain” and didn’t specify the EDS side of it (Which they were supposed to) so I had to send another request so they’d send it with the EDS specification -_-

Like I’ve said it before and I will say it again, EDS is likely WAY more prevalent than we think it is but people will only persue a diagnosis if their presentation is severe enough and there are so many hoops to jump through to get the diagnosis that it causes the number to look EVEN SMALLER since not everyone can keep jumping through those hoops, and even then you have to then convince whatever doctor you end up seeing for it to take you seriously and actually provide the diagnosis, which I’m sure will be its own uphill battle since I know at least some doctors who will diagnosis EDS won’t give the diagnosis to fat people (Fat people can have pretty much anything a thin person can have in terms of health related issues, fatphobia shouldn’t be a stumbling block to get a diagnosis, but unfortunately our world is deeply flawed :/)

The struggle is real -_-

#chronic pain #eds help #ehlers danlos syndrome #us medical industry #the us medical industry #medical industry #American healthcare #us healthcare #us health system #this is the bad place

[intersectionalpraxis]

Oh wow, mass human experimentation on political prisoners done in secret, that sounds awfully familiar……,,

⚠️tw for disturbing images and content containing this subject matter on human experimentation: suicide, self harm, abuse, white supremacist violence, nazism, the holocaust⚠️

this is something that we all should not forget -and it is not the only country that has 'experimented' on human beings -for those who do not know the history of birth control and Puerto Rican women, the despicable "father" of gynecology, as well as the "Tuskegee Study," I highly recommending starting here, because so many racist/dehumanizing 'pursuits' have been done in the name of "science" and it's horrifying.

#feminist #feminism #social justice #settler violence #colonial violence #antiblackness #history #us imperialism #western imperialism #medicine #science #forced sterilization #womens rights #violence against women #tw graphic #tw abuse #tw violence #tw white supremacy #medical industry #crimes against humanity #human rights violations

[your-fave-is-being-blended]

Perhaps Ethan Winters from Resident Evil?

Ethan Winters from Resident Evil is being blended!!

You cannot save him.

#your fave is being blended #you cannot save them #(are those medical grade staples on his wrist?) #(because they certainly dont look like it) #(istg if he used an industrial staple gun to keep his hand attached then he deserves blender hell) #blend requests #ethan winters #resident evil #re ethan winters #ethan resident evil

[squirrelstone]

The recent rise in "personal responsibility" conditions is honestly so concerning. Things that were once considered luck of the draw or the result of a bad environment are now being turned into morality issues, and the result is a decline in quality of medical care.

If you're fat or are considered clinically obese (BMI of 30+; these do not always overlap but both are treated poorly in the U.S. health system), you've dealt with this for ages, and it's spreading to other conditions because insurance companies have realized that if they can find a way to blame you, they have an argument to deny you coverage. A lot of these things can be quality of life issues for years before (or even if) they turn deadly (ex. arthritis), but I've watched the wording around things as significant and immediate as acute cancer cases change to blame the individual who's fallen ill.

Those screening guidelines for cancers that are common and easy to screen for and moving earlier and earlier in a person's life, and while I don't have a record of it because it's anecdotal and I'm not going to violate this family's privacy, I've got a friend who's father was denied partial coverage for their colon cancer treatment because he didn't start screening at 45. The man in question started screening when he turned 50 in 2017, before the guidelines were changed.

Nearly every medical condition I've had in the past ten or so years has been blamed on myself or my parents, on what I eat, what I do, anything the doctors could come up with to say "this was 100% preventable, and it's on you for not preventing it," completely ignoring socioeconomic factors, family history, or any other context of the situation in question. I've been blamed for getting a concussion by being too active (dropped a flagpole on my head in color guard), and in the same breath told I need to exercise more to lose weight and that if I had been exercising more, I wouldn't have pulled the shoulder muscle I was seeing another doctor in the same building about an hour after the neurology appointment for my concussion. I'd joined color guard specifically to get more active and more involved by the way, but it was still my fault for two injuries caused by accidents. My clumsiness and my newness to the sport were turned into moral failings.

I only see this getting worse and worse, so put your foot down with your doctor if they try to blame you for anything, get it notated in your chart that they wanted to blame you, and prepare for some long-ass calls with your insurance cause pretty soon, you could cross at a crosswalk properly and still be blamed if a car runs a red light and hits you.

#medical industry #us health system #health is not a moral issue #op

[swagging-back-to]

i unironically think gynecology is a barbaric practice and i'd genuinely rather die than go to one.

#every other field in the medical industry has had technological improvements and improvements in how testing/treatment is carried out #NOT gynecology. #Nope; gynecologists still use the same barbaric instruments that violent misogynistic 'doctors' used in the 1800s. #they still use no numbing when they rip chunks of your cervix out. #they still dont actually treat any conditions they find in your ripped up cervix sample. They just say 'it'll go away on its own' #conscious women are still used as living and unwilling experiments both by having random students conduct their exams #and by using mindless ''treatments'' like plastic meshes shoved inside their flesh then ripped out once it fuses to their tissue. #not to mention historically gynecology has been a facade for rapists and misogynists; exams were used to shame and punish women; and in #britain gynecologists were allowed to forcefully give a woman ''an exam'' at any time in any place for any reason ''to test if she has an #std'' #the very ''father of gynecology'' was a slave owner who raped and abused and experimented on conscious women. Modern gynecologists use the #very same instruments as he did. they do practically the exact same exams in the same manner; violent and barbaric. #that's all you need to know about gynecology.

[paranormeow7]

steaming hot take but there are just some things self diagnosed people just can’t talk over professionally diagnosed people about

#actual sugar post #don’t kill me for this I’m autistic #and I’m not completely anti self dx either #the medical industry is awful and has the power to take away the benefits my diagnosis allowed me to access at any time #and I’m not going to pretend that professional diagnosis is always the most reliable option because there is a lot of ingrained bias #but at a certain point #if you are self diagnosed you have to understand that you and I are different #and you have to be willing to listen to us sometimes #and hell. sometimes you’ll even have to listen to a doctor on the subject #sometimes their input can be valuable when they’re not calling you a fat hysterical bitch and asking you to cough up thousands of dollars #I’m not denying your symptoms and experiences as a self diagnosed person. i don’t know you and im not living your life #but maybe a second opinion from someone who’s been diagnosed is a bit more valuable than you think it is #we’ve had a lot of experiences that you haven’t #besides. You don’t need a label to acknowledge something you’re going through or validate your problems #for example it doesn’t NEED to always be autism if you show a few traits. you can just tell people you show those traits #do whatever makes life easier for you. you don’t need all these labels to have these issues #I’m going to get the worst anons for this I just know it #idk #sugars opinions #self diagnosis #professional diagnosis #autism stuff #autism #actually autistic #neurodivergent #adhd #audhd #actually audhd

[abuddyforeveryseason]

This is the Buddy for April 4th. Buddy's lungs. Not looking too good, I'm afraid.

Though, you know, he's going to die from all that smoking. It's a serious issue, after all. The Wikipedia article mentions five million deaths related to tobacco use per year, with around 10% of those being in the U.S.

Those are pretty much mass murder numbers. Worse than any genocide attempt, really.

I mentioned in the Buddy for December 15th that Walt Disney died of smoking-related health issues, and the same is true for a lot of other people I admire - most of them creative types, but also scientists, politicians and whatnot.

Of course, back then people didn't know that much about how dangerous smoking was. It's easy to dismiss it as they all being idiots, but hindsight is 20/20.

I knew a guy in high school, a year behind me, who we called Monk. He didn't smoke but he spoke highly of his dad, who always had a cigarette on his mouth while typing away at the computer, working. And that's kind of the case with a lot of those smokers - talented workaholics who used tobacco as fuel for their work binges.

Kind of messed up that people like the monk's dad were expected to jeopardize their lungs to keep working, to make money. And not only that, he had to spend money on the cigarettes too! Talk about burning the candle at both ends.

My dad doesn't smoke, because he's one of those people who value money above anything else. If I mentioned smoking to him and my mom, they'd go on a rant about "burning money" instead. The health issues were secondary (and even then, they were framed as "healthcare costs money"). Although it's not like their lifestyle is 100% healthy. It's different with cigarettes, though - they're very addictive and very unhealthy, so it feels like the only reason they're still being freely sold is because there's so much economic pressure towards it.

On the other hand, they do make you look really cool.

#ab4es #drawing #lungs #medical #medicine #cigarette #cigarettes #tobacco #tobacco use #smoking #tobacco industry #smoke #cancer #wikipedia #walt disney