‘Right to Repair for Your Body’: The Rise of DIY, Pirated Medicine
Four Thieves Vinegar Collective has made DIY medicine cheaper and more accessible to the masses.
You wouldn't pirate a medicine, would you?
I would if I could!
I will say, there's something scary about crafting your own medicine, I'd expect medicine to be highly precisely crafted in labs by highly educated professionals and that it'd be difficult and perhaps dangerous to make and take your own medicine. I could be wrong.
The things they write in the article are amazing, people can make their own life savine cure to hepatitis C for about 70 USD for their whole home made treatment, that just works? It seems too good to be true without any caveats.
Oh and, final thought, “Four Thieves Collective”? They really don't beat around the bush. I like that
Four Thieves vinegar was supposedly used by four grave robbers to protect them from bubonic plague, each thief added their own herb to the infusion. It apparently worked well enough, they negotiated their freedom by giving up the recipe.
Nowadays, people vary the herbs, garlic is the constant.
It's no secret herbs like oregano (most savory herbs actually) have antimicrobial properties. When you're poor and a doctor's visit is a day or more lost pay, the daycare is paid regardless of attendance, then the uninsured cost of the visit and pharmaceuticals, you learn.
It certainly sounds like it should be more difficult than that (and as far as I, a non-medical professional, know it is) but keep in mind the pharmaceutical industry is worth billions to a select few, and keep in mind back when Eli Lilly's Twitter was hacked and posted insulin, a substance that costing some people over $1000/month just to live, would be free, their stock dropped 4.37% the next day.
Like I said, I'm no medical anything but like with previous products that have claimed to be medically beneficial, I think it's worth at least taking a step back and looking at what someone stands to gain by claiming something vital is simple versus what those who claim otherwise stand to lose.
After all, I think we've all heard the story of the doctor who, in a fit of desperation, cured his wife's cancer with bicarbonate of soda and then did so with more of his patients before being sued by Big Pharma.
The CLR (the reactor to create the medicine) costs about US$300-500 to make according to their website. Then there's actually figuring out the software. They don't sell recipes,as it were, so there's time involved as well.
I've been poking around their site tonight after I saw this posted to another community. It's worth looking at, imho.
I'd expect medicine to be highly precisely crafted in labs by highly educated professionals and that it'd be difficult and perhaps dangerous to make and take your own medicine. I could be wrong.
You're not wrong—all of 4TVC's work is extremely dangerous. Not as dangerous as you'd think, though. And, compared to living a life crushed by debilitating disease or debt, do those risks outweigh the outcome? Probably not.
It is easy to make if you have the know how and some equipment, also if it is already known what you need to make. For example, aspirin is known structurally (unless I am mistaken), so if you have the chemistry know-how and equipment, you can make your own.
However the tricky part is to get it as a safe medicine to take, that you do not have impurities that could be dangerous, toxic. You will need to be able to make quality and safety checks like that. Which I am not sure how easy that really is.
White willow bark and devil's claw root contain naturally occurring salicylic acid, similar to aspirin. Better, but it tastes funky.
Nothing wrong with homemade medicine. Just know what you're doing. I've used many, on myself and now adult child. Grandparents on both sides taught me. Their's taught them. I've used comfrey to heal deep wounds on friendly strays.
As a European, this looks insane to me.
Capitalism working as intended though, undercutting the competition and all that.
My thoughts exactly. In Europe it's part of our social welfare
I’m a process chemist. I do this sort of thing for a living.
These guys don’t even know why what they’re suggesting is so dangerous. Do not do any of this.
I'm a quality chemist. I test the API's that process chemists make to be sure they're right. Yeah, reactions don't always proceed as intended. These guys do understand the risks, and are only trying to provide an option. Here in the US the insurance companies are perfectly willing to let us die because funding expensive treatment hurts their bottom line. Unless you're independently wealthy, a small scale reactor at home may become the only option a person has available. Definitely risky, but why not take the chance when corporate America has determined you're not valuable enough to save?
It's not even funding the expensive treatments, it's not charging a 1000x markup hurting their bottom line. It'd be one thing if it were genuinely expensive medicine (i would still propose a distribution method other than "capitalism") but it's not.
If these meds were available for a reasonable price i don't think we'd be seeing groups like this.
Quite frankly, the contamination from pesticide and polluted air, water and dirt on everyday foods (and of course my herbs) are a bigger concern. They're ubiquitous and unavoidable, now, thanks to big business and apathetic, time-constrained, overworked individuals. So I'm not that concerned by home remedies, although I really only trust my own. Some herbalists/root medics add turpentine to their remedies, for internal use. So I'll stick to my own or vetted suppliers.
Yeah that was my first thought too. While I kind of get the spirit of it, in practice this is so absurdly dangerous IMO. Even if someone has the best possible intentions, there are so many things that could go wrong with this, especially if you include things like long-term effects that aren't immediately apparent, or interactions with other drugs, especially if you're taking other home-made pills with potentially unknown ingredients. While it can be frustrating to hear about a promising new medicine that won't be available for years, there's a reason why they spend so long testing these things.
IMO the better (but much more difficult) solution is reforming the medical industry so that it's easier for people to see a doctor and actually afford to get medicine. I'm not usually a fan of big government stuff, but medicine is one of those things that just needs to be kept under supervision I think.
As someone with a chemistry background I'm surprised you think the industry even takes half these precautions for our current drugs.
Not even talking about 'state of the art' meds here were talking the plastics from cars that've been around since the 60's is under studied (but hey its sponsored by oil money so its 'safer')
I think these guys might be able to hack through the process and get stuff done and think getting other people to follow them will be trivial as well. But just because they didn't mess up, doesn't mean other people won't. A large majority might end up hurting themselves if they follow in their route.
I'm a dumbass. I don't do this sort of thing for a living. Do you think it will ever be as safe as properly manufactured and prescribed drugs?
No. Never. It takes whole teams of people to get it right. (Even then, they sometimes get it wrong.)
I firmly think this would be a boon for many people; owning one of these is likely a lifeline that even small town physicians could utilize to dispense drugs freely or cheaply to patients in need.
This is something that I think small-town pharmacies could use to create compounds in cases of drug shortages. I think tools and programs and small labs like what are discussed in the article are a positive force for good; and that they should be not only allowed, but encouraged, for many drugs that are expensive, unavailable to someone in need and can be readily synthesized safely with a basic college level of chemistry training by someone in a pharmacy.
I think the potential risks and downsides are small right now; and I think more of it should be encouraged gently so that we can find out quickly what the flaws and limitations are so that we can put regulatory guardrails around it so that people do not harm themselves.
Yeah, one of the meds they talk about making is Vyvanse. That's having a serious national shortage right now due to a combination of the DEA and corporate greed. It's illegal for compounding pharmacies to make it but there's no technical reason they couldn't. Same for lots of this stuff.
So uh yeah as we all know a lot of amphetamines have already been "open source" for a long time.
And we also know the DEA really doesn't approve of private production... Vyvanse itself only really was created as a produg because of their control of the amphetamine market and their desire for products with lower abuse potential.
If we could get the DEA out of the way anyways, it would make more sense to just make dextroamphetamine as it's simple, cheap and effective.
That would be great. My insurance was already not covering Vyvanse super well, but I at least had the extra coupon thing from Vyvanse that was getting it under $80 per month. But the start of this year Vyvanse stopped the coupon since there was a generic and my insurance was also pushing that. Which I didn't realize was a thing until I was about a week and a half past my refill and just kept getting auto calls from Walgreens that it was delayed.
Found out it was because the generic was on back order and they literally didn't know when they (or any location in my county or the next one over) would even get it. So I had to demand that they just fill the name brand since I can't function at work. The pharmacist was like "It will be over $200, are you sure you don't want to wait?". And all I could say was "Not like I really have a choice atm if I want to have my meds." Which while the price was (and still is) fucked. I am glad I didn't just keep waiting. I just said to put it on my file that I request the name brand if the generic isn't available.
It does seem that the insurance has also seen this happening to a fuck ton of people as they are back to at least covering what they were before. Which is still costing me around $125 or so a month since Vyvanse didn't re-instate their coupon. I had thought about going back to Adderall, but it doesn't last as long and I have heard there have been shortages for both name brand and generic before Vyvanse and its generic.
Let him cook
Ok this is pretty cool, I just don't know if I would trust it yet. I was actually thinking about the concept a bit ago, that I really don't know what I'm taking if my doctor prescribes something to me... I do really like the concept, though.
Lab synthesis had it's own set of problems. Imo, isolation of the"active" agent being one. Slippery elm and white willow teas don't taste good, but maybe the "inactive" ingredients work with the active ingredient in ways that are simply not studied.
trans people: first time?
Wouldn't "right to repair" regarding medicine just be universal healthcare?
Most people in right to repair states/countries still bring their iPhone to someone to fix (though they have the right to fix it themselves just as people I guess have the right to try to fix themselves rather than go to a doctor).
I don't think you fully understand right to repair.
Companies (most egregiously Apple, but Samsung, Microsoft, and other tech, farming, and medical companies as well) have been actively introducing barriers to self or third-party repairs for decades. Apple serializes their displays on iPhones, so if you were to swap the screen on an iPhone without Apple's authorization or without specific hardware, your iPhone disables specific features on your new screen, even if it's a genuine Apple part. Apple also has incredibly unfair and invasive contracts with their authorized service providers such that they have to provide a slower return window than Apple's own service centers. Furthermore, Apple et al. don't sell every part needed to fix phones, and even when they do sell parts, they are often sold as packages or bundles that make the parts unnecessarily expensive.
To be clear, it's rare for companies to ban third-party repairs outright. However, the vast majority of device makers artificially limit who can buy spare parts and who can fix their devices via software, by tight supply chain control, lawsuits, or getting governments to seize the few parts that could be obtained. This means that most third-party stores can't compete with manufacturers because they can't get genuine parts without becoming "authorized", and by becoming authorized, they can't provide a quality service.
States are absolved of patent law, so I keep hoping the west coast will make a compact where each state makes a major drug for their state health care plans and they share across.
Intellectual property is theft. Is there a WikiLeaks for medicine? WikiMeds perhaps?
You know what? Yeah I wouldn't pirate a medicine. They got me this time.
I would not trust that the pills he was throwing out to the crowd were legit. But if an independent third party could verify the drug, why not.
Also, I am not suffering from anything that is too expensive to fix. Maybe if I was desperate and not rich, I'd have a different opinion.
now we just need nile red to synthesize insulin. We'll be set once that happens.
I have a friend in Portugal who uses semaglutide that's compounded by a local pharmacy for about 35euros a month. I, in Canada still pay $230/month for Ozempic. For $120/month I could take a 2.5mg dose similar to Wegovy which in Canada right now is $400ish
Its the same drug, just no prefilled pen. All these pharmacies that offer it in Europe aren't accessible from North America without a vpn, and then once accessible refuse to ship to Canada.
Fascinating article!
And you know what bloody sucks? ADHD meds are one of the few that you can not and probably should not make at home. Why? Without watching the whole video, I can tell you the medication he can't get ahold of is Lisdexamphetamine. The precursor chemicals of which are the same as for Methamphetamine. It's also in the same schedule as opiates. So I'd imagine that even the guy the article is about wouldn't mess around with those publicly, and perhaps even privately as the DEA heavily monitors sales of the precursors.
I'm so fucking sick of the meds that make my brain work being out of stock :(
I was expecting a NileRed video of him extracting meds from batteries or anal lube or something
Incredible video.
Oh shit! We're getting Ripperdocs!!!
You wouldn’t pirate a medicine, would you?
You wouldnt' pirate a human thought would you? The basis of this entire sub, that one pile of neurons deserves for life the rights to a computation.
I just wrote it because it rhymed with the now memed 2004 anti piracy announcement You wouldn't download a car that was rightfully criticized.
...Are you a bot? Your account is less than a day old and this comment.... almost made sense. But what the heck does this mean?
...that one pile of neurons deserves for life the rights to a computation.
Ideas/art/concepts/recipes/books are just waiting around to be discovered. We as a species discover them or develop them from our shared culture. And a bunch of rich fucks think they should get perpetual rights because they own all the content mills/researchers, regardless of how much the rest of the species would benefit.
Ironically, someone have a non-paywall link?
