Remember when your family doctor was actually your doctor? That quaint historical period when physicians made independent medical judgments instead of reading from pharmaceutical scripts? When they looked at you as a unique human being rather than a collection of compliance metrics needing correction?
Those days are fucking gone.
Today’s primary care physician is something entirely different—a pharmaceutical compliance officer with a prescription pad, a corporate protocol to follow, and overlords tracking their every move. They’ve transitioned from healers to hustlers, from medical professionals to medication pushers, from trusted advisors to glorified drug dealers with better parking.
I recently had a conversation with a pediatrician that exposed the naked truth of modern medicine. He confessed to me—with a mixture of resignation and discomfort—that he was “mandated” to administer the PHQ-9A (depression screening) to every adolescent, and if they scored above a certain threshold, he MUST offer an SSRI antidepressant.
“What if the teen is just going through a breakup or having normal adolescent mood swings?” I asked.
He shrugged helplessly. “Doesn’t matter. If they hit the number on the screening, protocol says I have to offer medication.”
“But you know these drugs more than double the risk of suicidal events in teenagers,” I pressed. “The black box warning exists for a reason.”
https://brownstone.org/articles/how-your-family-doc-became-a-drug-enforcement-agent/