Investments and intestines

(File under: PRESS CRITICISM; GLOBAL POVERTY; SCATOLOGICAL HUMOR)

"Study links drugs to form of diarrhea" we read in today's paper.

The drugs in question are pretty popular ones — proton pump inhibitors like Nexium. So this is a big story. The question is, what's the bigger story — that these drugs are widely sold, or that these drugs are widely taken?

This is yet another story from the Business section. And it should be covered in the Business section — drugs like this are big business. It particularly makes sense for this to be in the business section of this particular paper, since one of the drugmakers directly affected by this news is also one of the largest local employers.

But the main import of this story is not primarily about the business of the Business pages. Yes, this will have an affect on stock prices. Yes, this is news investors will need to know. But the people most directly, and most intensely, affected by this news are the consumers — the people taking these medicines and suffering the side effects.

It's another example of the unfortunate colonization of news by the Business section. Stories like this — or stories about product recalls due to safety concerns — now routinely end up in the Business pages, where they are treated primarily as items of interest to the people for whom the Business pages are intended.

I'll concede that it's important to people who own stock in an automaker to know that the company's new SUV is prone to rolling over, but this information is immensely more important to the consumers who are driving those SUVs — or who find themselves alongside them on the highway. We shouldn't have to read about such things as incidental information in stories primarily written for the investors. Nor should the people taking these popular heartburn drugs have to turn to the mostly overlooked (because it's written for investors and most people aren't investors) Business section to learn that their cure may be worse than their disease.

Here in the developed world, we have the luxury of viewing diarrhea as more of a discomfort than a serious threat. It's worth remembering, though, that thousands of children in the developing world die from diarrhea every day. Those children, of course, are not suffering as a side effect of medicines they could never hope to afford — they are dying from the utterly predictable and preventable consequences of a lack of access to clean water.

Eureka! I've found the miracle medical cure that could save thousands of lives every day! Clean water. Before I can claim my Nobel Prize in medicine, however, I'll have to come up with a better distribution system …

Anyway, now that I've brought everybody down by mentioning the thousands of dying children that our way of life requires us all to pretend aren't there, let me end with sophomoric humor.

Some of my best friends are siblings who share a genetic disposition to digestive woes. They won't be happy to learn that the medicine they're taking to alleviate one such problem may be contributing to another. One coping mechanism they employ is an ever-expanding collection of euphemisms for this particular ailment/side effect. Among my favorites: "the squirts," "high tide," "the screaming mimis," "the flaming red-eye," "liquid shits," "ass piss," "F.O.F." (fear of farting), "Uh-Oh." Feel free to suggest others in comments below.