On Wed, 7 Feb 2001 20:54:35 -0500 Richard Geller <[log in to unmask]> writes: > > Ardeith wrote: > > Menopause is the next big money maker for the drug companies.... Richard wrote: > First of all, HRT does not necessarily enrich the drug companies. > You can take natural progesterone, for instance, and this has no patent on > it and is in no way proprietary. Ardeith writes: Beg to differ.....the doctors are not prescribing natural progesterone......they are prescribing "artificial" hormonal replacements that have no place in the healthy human female body. The natural progesterone you cite is no more "natural" to the healthy human female body than is the "artificial" therapy created from mares' urine. And such "natural" hormonal therapies, such as wild yam, were not available to the females of our species all over the world....just in some areas. Richard wrote: > Second, I think a lot of women do need HRT in the form of natural > hormone progesterone. It keeps them from being too moody and depressed > (important), it prevents osteoporosis, and has a lot of other benefits (helps > promote healthy sleep patterns for instance). Ardeith writes: Read my virtual "lips".....*a healthy human female body* .... there is nothing "un-natural" about menopause....it is not a disease or a mal-function of the body.....it is a change women are going to pass through with or without the aid or approval of the medical establishment....or the drug companies......but they are not about to let this opportunity to cash in slip away. They go all out of their way to scare women into believing they must take the medicine. Richard wrote: > Nature never "intended" for women to be comfortable post-menopause. > After reproductive utility is over, nature intended perhaps for women to > get old and die. Todd wrote: Humans are the only primates that experience menopause, and in fact menopause is rare throughout the entire animal kingdom. Ardeith writes: Now, why on Earth shouldn't a woman be comfortable post- menopause? She is free of the possibility of pregnancy, she has probably raised her children and can take on more responsibility for her clan/tribe.....in many cultures these older women sit on clan and tribal councils and their words are respected. In cultures where a female's only value is her ability to bear children, of course they become depressed when that time ends....they are facing a life of no value or worth. Wouldn't you become depressed if your only value was your ability to impregnate females, and then you lost that ability? And Todd is also correct.....human females are the only mammals that experience menopause. The rest of the female mammals keep going into estrus and bearing young their whole lives......when old age creeps up on them, they usually live long enough to raise the last pup or calve or kit.....then perish. It seems that only among humans does the female have the possiblity of living for many years past her fertility. And that may have evolved as a survival mechanism for our species.... for once a female's own young are raised, she is available to put her energy into helping her daughters or other young females raise their own young. Yes, there are some women who experience extreme mental/emotional turmoil during menopause....and there are some tiny bird-boned women who develop osteoporosis and other problems......but they are the few.....the vast majority of women, throughout history, have successfully made this change without artificial aids. Just as the vast majority of women gave birth without the modern medical establishment. It is the work of the doctors to convince otherwise healthy women that they need all sorts of medical intervention to have babies or pass through menopause. Yes, I know people who wouldn't be alive today without medical intervention at their births, but they are the rarity, not the norm. [log in to unmask] Walk The Path With Practical Feet! ________________________________________________________________ GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO! Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less! Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj.