Simpson & Son Revitalizing Tonic

So this one time, at band camp,...I mean, when I was sick at home between Christmas and New Year's last year, a couple of times I ran across a particular infomercial while channel-surfing. Something has been bugging me about it ever since, but it wasn't until a couple of weeks ago that I realized what, and then it wasn't until yesterday that I undertook what turned out to be a pretty heinous google search for it so that I could mock it. I was hoping to find a video of the infomercial, but instead I found a transcript, which meant I didn't have to watch the whole thing and transcribe what I wanted my own self. Woo hoo!

The infomercial is the work of a notorious infomercial scammer, the pitchman is "one of the top fitness and exercise gurus in Hollywood" although you've never heard of him, and the product is called "Flex Protex-D." It's advertised mainly as a joint-pain product, but that's not all they claim for it.

Anyway, this is what bugged me about it. Here's this guy shilling a single dietary supplement and badmouthing FDA-approved drugs, and he says this:

We in America treat the masses, we don't treat the individuals; this treats each and every person different....

...it treats each and every different type of pain individually...

...this is tailor made for each and every person, no matter, regardless of whether they have [a variety of things]

This is in contrast to the "lot of different products on the market," such as the NSAIDS, Vioxx, and Celebrex that he mentions (although Vioxx isn't really on the market).

If he's claiming that one supplement is tailored to the needs of each person, it seems perfectly fair and logical to conclude that he's implying that it is somehow different for each person, whereas the variety of pharmaceuticals available are apparently all the same. I don't know how many NSAIDs there are but he uses the plural so that's at least two, plus Vioxx and Celebrex, for at least four pharmaceuticals. It seems to me (although I'm not an M.D., merely a Ph. one) that four pharmaceuticals would encompass more variation than one supplement does, even one that is "tailor made for each and every person" through mass production methods with ingredients like Vitamin D, Vitamin D3, chondroitin, and COX-2 inhibitors (natural ones, not synthetic!). And apparently everyone need only take two pills twice a day to get the full individualized benefit. (Curiously enough the eggheads claim that COX-2 inhibitors are NSAIDs, but that can't be right, unless they only mean the synthetic ones.)

What's even more astonishing about this product is the variety of conditions it...well, not "treats;" claiming that would be illegal...it...affects? influences? somethings, anyway. Here's what they mention in the infomercial:

• Joint pain
  
• Arthritis, both osteo- and rheumatoid
  
• Fibromyalgia
  
• Restless leg syndrome
  
• Inflammation
  
• Neuropathy
  
• Tired leg syndrome
  
• Auto-immune diseases
  
• Tennis elbow
  
• Gout
  
• Chronic fatigue syndrome
  
• Carpal tunnel syndrome
  
• Scar tissue over the nerves
  
• Helps rebuild cartilage
  
• Works for dogs
  

(OK, strictly speaking "works for dogs" isn't a human condition, but like the other things it speaks to the degree of individual tailoring of the product.)

Now, granted, some of the things on the list could probably be lumped together; but other things – inflammation, neuropathy – have multiple causes. Plus, the list's causes (at least those which are understood) don't even stem from the same physiological system: osteoarthritis is skeletal, a sort of repetitive-motion condition, while gout has its origins in the kidneys. So that the product deals individually with them all is even more astonishing, especially considering that, unlike all of the "placebo band-aid products" such as the four pharmaceuticals which have side effects and do "not treat the problem" but only its symptoms, this product apparently...well, not "treats"...these problems and does so without side effects.

Well, it doesn't, of course; it wouldn't even if it did anything at all. What appalls me is that they think (and they are quite probably correct) there are plenty of people out there foolish enough to believe that a one-formulation-fits-all product is nevertheless individually tailored, more so than one (or a combination) of the variety of pharmaceuticals available.

Also, that it doesn't occur to such people to wonder why, if this product is all that and more, these guys have to sell it through an infomercial on daytime TV.