User:Sportsmand/ADHDdeclaration

As a WP:SPA I consider it relevant to state my POV in relation to my chosen subjects. This is my personal, unqualified opinion.

ADHD: Cause, diagnosis and treatment

• ADHD could well represent selected genetic traits in humans, validated through evolutionary pressure for more than 2 million years.

• Impacts on embryo or foetus, circumstances of birth or even later, could suggest that biological causes may impact brain development. This alone or combined with the selected traits, could vary the natural chemical workings of the brain. However, the main explanation is probably selection.

• The ADHD diagnosis represents a societal definition of these traits. However, the functional deficit compared to society is real.

• The gene pool is mixed. We all have it to some degree.

• Treatment. Seems like "coping" is the key word. Individualized programs. Self-reliance and -acceptance is indicated by professionals themselves diagnosed with ADHD.

• Stimulant use. Basic principle must be to let the individual or family decide. Don't use them unless really needed. Sudden death is a real danger, prolonged use accumulates risk.

My view on the pharmaceutics industry

Pharmaceutics may be called the arch-typical "high risk, slow feedback" industry; the aircraft industry being another example of this. Pharmaceutics take huge financial risks over many years developing products that may finally prove to not be marketable or not commercially successful. The risk is usually mitigated by spreading it to many concurrent asynchronous research and development projects, typically called the "pipeline". Some projects fail, some succeed, and the cost of the failures are paid by the income from the others. So-called "winners" seem essential to the business, as patents and market penetration may ensure profits for a large number of years. Winners are marketed and sold to the full extent possible to maximize profits.

One should never lose sight of the fact that pharmaceutics are just another industry in a market economy. It would be essentially wrong to conclude that the motivation of the industry is anything but profit. The motivation of the individual working in the industry may well be very different, but in the final analysis they too depend on the profitability of the business. Finally, how the drug companies operates becomes a regulatory issue.

1986: Disaster in Dreiländereck

Disclaimer

In the first half of the 1990's, I was professionally engaged with an international software consulting company that at the time had substantial contracts with the three major pharmaceutical companies in Basel, Switzerland. These are today known as Novartis and Roche. Stationed in Basel, I at various times advised, assisted or supervised co-workers directly involved with these companies. On one project, I briefly consulted directly with one of them. However, the large majority of my work at the time was not related to any of them. Since then, I have not had personal, professional, business-related or any kind of affiliation related to the pharmaceutics industry, or groups and beliefs opposed to such.--Sportsmand (talk) 13:29, 4 May 2009 (UTC)