An editorial in today's New York Times takes a skeptical approach toward the Food and Drug Administration's plans to ease the approval requirements for Alzheimer's drugs. The editorial warns "the proposal raises troubling questions as to whether the agency would end up approving drugs that provide little or no clinical benefit yet cause harmful side effects in people who take the medications for extended periods." The editorial goes on to say that "Even if drugs are eventually approved under this new approach, it will be imperative to force manufacturers to conduct follow-up studies, as required by law, to see if patients benefit in the long run."
Contrast the Times's cautious approach to Alzheimer's medication with its enthusiasm for medical marijuana, which the Times editorialists have recently been urging Governors Christie and Cuomo to dispense in New Jersey and New York despite the FDA's position that marijuana is not medicine and that the medical benefits of it haven't been shown to outweigh the potential risks.
The editorial on Alzheimer's drugs doesn't mention marijuana, but it lays the groundwork for a potential distinction in some phrases about how the early-stage Alzheimer's patients are "still healthy," while some of the medical marijuana patients may have cancer and thus not meet the Times standard of being "still healthy."
It's a fine enough distinction to raise the suspicion that's what's really driving these editorial positions isn't some finely calibrated or carefully thought out philosophy or system of medical ethics, but a reflexive opposition to the pharmaceutical industry and support for government regulation (on the Alzheimer's drugs) combined with a kind of warm Baby Boom generation counterculture hazy friendliness toward marijuana.