Posted by Todd (64.34.202.197) on August 09, 2000 at 17:46:57:
In Reply to: Mr./Ms. August Oh Pleeze........ posted by John Braganca on August 09, 2000 at 06:08:36:
You know, the neurological disorder which causes its' victims to scream out obscenities involuntarily. Sure you have...we've all heard of it.
But did you know that less than 100,000 Americans have Tourette's? That's .04% (4-100's of a percent). Oh, and of those 100,000, less than 10% are actually afflicted with the symptom for which Tourette's is best known...the involuntary swearing. That's 10,000.
Yet, in the 70's, the US Congress passed special legislation to fund research that has led to effective means of controlling (not curing) Tourette's. Pharmaceutical companies interested in bolstering their oft-muddied public images jumped on the bandwagon and offered the meds free or at extremely high rates of subsidy.
Now, let's continue the math exercise-
IF there are 36 Million CHr's and 3.6 Million are chronic, then there are 32,400,000 episodics.
Cycles vary greatly, but let's use one cycle per year for 6 weeks just for this exercise.
That's 194,400,000 cycle weeks per year. At 3 CH per day, it's a total of 4,082,400,000 CH attacks per year.
Add in the aforementioned chronics, at 4 CH per day for 45 wks out of the year and that's another 648,000,000 attacks per year, for a grand total of 4,730,400,000.
A drug like Imitrex that actually works for everyone and doesn't have the side-effects that limit Imitrex would sell very conservatively for $10/dose.
$47,304,000,000 per year. That's 47 Billion, 304 Million Dollars.
Just to be on the cautious side, let's say the 'real' number are only 1/2 of these guesstimates. That drops it to a little less than $24 Billion dollars. Per Year.
The longest journey begins with one step. If you don't want to walk along with the rest, fine. But have enough class not to sit roadside in your lawnchair and toss out sarcastic jeers.
KTSSU,
T