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Comment by slg | Hacker News Reader

>Why can't I just chat with an AI bot and get my prescription?

Because people have decided that whatever drug you are taking shouldn't be taken without a doctor's oversight. If you have a problem with that conclusion, the response should be lobbying to get that drug reclassified as safe for over-the-counter sale, not completely removing the doctor's oversight from the prescription process. Ironically, your proposal here is using AI to treat the symptom that frustrates you without any attempt to diagnose or treat the actual root cause of the problem.

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Doctors don't hunt for root causes, in my experience. They do the minimum to bring that specific visit to a pleasant, malpractice-free conclusion.

Doctors oversight should be removed (not as an option, but as a requirement) for 90% of all prescriptions. Unless the drug has externalities like antibiotic resistance, is heinously addictive, or is so difficult to administer correctly that you cant take it outside of a hospital, there's no good reason to tell people what they can't put in their bodies. Whether or not your insurance will pay for it without a prescription is another matter.

This is not an argument that has any relevancy to AI. If anything, someone who believes what you say should be against the introduction of AI into the system because your argument is fundamentally that these drugs shouldn't have a gatekeeper. Swapping out one gatekeeper for another, especially with the new gatekeeper being the unknown black box of some AI middleman, won't actually address your complaint.

It is entirely relevant because removing the bureaucratic gatekeeping of doctors allows people to choose to use AI instead.

> removing the bureaucratic gatekeeping of doctors

And replacing it with the "bureaucratic gatekeeping of" AI?

"choose" is doing a lot of heavy lifting there.

I think the AI could help. Sure there are a lot of drugs that should be over the counter. Don't know why anyone would abuse ear drops for a kid. But the AI could let you know if there are any dangerous interactions or if your alignment would be helped with this prescription. Besides the AI could spend more time w you than a doctor and answer questions

When it comes to abuse, you already have it with real doctors. Pill mills exist.

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