Too many people take too many pills

As a pharmacist in a big hospital in Adelaide, Emily Reeve would often see patients overwhelmed by the they took each day. “They’d say ‘I take so many medicines that I rattle when I walk’,” she recalls. And she worried that some of the medications these patients were on seemed useless, or even harmful.Dr Reeve’s patients are not unusual, at least in the rich world. About 15% of people in England take five or more prescription drugs every day. So do 20% of Americans and Canadians aged 40-79. Since the old tend to be sicker, the number of pills a person pops tends to rise over time. Of Americans who are 65 or older, two-thirds take at least five medications each day. In Canada, a quarter of over-65s take ten or more.