ERROR: Medicare patients are over 62 and are seldom pregnant.

Anyone receiving a disability benefit from the Social Security program is required to sign up for Medicare beginning 6 months after payment of the first benefit.

Additional persons receiving "social welfare" benefits from other (State, etc) programs frequently are eligible for Medicare, sometimes as an option and sometimes as a requirement of the programs.

In most states this includes the majority of children in foster care. Children of persons receiving some kinds of welfare benefits may be eligible even when the parents are not.

As a consequence, nearly 50% of MEDICARE eligible persons in the US are less than 62 years old. Payments by Medicare for medical treatment of persons under retirement age has hovered near 50% of all Medicare costs in recent years, including large numbers of females of child-bearing ages.

US Specific: In the US there is a move to require validation of herbal medicines for medical uses, with prohibitions on advertising herbals as having medical benefits without proof of effectiveness, control of dosage and purity, and verification of "freedom from harm." The Physicians Desk Reference for Herbal Medicines is just as easily available as the Physicians Desk Reference for prescription meds - both from the same FDA/AMA supported and approved publisher.

There are few prohibitions on sale, but claims of medicinal value need to be examined and have in some cases been disputed. (Some states prohibit sale of sassafras roots and bark, and some restrict licorice (but not necessarily anise) due to carcinogenic properties demonstrated by tests and known to my grandma 100 years ago.)

John