500mg 3 times a day for 10 days, vomited once, have had a horribl...

sorry, i disagree. i think it is the doctor's responsibility to go over possible side effects with patients. of course, they don't have time thanks to HMOs to instruct their patients on anything.
drug warnings have gotten so complicated that you can't expect lay people, sick lay people at that, to be able to read through all that technical stuff.
italy has a much better system. the doctor diagnoses the problem and sends the patient to a pharmacist who is a person with an advanced degree in pharmacology, not merely someone behind the counter at a CVS.
the pharmacist looks at the diagnosis, goes over the patients history, other medications (which are less in europe to be sure), allergies, etc and prescribes the right drug.
there is no need for drug companies to send cute girls to doctors' offices with free lunches and pens since the doctors don't prescribe.
italy ranks 2nd in health care as opposed to the USA at 37th. i suspect this has something to do with that

I have had strep several times even with no tonsils. The Z-pak quit working for me last year but they tried it again last week for a bacteria infection in my throat that made it impossible to talk and hard to swallow or breathe. I took the Zpak for the 5 days and still felt crappy. The doctor called in the Amoxicilan at 875 mg 2 times per day. The first day was okay, i could talk again but then the second day....... my entire body ached - legs, hips, arms, back. I have arthritis in my knees so pain is not anything new for me except this pain was like nothing i could remember. It subsided in the afternoon of the 3rd day so i thought i was over it, but took my evening dose and again woke up with aches so bad i could not sleep. I thought it was fibro myalga but knew that could not onset so fast. I am not taking anymore of that stuff and would rather live with the sore throat than all that aching.