> Pain a warning signal from the body. It's something one should listen to, not just try to ignore and overrule.

That's a pretty apt explanation for why pain probably evolved via natural selection, but you can't therefore conclude that all or even most pain is a genuinely actionable warning sign.

Presumably the vast majority of OTC painkiller usage is for short-lived and low-severity pain. I don't think it's a hubristic affront to biology to feel a bit of soreness, note it, then take the painkillers.

>Presumably the vast majority of OTC painkiller usage is for short-lived and low-severity pain

which is far from harmless given how many people use them as a replacement for treating underlying symptoms and changing their life. Case study my dad. Kept taking ibuprofen to get rid of 'harmless' headaches and back pain because he was 'too busy', few years later he couldn't ignore it any more, turns out he had completely messed up disc in his cervical spine from years of physical stress, bad posture, no treatment or exercise etc.

just look at the sheer amount of back pain diagnoses. About a third of Americans report back pain at any given time, IIRC 10-15% of the population go to the doctor any given year for back pain. There's likely millions, if not tens of millions preventable cases if you replaced the liberal use of OTC drugs with actually solving the lifestyle problems.

>but you can't therefore conclude that all or even most pain is a genuinely actionable warning sign.

I didn't read their comment that way at all. It seems they're critiquing the default action that many people take, which is "pain = pop an aleve/tylenol/advil/etc. and get back to it."