Imagine we had a pill that prevented lung cancer risk from smoking cigarettes. Would we say that preferring fresh air over cigarette smoke is "a fad, promoted as a cure-all for everything, its adherents have a near-religious devotion to it" just because we could now eliminate one of the many severe consequences of smoking?
When we know something has several adverse effects, it's not a "fad" or "near-religious devotion" to want to avoid it, even if some of those adverse effects can be mitigated with medications.
That's even putting aside the likelihood of other consequences from those medications, especially when many are combined, as they often end up being.
Dude just compared eating rice (a staple food staple food for 3.5 billion people) with cigarette smoking.
I rest my case.
100 years later it emerged as a fad diet among non-epileptics that is promoted as a cure-all for everything. It's adherents have a near-religous devotion to it. That's where the "stigma" comes from - not its medical use.