Pharmaceutical Companies Invest A Good Portion Of Their

"In the past two decades or so, health care has been commercialized as never before, and professionalism in medicine seems to be giving way to entrepreneurialism," commented Arnold S. Relman, professor of medicine and social medicine at Harvard Medical School (Wekesser 66). This statement may have a great deal of bearing on reality. The tangled knot of insurers, physicians, drug companies, and hospitals that we call our health system are not as unselfish and focused on the patients' needs as people would like to think. Pharmaceutical companies are particularly ruthless, many of them spending millions of dollars per year to convince doctors to prescribe their drugs and to convince consumers that their specific brand of drug is needed in

The Pharmaceutical industry spends about $100 million dollars a year to protect its profits through campaign contributions and lobbying expenses (Singer, 2007). These lobbyists outnumber congressmen two to one (Singer, 2007).

Traditional doctors prescribe their patients all types of drugs to treat conditions and diseases. Most people trust their physicians to give them the best care possible, but many doctors prescribe and recommend medications based on their relationship with a company. Pharmaceutical companies pay doctors or even provide meals, in exchange for meetings and education. In an article from Time Magazine from September 18, 2014, Your Doctor Should Reveal Biases and Pharma Ties, Says Group, author Alexandra Sifferlin explains the issue with these relationships. Sifferlin uses ethos, logos, pathos, and links to respectable websites to convince readers that patients should be made aware by their physicians of ties pharmaceutical companies and their positions of controversial practices.

The Pharmaceutical industry has been in the spotlight for decades due to the fact that they have a reputation for being unethical in its marketing strategies. In The Washington Post Shannon Brownlee (2008) states, “We try never to forget that medicine is for the people. It is not for the profits. The profits follow.” This honorable statement is completely lost in today’s world of pharmaceutical marketing tactics. These tactics are often deceptive and biased. Big Pharma consistently forgets their moral purpose and focuses primarily on the almighty dollar. Big Pharma is working on restoring their reputation by reforming their ethical code of conduct.

"The boundaries between academic medicine — medical schools, teaching hospitals, and their faculty — and the pharmaceutical industry have been dissolving since the 1980s, and the important differences between their missions are becoming blurred. Medical research, education, and clinical practice have suffered as a result"

When asked most people will say they are on at least one medication whether it be something over the counter or prescription. John Tirman in his book “100 Ways America Is Screwing up the World” writes about Big Pharma and how it has become both a domestic and global problem. Tirman discusses how American drug companies have a greater profit margin then most fortune 500 companies writing, “in 2004, the top nine American drug companies- this listed on Fortune 500- made median profit margin of 16 percent of revenues compared with 5.23 percent for other Fortune 500 industries” (Tirman 90). He goes on to talk more about how Big Pharma is dominating the industry, telling the reader that they are spending more on advertising than research. Tirman

Society expects drug companies to improve people’s well-being and to behave like a nonprofit company not overly concerned with making large profits. However, investors

Drug companies claim most of their profits are reinvested to develop new drugs, yet the industry has refused to show government auditors its books (Clemente, 2004). In addition, pharmaceutical companies do not acknowledge the financial contribution of the government which funds research with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Cancer Institute, and other public agencies. "The Federal Government, mainly through the NIH, funds about 36% of all U.S. medical research. . . Of the 21 most important drugs introduced between 1965 and 1992, 15 were developed using knowledge and techniques from federally funded research" (Barlett & Steele, 2004). Pfizer 's profits of $9.1 billion for 2002 were 28 percent, twice which of General Electric, nine times more than Wal-Mart and 31 times more than General Motors (Barlett & Steele, 2004). "Drugmakers ' net profit margins averaged 19 percent last year vs. 7.5 percent for all the companies in the S&P 500. The seven largest U.S. drugmakers made $31.2 billion last year" (Gibbs, 2003). This supports the findings of a recent online survey conducted by Weiss Ratings, Inc.: "forty-two percent of consumers polled blame pharmaceutical companies ' excessive profits for high prescription drug costs" ("Drug," 2004).

On the other hand, although such drug companies may be acting unethically, they are also acting in a legal matter. In other words, they are

Today pharmaceutical industry is worth 300 billion dollars and controls a majority of the money market. It is an industry that today is in very close ties with the FDA. The FDA has lost face because it is now to closely linked with big pharmaceutical companies. It is more beneficial and profitable for ‘Big Pharma’ to have more unhealthy people because that would mean more drug sales. Mercola, Joseph, Dr. "Exposing the Truth Behind FDA Approval and Guidance."

What is best for pharmaceutical companies or gun manufacturers, for example, is not necessarily what is best for the public. According to a joint study by the Associated Press and The Center for Public Integrity, printed by US News Online, “Drug companies and allied advocates spent more than $880 million on lobbying and political contributions at the state and federal level over the past decade; by comparison, a handful of groups advocating for opioid limits spent $4 million. The money covered a range of political activities important to the drug industry, including legislation and regulations related to opioids” (US News Online 3). Four million is derisory compared to upwards of a billion dollars. It is no conjecture whose agenda

- Pharmaceutical companies have a positive appearance with their “charity work” by donating large sums of money to charitable organizations to assist people who can’t typically afford the highly priced medical drugs.

The corporate social responsibility states that "corporations can and should act ethically and be accountable to society for their actions." Pharmaceutical companies work to save lives and make a profit. Individuals should make sure that

At first glance, pharmaceutical companies are seen as these evil corporations that just want your hard earned, tax payer money for medications that you do not necessarily need. While this may be true for reoccurring drugs taken over a long period of time, vaccines (not including the flu vaccine) are usually a one or two time “drug”, once you are done with the single dosage or dosage set you do not need more. Vaccines also prevent them from selling more medication for those diseases that are vaccinated for. The only way a vaccine is going to be a “cash cow” for the company is if it’s a brand new vaccine and its recently patented, which is not the case for any of the vaccines children and teens get every day. This type of medicine is recommended by doctors for the safety of children, not so that doctors and big pharmaceutical companies can make money:

There is a lot of discussion about pharmaceutical companies, intellectual property, and the global AIDS epidemic. Do pharmaceutical companies have a responsibility to distribute drugs for free or low cost in developing countries? Why is intellectual property such a big deal? What impact would South Africa’s decision to levy duties on drugs in the country have on the international distribution of drugs? Was the change that provided patent protection for pharmaceutical companies an appropriate change or a dangerous precedent? Was it necessary to relax intellectual property rules in order to ensure that adequate supplies of AIDs medications would be available for distribution in the