by Debs is Dead
(lifted from a comment)
I suppose that it is no surprise that peeps in NZ are more aware of
the fact their country is one of only two that allows direct to
consumer prescription drug advertising, than the peeps in the other
country, amerika. The deregulation may be newer here, but since it
occurs within the continuum of a semi-socialised health system is it
certainly more controversial. Physicians and other health professionals
complain of the difficulty of treating a patient who believes they
already know what they need having diagnosed their malady and selected
their remedy on the basis of a 20 second TV commercial.
The law was changed during the first flush of neo-liberal ‘let the
markets decidism’ At that time all censorship laws and anti-pr0n
legislation was also abolished – although that was re-introduced when
the most awful snuff movies starring no longer economically viable
german heroin addicted sex workers began to proliferate.
Since then slightly ‘lefter’ in name if not in action, governments
have allowed the commercials to continue. This after no holds barred
negotiations with big Pharma.
The pharmaceutical companies are forever trying to prevent their
brand name drugs from being replaced with no name generics, and have
deliberately withdrawn drugs from NZ for which there is no generic
alternative if Pharmac (the government drug buying authority) allows
generic alternatives to other drugs on their list.
It gets nasty and of course deadly since these are life and death
decisions. So by way of a trade off the government has agreed to let
the makers of Viagra, Ritalin, even Vioxx until that became a little how shall we say it, controversial?
In return for funding generics Pharmac is extorted into allowing big
Pharma to advertise their product, which if the patient insists, is
prescribed (and funded) ahead of the generic.
Of course that isn’t the worst that the drug corporates get up to
here. The old favorite of promising "wonder drug" -like properties on
some chemical that they hold exclusive rights to, then promising dying
people that this drug will fix them, if only the mean interfering
nanny-state will pay for it, is still popular.
Women who are considered the best target for these campaigns by big
pharma, as it is widely held most men usually only worry about being
sick when they are mortally ill. Anyway women are continually told that
Pharmac is conspiring to kill them.
Some wonder drug which can help in limited instances of breast
cancer has been pushed to women as their new saviour. Doctors with
nothing better to do than push their own barrow are leading the charge
for 100% funded Herceptin for all women with the particular form of
cancer that Herceptin can assist in.
On the surface that seems fair enough until one discovers that the
manufacturers charge over $US100,000 for each course of treatment of
Herceptin. Not because it costs anything like that to produce, but
because that is how much they can get.
Well just pay the $100,000 is what anyone with a loved one with
breast cancer would say. Thing is when the health budget is finite as
it is; is it morally acceptable to spend $100,000 on something that
might extend a person’s life for several more years knowing that money
could also be used to pay for several open heart operations, or many
other treatments which would give life to more people. In addition
accepting the drug manufacturers extortion will guarantee that every
other corporation will also ramp up their prices for their sole patent
drugs.
The govt attempted a compromise. Herceptin treatment normally runs
for 12 months but they uncovered some research which they claim shows
nearly as good a success rate with a much shorter treatment period, 9
weeks.
That didn’t go down well with the corporate propagandists who rarked
up the "Herceptin Heroines" into refusing the shorter treatment thereby
endangering their own lives (drug companies will stop at nothing it
seems) to demand the full 12 months, which is apparently not affordable.
As I’ve pointed out before, the amerikan health system’s appallingly
inefficient and discriminatory structure impacts on everyone else’s
health system around the world. If amerika did introduce a form of
complete health coverage for all citizens, the pharmaceutical
corporations would lose their guaranteed ‘earner’ of unquestioning
support for those elites with five star corporate coverage, (probably
coverage underwritten by insurance corporations which hold stock in the
drug corporates), and have to negotiate with health authorities world
wide on a more equal footing. If the various government bodies
responsible for public health funding decisions, about this planet
stood together, some remarkable changes in healthcare affordability
must ensue.