Profiting From Your Ill Health
Profiting from your ill health...Modern mainstream medicine and research provides us with an unprecedented understanding of human biology and the opportunity to live healthier longer lives. However, in recent decades there is growing concern about the power and the role that massive pharmaceutical companies play in how health is treated today. Although the pharmaceutical industry generated an enormous $364 billion of revenue in 2001 [1] by 2006 the sales of prescription medicines had topped $600 billion. This equalled an incredible $252 billion in annual sales in the USA alone, with strong growth in the markets of China, Russia, Mexico and South Korea. [2] If you are ill - especially with an untreatable condition with symptoms that must be managed - you are one of thousands, or millions even, of small goldmines for the drugs companies. - Just imagine if everyone became well overnight? What would happen to the pharmaceutical companies profits? Put simply, it is not in the drugs company's interests for you to be healthy (or even necessarily happy)! This is not a conspiracy theory just the simple economics of running a corporation whose primary goal is profit.
Of course it won't happen. But what if we took greater control for our own health and better care of ourselves from an earlier age? After all, the number one medicine in the world is Lipitor [3] used for high cholesterol, made by Prizer it has annual sales of $12.9 billion [4] . What if we looked to resolving the underlying problems causing our health problems not just manage the symptoms? What if we took our happiness, mental health and levels of stress seriously? Would this also be in the drugs companies interest? It would certainly take longer but would also have an enormous impact on their profits too. Drugs are marketed as the solution to all your health concerns - a pill for every ill: depression, obesity, ADHD [5] , mental health issues such as bipolar disorder, heartburn, hair loss, and impotence/ erectile dysfunction. We and our children also now face an ever increasing numbers of modern day illnesses and disorders that has led to a new phrase - disease mongering! Pharmaceutical companies spend huge amounts of money on advertising, lobbying politicians, marketing to the public, and public relations. This is through mainstream media (such as television, magazines and newspapers) but also through health care journals. In 2001, all but one of the top 9 US drug companies spent over twice as much on advertising, marketing and administration than on research and development [6] . They also market directly to doctors, physicians, general practitioners (GPs) and health care practitioners, especially in the USA. Increasingly doctors are seen as the most important players in the pharmaceutical industry as they actually write the prescriptions. [7] In the USA alone there are over 90,000 drugs reps trying to secure sales of drugs to physicians [8] by bombarding them with samples, gifts, and even food. It has become so bad that an organisation of healthcare providers have formed an organisation. NoFreeLunch is totally opposed to pharmaceutical promotion guiding or influencing clinical practice and is actively attempting to discourage all health care providers, trainees, and students from accepting the plethora of free gifts drug reps hand out! They are gravely concerned that the drugs companies exert enormous influence this way. [9] Check out the AMAZING AMOUNT OF VIAGRA FREEBIES . This is not to rubbish modern medicine, like some alternative medicine practitioners like to do, or deny its ability to play an enormously important role in today's world. Or equally to offer herbal, alternative and complimentary medicine as a panacea to all the problems we face but to ask a very simple question: Do the pharmaceutical companies have our best interests at heart?
[3] Registered trademark Pfizer |
