The Black Hole in The Cost of Healthcare: Big Pharma and Transparency
It’s no secret that Big Pharma has been providing doctors with special perks in return for prescribing their products. This has been going on for ages. But to get a better grip on why the costs of healthcare have been increasing dramatically we need to understand about the massive networks that Big Pharma is involved in. Believe it or not, Big Pharma is connected to everything. The AMA, the FDA, the financial markets/big business, the insurance industry, law and politics; these are all affected by Big Pharma.
Recently it was reported that there are more Americans addicted to prescription drugs than illegal drugs. An article in The New York Times stated that “An analysis of autopsies in 2007 released this week by the Florida Medical Examiners Commission found that the rate of deaths caused by prescription drugs was three times the rate of deaths caused by all illicit drugs combined.” That’s a pretty hefty number. I know quite a few people who became addicted to prescription drugs. Some said tranquilizers and painkillers were harder to quit than illegal drugs. Prescription pain killers have become the “new heroin”, and are increasingly becoming a major problem in the school system.
Not only are the doctors getting “perks” from the drug companies, but the professors and the research facilities of major universities have been the recipient of “special benefits” as well. Recently “three influential psychiatrists from Harvard Medical School seem to have been caught with their hands in the drug-laced cookie jar, and now they’re in big trouble. Two days after it was alleged that the three doctors failed to report a collective $4.2 million in payments from pharmaceutical companies, Harvard and the affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital have launched an investigation into the doctors’ behavior.” Big Pharma = Big Money.
More… 
- research thanks to: Bruce S.
