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  • Essay / The Effect of Commercialism on the Pharmaceutical Industry in the United States

    The United States today faces a crisis of greed and distrust in the pharmaceutical industry and the medical field, leaving doctors and medical professionals to contradict the reasons they took an oath to serve the pharmaceutical industry. patient who comes to ask for help and never take advantage of their vulnerability. This oath once followed by doctors and health professionals now highlights how "doctors have always sought to present themselves as providers of social services; until recently, in the United States, they functioned as small businessmen.” (Churchill) With this awareness of a changing personality in the pharmaceutical and medical field, how has it been affected by commercialism? Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the Original Essay To put more emphasis on the pharmaceutical industry and medical research, we must first delve deeper into the oath of Hippocrates, the basis of the doctor-patient relationship. , and how both have been displaced by commercialism. The ethical role of a physician, known as the Hippocratic Oath, is to apply scientific knowledge to the patient's individual situation and to practice these skills for the benefit of the patient. Currently, in many countries, including the United States, commercialism threatens professional ethics, leaving many doctors helpless without the support of the pharmaceutical industry and its products. Marc A. Rodwin, author and professor at Suffolk University Law School, makes the above points about commercialism in medicine and research, stating that "the central problem with commercialism in medicine today, as in the past, is physician entrepreneurship. The challenge today is to find ways to manage conflicts of interest in medicine while preserving those aspects of the market and commerce that provide value. » (Rodwin) Furthermore, the main reason for the decline of medical professional values ​​is the increasing commercialization of the United States. health care and pharmaceutical system. Dr. Howard Brody, professor and director of the Institute for Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, writes in his book Hooked: Ethics, the Medical Profession, and the Pharmaceutical Industry about how “ modern medicine breaks the doctor-patient relationship of trust, allowing itself to be hooked by the pharmaceutical industry without being able to escape its grip. (Brody) He mentions how gifts and rewards influence doctors' decisions and, furthermore, medical institutions are becoming more and more dependent on support from the pharmaceutical industry. It is also important to remember that pharmaceutical companies also use drug marketing and advertising to get patients to ask. their doctors on the drugs that have been promoted, whether on television and radio, thus promoting the commercial and lucrative plan of the medical field. Dr. Brody also points out that the revenue generated by pharmaceutical companies uses these funds to. research, but also manipulate data to achieve favorable results, thereby promoting higher sales and demand for currently marketed drugs or drugs. More interestingly, Raffy Chilingerian, global head of established medicine program regulation at Novartis Pharmaceutical, agrees that insurance and pharmaceutical companies)