The Cost Of Prescription Drugs Is Justified Summary

567 Words2 Pages

Richard Epstein, a senior fellow at Hoover Institution writes, “The Cost of Prescription Drugs Is Justified"(2009), which defends the high cost of pharmaceutical drugs that are seen in today’s market. To start, Epstein acknowledges the widespread belief in America that pharmaceutical drugs cost too much. He discusses the rise of profits in drug companies in comparison to their success on Wall Street citing that companies such as Pfizer have had to cut-costs due to a lack of success in stocks. Then, Epstein focuses on four key ideas that help to explain the high cost. The first idea Epstein explores is the economics involved with drug-making. Drug companies earn most of their profits from one or two highly profitable drugs. The author claims that when generics or …show more content…

The time and cost it takes to put a drug through the trials as well as the FDA’s regulations make the rarely successful process a huge commitment for these drug companies. Next, the author compares the cost of drugs to the amount of lawsuits the companies receive. There are many risks to mass-producing drugs and with the FDA siding with Public Safety, the author states that drug companies can lose a lot of money. This is because the FDA is not willing to take any risks in approving drugs due to the repercussions being so severe, The final idea the author discusses is the process of research itself. The drug companies revenue is put towards developing new drugs that will help the public. This can be a very costly process which is why a lot of money is needed to support the research. Epstein’s purpose in writing this article is to defend the rising costs of pharmaceutical drugs in order to get people to understand the drug companies point of view and contributions to society. This article can be considered credible because it comes from Opposing Viewpoints in Context. This is a very reliable database for gathering

Show More
Related

  • Dr. John Abramson Overdosed America Summary

    859 Words  | 2 Pages

    Dr. John Abramson’s book Overdosed America debunks the myths about the excellence of American medicine. Abramson backs up this claim by closely examining research about medicine, closely examining the unpublished details submitted by drug manufacturers to the FDA, and discovering that the unpublished data does not coincide with the claims made about the safety and effectiveness of commonly used medicines. Abramsons purpose is to point out the flaws of the pharmaceutical industry in order to warn the readers about the credibility of the drugs they are buying. Given the critical yet technical language of the book, Abramson is writing to an audience that may include academic physicians as well as those who want to learn about the corruption of the pharmaceutical industry.

    Read More

  • Summary Of Melody Peterson's 'Our Daily Meds'

    760 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Melody Peterson’s “Our Daily Meds” , the history of marketing and advertising in the pharmaceutical industry is explored. The first chapter of the book, entitled “Creating disease”, focuses on how major pharmaceutical companies successfully create new ailments that members of the public believe exist. According to Peterson, the success that these drug manufacturers have experienced can be attributed to the malleability of disease, the use of influencial people to promote new drugs, the marketing behind pills, and the use of media outlets.

    Read More

  • Corruption of the Pharmaceutical Industry in America

    2937 Words  | 6 Pages

    "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 order to cure their ailments. For instance, they may present symptoms that are perfectly harmless, and lead potential citizens to believe that, because of these symptoms, they are "sick" and in need of medication. In some instances, the pharmaceutical industry in the United States misleads both the public and medical professionals by participating in acts of both deceptive marketing practices and bribery, and therefore does not act within the best interests of the consumers.

    Read More

  • Prescription Drug Advertising Pros And Cons

    520 Words  | 2 Pages

    Direct-to-consumer prescription drug ads are dangerous and can have serious effects on the health of the general public. In the article “Pros & Cons Arguments: ‘Should prescription drugs be advertised directly to consumers?’”, the pros and cons of the advertising of prescription drugs are compared. The negative aspects of these ads outweigh that of the positives. DTC prescription drug ads misinform patients, promote over-usage, and pressure medical providers. The counter side argues that these ads inform patients, create a positive impact on patient compliance with medication, and cause patients to confront their doctors.

    Read More

  • Drug Patents

    1902 Words  | 4 Pages

    Yu, Winnie and Joel Hay. 1999. “Drug Patents and Prices: Can we Achieve Better Outcomes?” Measuring the Prices of Medical Treatments. Pages 27-28.

    Read More

  • Medicare: Cost and Implications for the Future

    1965 Words  | 4 Pages

    Medicare is a social policy many of our seniors look to for their stability when they reach 65

    Read More

  • The Rise in the Price of Prescription Drugs

    1345 Words  | 3 Pages

    Government factors into the equation of the argument. Critics of the drug industry say that there is not enough regulation, while supporters of the pharmaceutical companies argue that there is too much regulation and that that is one...

    Read More

  • Enforcing Existing Controls for Drug Pricing

    1835 Words  | 4 Pages

    With prescription drug prices continually on the rise, especially in recent years, many have posed the question of how to control them. In their article “Why Don’t We Enforce Existing Drug Price Controls? The Unrecognized and Unenforced Reasonable Pricing Requirements Imposed upon Patents Deriving in Whole or in Part from Federally Funded Research,” Peter Arno and Michael Davis address and pose a solution to this long standing and hotly debated issue. The piece is an article published in 2001 as part of a student edited journal from Tulane Law University titled “The Tulane Law Review.” Although written in 2001, the problems addressed in this article hold the same, if not more merit than they did when the article

    Read More

  • The Rising Cost Of Healthcare

    1621 Words  | 4 Pages

    There is no doubt that healthcare cost are rising out of control. No one likes the

    Read More

  • The Power and Benefits of Monopolies in the Pharmaceutical Industry

    1993 Words  | 4 Pages

    Martinez, Barbara “Firms Paid to Trim Drug Costs Also Toil for Drug Makers” The Wall Street

    Read More

  • Argumentative Essay On Drug Advertising

    2059 Words  | 5 Pages

    Prices continue to increase with no end in sight. Although there are a number of reasons for this trend direct to consumer drug advertising is partially to blame. The American Medical Association has spoken out against drug advertising. Stating that the ads are driving up drug costs by convincing the consumer that the brand name drug is the one they need the most. Doctors feel pressured by patient into prescribing brand name drugs instead of their cheaper counterparts. Brand name drugs cost more than generic drugs. On average brand name drugs cost 80% more than their generic counterparts. Yet patients will often come in and request the band name drug. Insisting that the drug they saw on television is the one they need. Most doctors will give in to the patient’s requests. Patients are needlessly increasing their own medical costs because they incorrectly believe that the drug they saw on TV is safer and more effective. This is not the case. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) require all generic drugs to prove they are identical to their brand name counterparts, even going as far as to have both generic and brand name drugs have the same active ingredients, strength, dosage form, and route of administration. Generic drugs are just as safe and effective as brand name drugs and cost considerably less. Yet patients continue to request overpriced brand name

    Read More

  • Universal Prescription Drug Prices: A Case Study

    667 Words  | 2 Pages

    With the United States being the only country allowing a free market to determine drug prices, it has the potential for some companies to take advantage of it. Other European countries such as Germany, Sweden, France, and the United Kingdom have set government regulations on the prices of drugs and expenditures (Gross, D. J., Ratner, J., Perez, J., & Glavin, S. L.,1994). This set regulation prevents companies from price gouging, and these regulations are also due to their universal prescription drug benefits.“ A recent study by the U.S. Department of Commerce reviewed pricing in 11 OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries and found that, for patented drugs that were best sellers in the United States, the prices in other OECD countries were 18 to 67 percent less than U.S. prices, depending on the country.”(Sood, N., De Vries, H., Gutierrez, I., Lakdawalla, D., & Goldman, D., 2009). With the United States being the world’s leader is drug development, they are also the world’s leader in drug prices with their free market system (Gross, D. J., Ratner, J., Perez, J., & Glavin, S. L., 1994).

    Read More

  • The Prescription Drug Abuse Crisis

    1696 Words  | 4 Pages

    The rate of death due to prescription drug abuse in the U.S. has escalated 313 percent over the past decade. According to the Congressional Quarterly Transcription’s article "Rep. Joe Pitt Holds a Hearing on Prescription Drug Abuse," opioid prescription drugs were involved in 16,650 overdose-caused deaths in 2010, accounting for more deaths than from overdoses of heroin and cocaine. Prescribed drugs or painkillers sometimes "condemn a patient to lifelong addiction," according to Dr. Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This problem not only affects the lives of those who overdose but it affects the communities as well due to the convenience of being able to find these items in drug stores and such. Not to mention the fact that the doctors who prescribe these opioids often tend to misuse them as well. Abusing these prescribed drugs can “destroy dreams and abort great destinies," and end the possibility of the abuser to have a positive impact in the community.

    Read More

  • Specialty Drug Targeting: A Case Study

    811 Words  | 2 Pages

    The prices of specialty drugs would be lowered because there would not be several different companies making a drug for a condition that is already being effectively treated. Specialty drug prices are so high, that even doctors and hospitals have a hard time justifying the cost of them to patients, and some are even rejecting drugs. “Sloan-Kettering is not alone in rejecting drugs whose value doesn’t justify their cost. In Arizona, Banner Health last year added an economic review to its clinical appraisal of formulary drugs” (Melanie Evans). Specialty drug prices have become so ridiculous, that Banner Health, “which owns and operates 22 hospitals across seven states,” (Evans) felt it was necessary to add an economic review for specialty drugs. “The system’s economic review uses drug industry and other models as well as internal data to project the economic benefit for a drug, which includes the price and other factors such as potential savings from a medication that prevents hospitalization” (Evans). By using their economic review standards, Banner is able to justify if a specialty drug is worth the cost to the

    Read More

  • Pharmaceutical Case Study

    1598 Words  | 4 Pages

    Stan Frinkelstein and Peter Temin believes that one solution is to eliminate the link between drug prices and drug discovery. This will help ease the fear of losing research funding for new medicine and by doing so, drug prices should be a lot more reasonable. The next solution they have is to undo the blockbuster mentality and this is closely linked to eliminating the link between drug prices and drug discovery. Blockbuster refers to pharmaceutical companies that achieve an annual worldwide sale of $1 billion or more. They can achieve this because the drugs are used by many patients and/or used for a long period of time. This will solve the drug price crisis because by doing so, researchers can focus more on society’s needs instead of focusing on how to generate more revenue. Their solutions will help researchers develop drugs that society truly

    Read More

More about The Cost Of Prescription Drugs Is Justified Summary

Open Document