Have you ever thought why you don’t have any medicine or vaccine at hand which with one use can completely cure you from mental disorders like AIDS or cancer? Maybe it’s too difficult to make those scientists haven’t even tried yet, or they deliberately don’t try to make one so you don’t have to buy the drug more than once and they can’t make any more money off of you.
Before discussing the topic, let’s first see what needs to be done before bringing medicine to the market. So, the first step in bringing the drug to the market is to give the drug a trial. First, the drug has to be tested on animals. Then there are three steps to give trials on humans. Then this research has to be published in scientific literature. Finally, the medicine delivers to the market.
But the problem is that when the results of these trials are negative, the drug company stops producing the drug. But many pharmaceutical companies only release such drugs in the market in the hope of their profits. Sometimes the side effects of these medicines are not disclosed to the public. And only the positive aspects are highlighted in the literature. But when the drug is given a trial in a government-funded or non-profit organization, its truth is discovered.
A big example is a drug called ‘STATIN’ which is a cholesterol-lowering drug released in 2007. Researchers of ‘Plose-medicine’ meta-analyses about the drug where many observations are made. They show that out of 192 trials of this drug, the trials funded by the medicine industry showed 20 times more benefits than other trials. It is done on purpose. This deliberate miscalculation at a medicine company is called publication bias.
Another example of clinical miscalculation is the release of a diabetes drug called ‘ROSITAZONE’ in 1999. It is produced by the famous international medicine company GlaxoSmithKline. This drug has heart side effects. In 2003, the WHO found that this drug was causing serious heart disease. In 2007 another meta-analysis found that taking the drug increased the risk of heart disease by 43 percent. But GlaxoSmithKline kept all these things secret and released the drug in 1999.
Another drug of GlaxoSmithKline is ‘Anti-depressant Paroxetine’ which increases the tendency to commit suicide. Again, a currently available drug ‘VLOXX’ increases the risk of a heart attack. Each of these side effects is kept secret by the drug company from the customer.
Now let’s discuss why we don’t have any permanent medicine for the diseases like AIDS or cancer. In 2003 ROCHE, an international medicine company discovered an HIV medicine called FUZON. But the problem is that a person has to spend 20 thousand dollars a year to take this medicine. In other words, if you take this drug, your HIV will not be completely cured, but the company will hold you, hostage, for the rest of your life.
In 2007, the University of Albert started researching a cancer medicine called Dichloroacetic acid. Cancer cells can be cured like normal cells through this remedy. The University of Albert sought further funding to complete the research. But the interesting thing is that no profitable company gave them funding because what would happen to their business if a permanent cure for cancer was discovered?
Overall, pharmaceutical companies think about their profits first and not about serving people.
Want to read more blog, click here https://ysseblog.com/is-pharmaceutica…service-or-fraud/
Joyosree Sikder
Intern, Content Writing Department
Youth School for Social Entrepreneurs (YSSE)