I previously mentioned Kalman Applbaum's excellent post on conflicts of interest, and he has since produced a wonderful series of posts on pharmaceutical marketing, capitalism, and medicine.
Excerpting them will not be helpful, IMO, as they should be read in their entirety.
The series consists of three posts: here, here, and here.
As someone with a pronounced interest in matters related to conflicts of interest, I have found over the past few years social science approaches to be especially useful in framing some of the inquiries and illuminating key pieces of data. For example, the primary evidence suggesting that even small gifts are troubling from an ethical perspective stems from the extensive social science literature on the effect of gifts in producing social cohesion. Gifting accomplishes this by promoting reciprocity among the gifter and the giftee, which is, of course, exactly the point of doing so in the relationships between prescribers and pharmaceutical/medical device companies.
Analyses of this quality usually languish behind a paywall at a publisher, so take advantage, and go read Applbaum.
The big drug companies have been doing this for years and they aren't about to stop now. Major companies offer bonuses to doctors and other health advocate whom push pills,treatments, visits, etc
It is all about the money to them , no compassion for life what so ever.
Posted by: Nurse line | March 10, 2009 at 08:29 AM
Glad to see that your blog is still active, Daniel.
About 300 years ago the Norman-English aristocracy stopped plotting against and murdering each other and began to almost exclusively (if you don't count wars) use law for criminal purposes.
That empire never took the results of the Revolutionary War or the War of 1812 seriously. Even the Civil War can be seen as a continuation of the struggle between monarchists and commoners.
The monarchy gives special protection to the pharmaceutical industry. No class action suits, for example.
Posted by: Sue | March 19, 2009 at 06:17 AM
As usual it is all about the money and power. It is absolutely disgusting when someone finally realizes what the hell is going on in the world today.Power,greed, and corruption
Posted by: Electronic Medical Records | March 22, 2009 at 03:44 PM