The U.S Pharmaceutical Industry

The U.S pharmaceutical industry is one of the world's most important national markets, and this industry affects everybody. With such a high responsibility, the pharmaceutical industry needs to respect its consumers. Through the use of pharmaceutical advertisement the industry is causing problems among its consumers regarding what is right for themselves. Advertisements try and sell a product to their consumer, and that’s the problem. People should not be sold on medication, but rather in dire need of medication. Pharmaceutical advertisement's offer a quick fix to medical issues, and affects the consumer thinking that there are pills for every medical issue. These types of advertisement's have a greater and even deadly effect on its consumers. Being how serious the matter of the business is, drug companies should not be able to advertise to the public.

An article posted on Oregonlive.com, raises the question of whether or not drug companies should be able to advertise to the public. Oregonian Media Group is a media company that serves a variety of businesses. They provide strategic advertising, digital, print, search, social and content marketing — locally, regionally and nationally. Oregonian Media Group is Oregon’s leading news source and publisher of The Oregonian / Oregon Live. Oregon Live picked up this topic from The Tylt. The Tylt is an Advance Digital Inc. property. The Tylt focused on debates and conversations around news, current events and pop culture. The Tylt provides the community with the opportunity to share their opinions and vote on topics that matter most to them through social media. The article goes on to state “Direct-to-consumer drug advertising (DTCA) is illegal in every developed nation except the US and New Zealand.” This information raises the question on how much does the United States care about the safety of its citizens when dealing with pharmaceutical drugs. In addition to this information, the article introduces Julie Donohue, a professor of public health at the University of Pittsburgh. She states “something like a third of consumers who've seen a drug ad have talked to their doctor about it…About two-thirds of those have asked for a prescription. And the majority of people who ask for a prescription have that request honored” (qtd in Tylt). Every human should always have the right to their own health and decide what goes into their bodies. Every drug company should not have the right to free speech, but should be required to provide information to the public through their primary caretaker before becoming an ad for whomever to see. This article also uses a bandwagon technique by showing a poll of people who voted on the subject. The poll lists that 83.4% of people voted to band drug ads, and 16.6% of people voted drug ads are necessary. This leads the question how many people are taking negative affects to not being properly prescribed drugs.

Donald W. Light writes in his article, "New Prescription Drugs: A Major Health Risk With Few Offsetting Advantages" on Harvard University's Center for Ethics webpage, “properly prescribed drugs (aside from falsely prescribing, overdosing, or self-prescribing) cause about 1.9 million hospitalizations a year. Another 840,000 hospitalized patients are given drugs that cause serious adverse reactions for a total of 2.74 million serious adverse drug reactions. About 128,000 people die from drugs prescribed to them.” It's safe to say that nobody is falsely prescribing any of the drugs to their patients. The Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics seeks to advance teaching and research on ethical issues in public life. Widespread ethical lapses of leaders in government, business and other professions prompt demands for more and better moral education. Light argues “Perhaps this is 'the price of progress’?” This argument might be true in some cases but is still an appeal to pity in effort to accept the conclusion. Instead of slanting the argument, Light goes on to talk about the people who benefited from prescription drugs. Light states “about 170 million Americans take a prescription drug, and many benefit from the drug. For some, drugs save their life or keep them alive. About 80 percent of them are generic…” That leaves about 20 percent of the estimated 170 million people [34 million] have benefited from non-generic drugs, generic meaning drugs whose benefits and risks are better known. With all the information attained from this article, banning drug ads seems to be the correct and safe route.

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