To Market to Market, by Martha Thomases – Brilliant Disguise

August 13, 2011 Martha Thomases 1 Comment

The GOP declares that if we just let the free market be the free market, everything will be fine.  

If I may over-simplify, they maintain that the laws of supply and demand will correct possible abuses by business.  For example, if Corporation A overcharges for its services, or offers an unsafe product, consumers will choose to buy from Corporation B.  

This is fine if you aren’t the consumer who demonstrates that A’s products were unsafe, perhaps by having an accident while using them.  And if we’re talking about products that are not necessities, like maybe lipstick or pantyhose, it’s not usually a big deal.

But then there’s health care.

Throughout the debate over what the right loves to call Obamacare, opponents argued that there was no reason for government interference, because the free market was all we needed to guarantee safe, affordable health care for everyone.  They claimed that our health care system is the best in the world (actually, we’re 37th), and maybe it is, if you have enough money to see your private doctor whenever you like, without having to worry about an insurance company denying your coverage.

There are times when capitalism and health care don’t mix well.  This week, we have two examples.  No surprise, they both involve the pharmaceutical industry.

Phizer is asking for permission to sell Lipitor, a medicine to lower cholesterol, over the counter.  Their patent is about to run out, and they see OTC as the best way to maintain their level of profit.

Unfortunately, the possible side effects and drug interactions that Lipitor can cause would make it seem unwise to take it without a doctor’s supervision.  

If Phizer can’t sell Lipitor over the counter, and they can’t maintain a monopoly on it once their patent runs out, will they continue to make it?  Given the problems we have in this country with cholesterol, obesity and heart disease, you’d think there would be a market.

You might also think that there were enough people in this country with cancer that there would be business potential in treating them.  However, according to this story, you would be wrong.  Because their patents are about to expire, drug companies have stopped making dozens of drugs.  As a result, thousands of people cannot receive the potentially life-saving treatments for which they were scheduled.

I like profit.  I enjoy the things that money can buy.  I think that, done properly, capitalism encourages the kind of enlightened self-interest that leads us to value each other.  

But this goes too far.  Most medical advances (including developing new drugs) come about because the government contributes, either through grants or tax benefits or actually conducting the research in government labs.  In other words, the drug companies don’t succeed by themselves, but through the contributions and assistance of tax payers like us.  

True, these same pharmaceutical companies spend a lot of their own money developing new treatments.  They are entitled to profit from their investment and from their risk.  And they do, with the patents they obtain.  Once the patent runs out, however, it seems to me there is an implicit contract to keep making medicines that are legal.  

If there is no profit in it, perhaps it should be done by the government.  It’s not my favorite solution, but it’s better than people dying from curable diseases.

Martha Thomases, Media Goddess, is quite grateful that she doesn’t, at this time, need any of these medicines herself.