Thursday, March 19, 2009

We Are All Going To Die!!!!

On the subject of Liam Donaldson, his comments about alcohol were part of his annual report, a kind of State of the Nation address for medical issues. The same report covered a variety of topics including the reduced effectiveness of anti-biotics, which is what my post title is subtly alluding to. Essentially we are screwed if we don't cut back on anti-biotics. That is uncontroversial, but the culprit that Donaldson singles out for the blame for this process whereby drugs are over prescribed and thus rendered ineffective is revealing:
In pursuit of profit, drug companies aggressively market new products to ensure that they are prescribed as often as possible. The latest drugs, to which resistance has not yet been developed, should be held in reserve as a last resort. A profit-driven market cannot be relied upon to meet society’s needs.
See it isn't the fault of doctors, who dole out anti-biotics to pushy patients with colds (not a bacterial infection), but to the profit motive.

I'm just going out on a limb here but I think I can guess Sir Liam's political leanings....

2 comments:

Leg-iron said...

The thing is, a drug that makes no profit will never be developed into a product.

Socialists think all business and all profit is evil but if there's no prospect of profit, why would anyone develop anything new? What would be the incentive?

You can't, no matter how much they want it, force people to invent. It simply doesn't work that way.

Anonymous said...

"Socialists think all business and all profit is evil but if there's no prospect of profit, why would anyone develop anything new?"

Exactly, and if they say profit shouldn't matter then they should spend years becoming qualified medical researchers and then volunteer their own time for free.