#精品长文创作季#
Nowadays, the development of the mainland's economy, science and technology has reached a very high level, and the number of domestic drugs is also increasing. Pharmaceutical issues are a key issue involving the national economy and people's livelihood, and the state is investing a lot of resources in the research and development of new drugs every year.
There are some folk medicine companies that cooperate with the state in the research and development of new drugs. But there are some drug development companies that do anything to make money. They even sell the drugs they produce at a high price in China, but sell them at a low price in foreign countries. What's going on here?
First, four companies engage in double standards
According to media reports, there is currently such a drug, and its name is polymyxin sulfate B. The price of this drug in China has reached 2,300 yuan a box. But when I was abroad, it was only sold for 65 yuan a box. You can imagine how big the price gap in the middle is.
Polymyxin B sulfate is a drug that is widely used in clinical practice. It is mainly used to treat bronchitis, sepsis and other diseases.
Some doctors also use the drug polymyxin B sulfate when treating patients with urinary tract infections. The price of polymyxin B sulfate is too expensive, 2300 yuan a box, not everyone can afford it. There is also a lot of controversy about polymyxin B sulfate drugs.
The price of polymyxin B sulfate drug should not have been so high, mainly because the companies that produced this drug deliberately raised the price of the drug in order to make more money. The companies involved include a number of commercial companies, including Wuhan Huihai and Minkang Pharmaceutical.
After discussion, these companies jointly committed the criminal acts. Their approach is to inform the outside world that polymyxin B sulfate uses a variety of precious resources through public opinion. So the production cost is high, but the treatment effect is very good.
And then they work with some bad doctors to prescribe polymyxin B sulfate when they prescribe drugs to patients. Pharmaceutical companies and doctors can make huge profits in it.
In order to make money, these pharmaceutical companies also cheat in the purchase of original drugs. An important ingredient in polymyxin B sulfate is Aceris from Denmark. The price of this API in Denmark is up to about 90 yuan per gram.
However, in the reports of those pharmaceutical companies, the price of the raw material purchased by Thompson Denmark reached 35,000 yuan per gram. The price of drugs produced from this high-priced raw material naturally increases.
These pharmaceutical companies must meet international standards when selling their polymyxin B sulfate to the international market. Some of the raw materials they buy when they produce drugs are abroad, so it's hard to fake.
As a result, the price of the same drug in China exceeds 2,000 yuan. But abroad, you can buy it for a few dozen dollars. Even in some particularly poor areas, such as Bangladesh, polymyxin sulfate B can be bought for only 23 yuan. This is disrespectful to Chinese patients and a blatant attempt to make illegal profits.
The practices of these pharmaceutical companies have no moral bottom line. It has increased the cost of medication for patients, so that some patients who were waiting to save their lives have more physical problems because they cannot afford to use high-priced drugs.
Fortunately, the state reacted quickly and punished the four companies. The decision of the relevant authorities is to fine the four companies 1.2 billion yuan.
The relevant departments also calculated that the income obtained by the four enterprises through illegal means was confiscated. Subsequently, the relevant departments asked those pharmaceutical companies to sell polymyxin B sulfate. The price must be reduced by 90%, including the reimbursement of health insurance.
Polymyxin B sulfate has changed from an unaffordable drug to a drug that almost every household can afford.
2. There is a monopoly situation in pharmaceutical companies
The root cause of this is that the number of pharmaceutical companies is too small. A very small number of pharmaceutical companies have a monopoly on a large number of important drugs, which is equivalent to controlling the pricing power. These companies can then use their pricing power to their own personal gains.
This situation is not uncommon in foreign countries, such as the United Kingdom and the United States, where there have been sky-high drug prices. Even the price of some drugs can reach tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of yuan per box.
The main reason why pharmaceutical companies dare to do this is because the core technology of many drugs is in the hands of one or several companies. If they don't produce medicines, patients who are waiting for them to save their lives won't be able to buy them.
In addition, some national pharmaceutical companies have come up with interesting reasons for raising the price of drugs. The caliber of these pharmaceutical companies is very uniform, for example, the research and development cost of some drugs is particularly high. It costs hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars to develop a drug.
In order to make money, the company has to raise the price of the drug. The R&D cost is evenly distributed to consumers, so as to ensure the survival of pharmaceutical companies and the development of more high-end drugs.
This may seem reasonable, but it is problematic. Because many drugs have never dropped in price since they were on the market. There are also drugs that are so widely used in the market that it stands to reason that the companies that produce these widely used drugs can recoup their costs in just a few years and even go far beyond that.
So why don't they lower the price of drugs? So the so-called high cost of research and development is so high that they can't lower the price of drugs, which is just a reason to excuse it.
In foreign countries, there are also many people who are dissatisfied with the monopoly of the market by certain pharmaceutical companies, and some patients also tend to take up legal weapons to protect themselves. In the United Kingdom, for example, there have been lawsuits against local pharmaceutical giants.
What happened in the UK also reminds us that we must find a way to control the monopoly problem of pharmaceutical companies. The intellectual property rights and production rights of certain drugs cannot be left in the hands of a very small number of companies. No one can guarantee what the top management of these companies will do in order to make a profit.
In the future, the pharmaceutical industry must be more deeply included in the strict supervision of relevant departments. Only through strong administrative supervision can the rights and interests of patients be protected to the greatest extent. In order to avoid the occurrence of sky-high drug prices.
Thirdly, the State has been taking action
We, as consumers, should have full confidence in the country. There are indeed some chaos, but they are not completely unsolvable. In recent years, the state has also been trying to find ways to combat chaos in the medical field, and the country wants to solve the problem from the root.
The specific operation of the state is to fight upstream and downstream together. The state first punished a number of pharmaceutical companies involved, most of which were suspected of pharmaceutical monopolies. Or they are in cahoots with the staff of the medical system for personal gain.
Then the state vigorously cracked down on corruption in the health care system, and anyone who colluded with pharmaceutical companies was punished. There are quite a few front-line doctors, and even middle and senior leaders in some hospitals. All of them were arrested and imprisoned for embezzlement and bribery, and suspected of medical corruption.
From this series of actions of the state, it can be seen that the state is indeed determined to combat medical corruption, and the actions taken are also full of intensity. And the state will do this because it knows that there is a problem with the current medical system.
It is difficult and expensive for ordinary people to see a doctor, which has become a social problem that must be solved.
After the state took action, the people's medical expenses have indeed been effectively reduced. This is enough to prove that the policy of the state is correct and useful. What we have to do is to give the country enough time to wait for the relevant departments to solve the problems of the medical system and the medical system, and we should be patient.
At the same time, similar problems of medical corruption are not limited to China. Many countries, including the United States, also have high-priced drugs. Even foreign pharmaceutical companies have no bottom line in order to seek personal gains.
The several mainland pharmaceutical companies involved in this incident mainly engaged in double standards. In order to make money, foreign pharmaceutical companies do everything they can.
For example, there was a giant pharmaceutical company in the United States called Purdue Pharmaceutical. The company put a highly addictive drug on the market in order to make a profit. In order to get their drugs on the market, they first bribed senior officials of the U.S. pharmaceutical administration. Let them give the company's drugs through illegal means and issue relevant licenses.
Then there are various forums and discussions, bribing the experts and scholars who attend the meeting. Let them publicly advertise that there are no safety concerns with the drugs sold by Purdue Pharmaceutical.
Finally, collude with those doctors to recommend the sedative drugs produced by their own company when they see patients. However, Purdue Pharmaceutical's highly addictive drugs have swept the United States in just a few years, and tens of thousands of Americans are addicted to drugs. This case has also become the most high-profile medical corruption case of this century.
Interestingly, however, the company in question ultimately avoided punishment by continuing to pay bribes to those in power. The company involved only paid the fine, and the company's senior leaders were hardly punished.
In this comparison, mainland pharmaceutical companies are only deliberately raising drug prices, at least not putting non-compliant drugs into the market. Therefore, the mainland's pharmaceutical companies can still be saved, as long as they strengthen supervision, I believe they can solve the problem.
Epilogue:
It is necessary to solve the problem of medical corruption, because the Chinese people attach great importance to medical health. It is in the interests of the majority of people to ensure the stable operation of the medical market. Therefore, the state will also find ways to crack down on medical corruption, and I believe that with the further strengthening of state punishment, similar problems will never arise, and we should have full confidence in the country.