| Besides the fact that has already been mentioned that narcotics can be & are abused, just imagine if all drugs were OTC:
People walk into their local pharmacy with an ache, pain, cough, sneeze, vomiting, diarrhea, difficulty breathing, etc., etc., etc. sign or symptom, and with their self diagnosis, proceed to pick up drug A that is for an atrial heart problem, when in reality they have a ventricular heart problem, or no heart problem at all. Well, they get worse or die as a result of the wrong medicine for the wrong problem. Who's at fault?
You say, well, I'll go to the Dr. to find out what's wrong, he writes the script, & I pick it up OTC. Sounds good, but first of all, not everyone will do that, not all are honest, people will still continue to self diagnose (they already do, it's just that the most potentially harmful drugs aren't OTC),second, what about kids stealing them & taking or doing whatever with them, etc. Can you imagine someone with cancer trying to pick up the right chemo drug or combination and using/administering them appropriately, monitoring & dealing with the side effects. Or someone trying to regulate themselves with diabetes, Addison's disease, Cushings, seizures, etc. It won't work.
There is a reason these drugs are controlled medically.
But true, that the drug companies have us by the short ones, true that a lot of money is spent by them for research & developement on new & better drugs, yet true that they are making a profit, often times huge. The larger & fewer that they become (buying up smaller companies, becoming larger conglomerates) the greater the potential for greed & corruption to skyrocket. Greed & corruption is not limited to pharmaceutical companies, oil companies, politicians, or any other faction of society, but the larger they become, the greater the chance for greed & coruption to become more pervasive. The drug companies were more altruistic & less greedy (still making a profit) when there were more of them & they were smaller. As the monopoly continues, so will the cost of drugs, unless society as a whole steps up & insists on more humanity. |