The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 279 No 7467 p232-233
1 September 2007

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Letters to the Editor

The industry

Drug industry should be nationalised and kept under control

From Mr R. J. Giles, MRPharmS

It may be unfashionable to talk in terms of socialism or nationalisation, but having completed 35 years in hospital pharmacy and witnessed how the pharmaceutical industry still exerts its influence on how health care is delivered, I have no hesitation in risking being labelled a dinosaur by clinging to the belief that it should be the NHS that determines our health care priorities, not the profit-hungry drug companies.

The recent example of the High Court challenge to the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence guidance on Alzheimer’s disease is a good example. But there are many others.

The press, having highlighted the case, presumably as a result of press releases from the companies concerned and the Alzheimer’s Society, have tended to concentrate on one part of the story only, whipping up emotional responses to the supposed “unfairmess” of the guidance, with more talk about post-code prescribing.

Suitably briefed individuals have been placed in front of the cameras to make not only their case but also that of the manufacturers. And so battle commences between NHS and the needs of capital.

While I would admit that all is not well with the NHS, if it is to remain an organisation that is funded out of general taxation, then how it develops will depend upon how much the public is prepared to pay in tax (plus political decisions on where that tax is spent).

I do not see many of the descendants of the Thatcher generation being prepared to fork out more. So what are all those people saying — those who demand that everyone should have every drug that the pharmaceutical industry insists is necessary?

Because if we do have to pay out for all these new — ie, expensive — drugs that become available, a lot of the NHS is going to be placed under even more pressure. There will be staff shortages, infections, longer waiting lists, etc.

I feel much empathy with sufferers, but sometimes wonder how much false hope they are given in the interests of profit. (Just how independent are these support groups? If not funded by drug companies, they are certainly briefed by them.)

A far better system would be one where the industry and health system work in conjunction to determine what the priorities are and to develop medicines and other methods of treatment that would be of real benefit to many rather than doubtful benefit to the few.

But of course we all know that in our system of production, profit comes first. Which is why I still adhere strongly to the idea of nationalising the drugs industry and keeping it under control.

Ron Giles
Retford, Nottinghamshire

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