Prescription for the People: An Activists Guide to Making Medicine Affordable for All (The Culture and Politics of Health Care Work)

Millions of people around the world face a real problem: their desperate need for affordable medicines clashes with the core business model of the powerful pharmaceutical industry. In response, patients and activists are aiming to make all essential medicines affordable by reclaiming medicines as a public good and a human right, instead of a profit-making commodity. Their challenge is made more daunting by the perceived complexity of the issues surrounding access to essential medicines. “The problem we have is that there are only a handful of people in the world who know what we are taking about,” one leading medicine activist admits. It doesn’t have to be this way. __A Prescription for Change__ diagnoses our medicines problem and prescribes the cure: it delivers a clear and convincing argument for a complete shift in the global and U.S. approach to developing and providing essential medicines—and a primer on how to make that change happen. Cover -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Part I. Toxic Impacts -- 1. People Everywhere Are Struggling to Get the Medicines They Need -- 2. The United States Has a Drug Problem -- 3. Millions of People Are Dying Needlessly -- 4. Cancer Patients Face Particularly Deadly Barriers to Medicines -- 5. The Current Medicine System Neglects Many Major Diseases -- Part II. Profits over Patients -- 6. Corporate Research and Development Investments Are Exaggerated -- 7. The Current System Wastes Billions on Drug Marketing -- 8. The Current System Compromises Physician Integrity and Leads to Unethical Corporate Behavior -- 9. Medicines Are Priced at Whatever the Market Will Bear -- 10. Pharmaceutical Corporations Reap History-Making Profits -- Part III. Patently Poisonous -- 11. The For-Profit Medicine Arguments Are Patently False -- 12. Medicine Patents Are Extended Too Far and Too Wide -- 13. Patent Protectionism Stunts the Development of New Medicines -- 14. Governments, Not Private Corporations, Drive Medicine Innovation -- 15. Taxpayers and Patients Pay Twice for Patented Medicines -- Part IV. Trading Away Our Health -- 16. Medicines Are a Public Good -- 17. Medicine Patents Are Artificial, Recent, and Government-Created -- 18. The United States and Big Pharma Play the Bully in Extending Patents -- 19. Pharma-Pushed Trade Agreements Steal the Power of Democratically Elected Governments -- Part V.A Better Remedy -- 20. Current Law Provides Opportunities for Affordable Generic Medicines -- 21. There Is a Better Way to Develop Medicines -- 22. Human Rights Law Demands Access to Essential Medicines -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Index "In Prescription for the People, Fran Quigley diagnoses our inability to get medicines to the people who need them and then prescribes the cure. He delivers a clear and convincing argument for a complete shift in the global and U.S. approach to developing and providing essential medicines, and a primer on how to make that change happen. Globally, 10 million people die each year because they are unable to pay for medicines that would save them. The cost of prescription drugs is bankrupting families and putting a strain on state and federal budgets. Patients' desperate need for affordable medicines clashes with the core business model of the powerful pharmaceutical industry, which maximizes profits whenever possible. It doesn't have to be this way. Patients and activists are aiming to make all essential medicines affordable by reclaiming medicines as a public good and a human right, instead of a profit-making commodity. In this book, Quigley demystifies statistics and terminology, offers solutions to the problems that block universal access to medicines, and provides a road map for activists wanting to make those solutions a reality."-- Résumé de l'éditeur

In Prescription for the People, Fran Quigley diagnoses our inability to get medicines to the people who need them and then prescribes the cure. He delivers a clear and convincing argument for a complete shift in the global and U.S. approach to developing and providing essential medicines—and a primer on how to make that change happen.

Globally, 10 million people die each year because they are unable to pay for medicines that would save them. The cost of prescription drugs is bankrupting families and putting a strain on state and federal budgets. Patients’ desperate need for affordable medicines clashes with the core business model of the powerful pharmaceutical industry, which maximizes profits whenever possible. It doesn’t have to be this way. Patients and activists are aiming to make all essential medicines affordable by reclaiming medicines as a public good and a human right, instead of a profit-making commodity. In this book, Quigley demystifies statistics and terminology, offers solutions to the problems that block universal access to medicines, and provides a road map for activists wanting to make those solutions a reality.

"In Prescription for the People, Fran Quigley diagnoses our inability to get medicines to the people who need them and then prescribes the cure. He delivers a clear and convincing argument for a complete shift in the global and U. S. approach to developing and providing argument for a complete shift in the global and U.S. approach to developing and providing essential medicines -- and a primer on how to make that change happen." --