I agree that the cost is artificially inflated for a variety of reasons.
I also agree with Zappy that banning advertising is a violation of the NAP, and i don't think thats the appropriate action.
Advertising actually plays a beneficial role for a variety of reasons(product awareness, time scarcity, etc) and the fact that people are prevented from getting certain products w/o a prescription doesn't change that.
Studies show they encourage people to seek help even if the final treatment isn't necessarily the advertised drug brand.
Quote
(example:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14527237 " Among the 35 percent of our sample who had a physician visit during which DTCA was discussed, 25 percent received a new diagnosis, of which 43 percent were considered high priority according to authoritative sources. More than half also reported actions taken by their physician other than prescribing the advertised drug. Despite concerns about DTCA's negative consequences, we found no differences in health effects between patients who took advertised drugs and those who took other prescription drugs.")
Big things i would look at are easing the restrictions to competition (patents and high costs of entry via FDA etc) and also legalizing the importation of prescription drugs from other countries.
If they are available cheaper elsewhere we shouldn't be prohibited from getting them. This would reduce the cost considerably. Its classic protectionism that we would reject with other goods.
(credit to Sanders for slightly opening up to this idea and making it part of his platform to a very limited degree, even if he doesn't consistently apply the logic to other areas. He wants to permit some imports from Canada)
However, thats not to say advertising is in a perfect spot right now. Their artificial market advantages/monopolies make marketing to this extent more profitable than it otherwise would be. (leading to an increased supply of advertising)
This post was edited by cambovenzi on Apr 22 2016 08:06am