They've started. The for profit health care and pharma

[Cleita]

industries are revving up for the coming elections in which health care is going to be a hot button issue. I picked up this scare ad from Glaxo in my new Smithsonian.



What's wrong with this ad? It doesn't address what Glaxo plans to do to solve this problem of Americans needing to get their drugs from Canadian pharmacies because of the exorbitant costs. Ads like these are part of the reason American citizens and residents are paying exorbitant prices for drugs. They are passing the costs to you.

The drugs Canadian pharmacies carry are the same ones we get here. Drugs are manufactured all over the world and the Pharma company labels slapped on them for distribution by those respective companies. Our drugs are not all manufactured in America but worldwide.

Last, I don't know if foreign drug companies are claiming to be Canadian pharmacies that the drugs are mailed directly from. I think it's closer to the truth that the Canadian pharmacies have drugs shipped directly from the manufacturer for reasons of efficiency. I will have to look deeper into it.

In the meantime we must all be on the lookout for disinformation that is spread concerning this. Our health care insurance, HMO and pharma industries hire high powered PR firms to do this, so they don't look like they are at the bottom of it, but they are.

This time we won't let them win. Remember what they did to Hillary and her health plan. Go to the website of Physician's for a National Health Plan. It's full of good information about the for profit health care industry. http://www.pnhp.org

[bemildred]

1. Fear is good. You can't think when you're scared.

There is a lot of profit to be made in selling fear.

The entire Amerikkan medical system is based on fear and manipulation.

[johnnomac]

9. "You need to learn more" says the ad...

I guess that translates into "Be afraid! Be VERY afraid!"

[bemildred]

11. Pretty much, yeah.

But there is a good deal more anxious bullshit in the ad.

The fact is I don't need to learn shit about the bills before Congress, and further, Congress as presently constituted could give a shit what I know or what I think.

[HuckleB]

2. Ugh.

I sure hope the Smithsonian's readership is smart enough to see through this baloney.

[Cleita]

3. I was, but I'm familiar with the for profit health cares' smear

propaganda tactics since we have been trying to get national health care here in this country. The trouble is our side doesn't have the cash to run counter ads in the Smithsonian debunking their claims.

[CAG]

4. They have no end to their abilities to pay for this propaganda...

because they already have all of our money. The top 10 pharma companies are more profitable than the rest of the Fortune 500 companies (from Marcia Angell's book "The truth about Drug Companies").

They will continue to feed this fear to the electorate, and if the electorate doesn't buy it, they'll pay even more to even better advertisers to spin it better, and eventually the electorate will buy it.

[undergroundpanther]

5. Not only pharma

But the prision indulstry profits too the ,makers of torture devices tazers and restraints.

This"new frededom/Teen screen" bullshit is a very ugly and dangerous violation of human rights.

[johnnomac]

6. So where do Canadians get their drugs from???

Is the ad implying that we're shipping the crappy stuff south and keeping the good drugs for ourselves? If Canada's drugs are coming from overseas, and Canadians are healthier than Americans, wouldn't it be a good idea to copy what we are doing? Just a thought.

[Cleita]

7. You're getting the same drugs we do for a fraction of the cost.

Also, those drugs are manufactured all over the world. So we get the same drugs manufactured from different countries with the labels of the American pharma companies pasted on them. There is no difference. They are implying that only Canadian drugs are manufactured from all over the world. A big lie. It's to scare Americans who are getting their drugs from Canada because they are cheaper.

These guys really should be stopped from doing ads like these and the other ones that they do. This is what is driving up the cost of our drugs bought domestically. Also, the we are doing research excuse isn't entirely true as tests are run all over the world as well.

By the way, welcome to DU. :hi:

[johnnomac]

8. Oh..... so you're ust being ripped off.....

Yeah... Canada's evil socialist agenda scores again! I guess I just don't understand government bureaucracies. Hasn't some politician discovered that if he was elected, he could lower people's medical costs drastically without hurting services? And hasn't he told anybody this? Oh well. Thanks for the welcome!

PS. I'd like you to know that I went to Olympian efforts not to use the words "suckers" or "chumps" in this post.

[Cleita]

10. We've been trying for over a decade but with most of

our politicians in the back pocket of the insurance and pharma industries here, it's going to take a big miracle to get anything done. These ads are placed incidentally to appeal to the "suckers" and "chumps".

Wait until they start planting articles in mainstream magazines and newspapers saying what snakepits your hospitals are and how medical professionals are fleeing Canada to work here. Now that Americans and Canadians have access to each other in the internet, hopefully stuff like this can be debunked by the Canadians. We didn't have that when they pissed all over Hillary Clintons national health care plan.