Drugs and Ethics

Ethics and law do not always go hand in hand. Not every law is ethical, and even if a law is considered ethical on its surface, it may result in unethical outcomes. "Ethics refers to well-founded standards of right and wrong that prescribe what humans ought to do, usually in terms of rights, obligations, benefits to society, fairness, or specific virtues.”

The pharmaceutical industry confronts several dilemmas every year. Most of these dilemmas revolve around money or whether or not to sacrifice now for a bigger payoff in the end concerning money and/or lives. Pharmaceutical companies tend to use shortcuts that create ethical problems. Drug companies have spent millions/billions of dollars in research, and they obviously want to see favorable results during the testing stage so they know that they didn't spend all that money for nothing. The companies usually are the ones who influence what, when, how and who tests their drugs. This gives them an influential leg up on the negative outcomes. Sometimes, drug companies have even resorted to testing on individual without their approval. The pharmaceutical industry spends money to make money, but the majority of people who are sick tend to reside in third world countries that cannot afford to pay the premiums that the drug companies charge. Sometimes, this can result in drug companies not pursuing a drug that could save millions of lives just because they wouldn't be able to make a profit.

Immanuel Kant believed that humans should not be treated merely as a means to an end. If humans are treated this way they are being utilized merely as objects, which deprive them of their humanity. Pharmaceutical companies have goals. They want to improve the lives of the humans that they "serv...

... middle of paper ...

...s ethical dilemmas every day of their lives, and the best that one can do is to work towards high standards that benefit the general good of the community.

Works Cited

Miller, Roger LeRoy., and Gaylord A. Jentz. "Chapter 2." Business Law Today: The Essentials : Text & Summarized Cases : E-commerce, Legal, Ethical, and International Environment. 9th ed. Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning, 2011. 43-55. Print.

"Pharmaceutical Corporations and Medical Research — Global Issues." Global Issues : Social, Political, Economic and Environmental Issues That Affect Us All — Global Issues. 2 Oct. 2010. Web. 12 Feb. 2012. .

Velasquez, Manuel. "What Is Ethics?" Santa Clara University. 2010. Web. 12 Feb. 2012. .