The Pros And Cons Of Over-Prescription Of Psychoactive Drugs

The increasingly common prescription of psychoactive drugs is the result of many problems with the pharmaceutical and medical systems as well as with society as a whole. While a few of these problems will be discussed in this paper, they are by no means the only issues afflicting our current systems of treatment and drug administration. The pharmaceutical industry is a multibillion dollar enterprise that develops, produces, and markets drugs to be used in the treatments of illnesses. Throughout its history, the pharmaceutical industry has amassed enormous amounts of resources in the forms of financial, material, and political capital. Because of this accumulated capital, the pharmaceutical industry has a large amount of lobbying power and political

The medical system has even become complicit in this scheme in their own attempt to get a cut of the earnings as many times doctors will get “commissions” or are incentivized to prescribe certain drugs. Furthermore, in 1997, the FDA eased its restrictions on broadcasted Direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA). This led to a more than 300% increase in spending on advertising by 1998 to $1.2 billion which led to another 450% increase by 2006 to approximately $5.4 billion (Ventola 2011). There are both positive and negative aspects to DTCA; but, whether beneficial or harmful, this form of advertising has undoubtedly led to increased patient drug-seeking behavior and self-diagnosis that results in greater profits for both doctors and the pharmaceutical industry. With an increased number of adults seeking medication not only for themselves, but also for their children, why would the doctors not prescribe drugs to their patients? Not only do these drugs provide a monetary incentive to the doctors but they also provide an “easy way out” for the patients and drug