[woahAcademia]

Alternative healthcare? Let me remind you of the opioid epidemic entirely caused by physicians.

To buy dandruff medicine you need to get approval from a Physician, a pharmacist, and pharmacy. Not to mention the actual product regulations.

We've had 140 years of regulation. It was to protect healthcare workers at our expense.

[AlexandrB]

The opioid epidemic was caused the the corrupting influence of money in the medical profession. And your solution is to remove the only countervailing force - regulation - and turn the whole thing over to money-driven incentives?

I'm sure you're right, and without regulation doctors would be paid less. They'd make it up in direct sponsorships from pharmaceutical companies though.

[wooby]

Arguably, regulatory forces created the environment in which money could be used to so effectively manipulate doctors at the cost of patient outcomes. If doctors stood to lose business when they lost patients -- instead of fearing only for their license being revoked -- perhaps they'd be incentivized more to treat patients well than to engage in opioid schemes.

[Red_Leaves_Flyy]

Crazy thought:

Sometimes well intentioned regulation gets it wrong. Sometimes it's perverted in Congress. Sometimes it's designed to fail. It is congresses responsibility to police themselves as much as it is the people's. When regulation fails fix the regulation. That's hard when Republicans are dying on the hill of Government Bad.

[wooby]

It's not a crazy thought at all. Many Americans see government in this light. Others do not:

"No one will really understand politics until they understand that politicians are not trying to solve our problems. They are trying to solve their own problems -- of which getting elected and re-elected are No. 1 and No. 2. Whatever is No. 3 is far behind".

Thomas Sowell

[alistairSH]

Does Thalidomide ring a bell? Because that's what happens with no regulation.

[BostonEnginerd]

"The US FDA refused to approve thalidomide for marketing and distribution. However, the drug was distributed in large quantities for testing purposes, after the American distributor and manufacturer Richardson-Merrell had applied for its approval in September 1960.[citation needed] The official in charge of the FDA review, Frances Oldham Kelsey, did not rely on information from the company, which did not include any test results. Richardson-Merrell was called on to perform tests and report the results. The company demanded approval six times, and was refused each time. Nevertheless, a total of 17 children with thalidomide-induced malformations were born in the US. Oldham Kelsey was given a Presidential award for distinguished service from the federal government for not allowing thalidomide to be approved for sale in the US.[42] "

Although not perfect, the FDA seemed to do the right thing in the case of Thalidomide.

[alistairSH]

Yeah, it was a bigger problem in other countries. Point still stands - the Thalidomide birth defect crisis was largely a result of poor regulation for pharmaceuticals.