What does the pharmaceutical industry do with the record-breaking profits they make year after year?

[Uncle Joe]

Link to tweet

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[BeckyDem]

1. And it worked too.

[CurtEastPoint]

2. Has anyone besides Bernie had the courage to call them out?

[leftstreet]

3. No one is going to do anything about it

Big Pharma and Insurance own politicians on both sides of the aisle

Single payer nonprofit healthcare is the only answer, but even Bernie seems to have stopped talking about that

[Hortensis]

13. Donations in themselves don't mean "bought". Bernie Sanders took

pharmaceutical company donations for years, though I don't know if he has since it hit the news during his 2019-2020 campaigning. That doesn't mean he was bought then or is bought now.

However, deceiving voters is another matter.

People here may recall Sanders "challenged" Democratic candidates to not take donations for insurers and pharm, implying doing so was...verry wrong. Sanders as a presidential candidate expecting the media to play along with this by not mentioning his own support by Bg Pharm went a bit too far for them. And his deceit was blown.

If only people would remember, and care, politicians would be forced to.

[JoeOtterbein]

4. K n R ! Thanks for posting!

Bernie speaks the truth!

[IcyPeas]

5. this should be the real war on drugs

I don't know how some people can afford their needed medicine.

reminds me of Martin Shkreli the little creep, but they are all at it.

...Shkreli was widely criticized when Turing obtained the manufacturing license for the antiparasitic drug Daraprim and raised its price by a factor of 56 (from US$13.50 to $750 per pill).

...After obtaining the financing, Shkreli was able to acquire rights to market tiopronin (brand name Thiola), a drug used to treat the rare disease cystinuria, and another drug Chenodal, and subsequently raised the price of each drug substantially, with Thiola being marked up about 20 fold, from $1.50 to $30 per pill (patients must take 10 to 15 pills a day),[48][49] and Chenodal about 5 fold.[50] Retrophin did not lower the price of these drugs after Shkreli's departure.

[doc03]

6. They apparently spend huge sums of money on advertising on all the

so called cable news channels. I imagine their CEOs get a huge salary too.

[rickyhall]

9. That's where most of it goes. Drug pushing on the tube, only legal in the United States of Avarice.

[TwilightZone]

10. Also legal in New Zealand

Been legal there for about 40 years. There have been attempts to ban it, as yet unsuccessful.

[rickyhall]

11. Didn't know that.

[Rebl2]

17. That's what

I was going to say. They have spent millions or more on print, tv, radio etc. advertisement for 30 plus years. I wish it had never been allowed by Congress. Guess they promised politicians lots of money if they passed a law to allow it.

[ck4829]

7. "Research and development"? What are they researching with that kind of money?

Apotheosis?
Animal uplifting?
Inter-dimensional travel?

[Polly Hennessey]

8. I think the Mercks buy yachts.

[NurseJackie]

12. What does any publicly-traded company do?

My Rx costs increased here and decreased there... overall, we're doing better with Cigna than previously with Aetna. We need to strengthen the ACA and keep the insurance companies on a short leash.

[gab13by13]

14. Don't forget pay lobbyists,

pay politicians, and buy back stock.

[PatrickforB]

15. I always get a kick out of how Sanders is described as 'radical left' by the media.

His policies are middle of the road in that they restore balance between individuals and corporations. It is all a matter of priorities. Why can we squander trillions on tax cuts, forever wars and drug wars, and yet not use our tax dollars to provide universal healthcare not tied to employment? Why do we still have student loan debt? Healthcare debt? Healthcare bankruptcies? Why?

Priorities. Right now the RADICAL RIGHT WING is all about profits over people. I'm tired of that. Aren't all of you?

[Evolve Dammit]

16. They OWN you. Banks, insurance companies, "health care industry", colleges, utilities, oil and gas.

They increase prices all the time. We get raises that keep us stuck in reverse. "Stagnant wages" for 4 decades. No wonder a major portion of the workforce is being more selective. Duh. They are tired of being used and abused.

[George II]

18. I think many of us know what they do with it. They reinvest in their research labs, equipment....

....facilities, doctors, personnel, etc. so they can develop more lifesaving drugs.

It's easy to take shots at the pharmaceutical industry, but without them we'd still be locked in our homes and 2000+ Americans would be dying per day. That is, if they survived smallpox or polio, or cancer or other deadly diseases.

Have you been vaccinated?