So are the illnesses they treat.
It's a lot like chemotherapy for cancer; the treatment might kill you but the cancer surely will.
This is one of those issues where the truth really does lie somewhere in the middle, somewhere between the ranting anti-psychiatry Scientologist and the lazy doctors who over-prescribe powerful meds just to get difficult patients out of their offices, or in pandering to celebrity. (Michael Jackson, Prince, Rush Limbaugh... they all bought doctors who wouldn't say "No!" Trump's doctor is apparently the same... )
Yes, many pharmaceutical corporations are evil. Maximizing profits, which is the only goal of any capitalist corporate entity, makes for bad medicine. The goal of good medicine is to return patients to a healthy state so they don't come back. But common chronic conditions are where the big money is, the prescriptions I refill every month.
I take some powerful meds, including psych meds, costing a few hundred dollars a month here in the U.S.A.. (They cost less in Canada or Mexico, which is another story.) I know from terrifying personal experience I'm a danger to myself when I quit taking them, or when the effectiveness of one fades, which happens. By some good fortune I've not been a direct danger to others, except as it hurts friends and loved ones to see me crashing, or to anyone who might try to rescue me from some dangerous situation I've got myself into.
Good medicine by nature is a socialist endeavor. That's obviously the case with dangerous communicable diseases which we strive to eradicate with vaccines and other public health measures, and accidents which we strive to reduce the severity and frequency of by safety regulations. But it's also true of all the random shit that afflicts humans. Anyone can be hit by some cosmic ray that turns a healthy cell into an aggressive cancer, anyone can be born with a combination of genes that makes them prone to some addiction, anyone can suffer an accident that permanently disables them, maybe causing chronic pain or psych issues.
Even medical problems our judgmental society traditionally blames the victim for (smoking related diseases, sexually acquired diseases, etc...) are social issues, and best addressed in socialist ways.
I have huge issues with the health insurance corporations, both profit and non-profit. It seems they don't really care about the actual health of their customers, or even minimizing medical costs. Rather it's all about the size of the revenue streams they control.
= new reply since forum marked as read