If you have read his books, you know that for every “villain” he finds an animal allegory: Leeches (the golden pensioners), Weather in Pescecani e Vultures (the nabobs who profit on the evils of the country). This time it’s the turn of the Jackals. Viruses, health and money. Who gets rich on our skin. This is the title of the last work of Mario Giordano, volcanic conductor of Out of the core, aired every Tuesday, in the early evening, on Rete 4. An investigation in which the historic face of Mediaset, faithful to its rule of “making names and surnames”, puts in line all the distortions of the business that revolves around the health, all the “sins” of Big Pharma and the shortcomings of the public regulator.
Let’s start from the liberal thesis: pharmaceutical companies earn on health, but without the opportunity to cash in, there would be no incentive to discover treatments and produce medicines.
In reality, even according to classical liberal theory, health should remain outside the mechanism of competition between private individuals.
Because?
Because this is the only industry whose goal is to reduce turnover, rather than increase it.
Minimize the “customers” or the sick?
Exact. But the idea that public authorities should intervene does not imply that everything must be nationalized. If, however, one relies only on free initiative, then the private individual should – intentionally exaggerate – make someone sick to sell him the medicines.
Maybe they don’t make us sick, but they make us believe sick: so they create the demand for a drug …
If you create a demand for food or books, do something positive. In the health sector, demand should be reduced … This is the limit of the liberal approach. After that, of course, there must be a reward for those who invest.
Otherwise the search stops.
But even in research there is a fundamental error.
Which?
The fact that it is totally left in the hands of companies, without all independent studies being published, because perhaps a private individual does not consider them of interest. Take the case reported by Washington Post.
Or?
Pfizer finds that an existing medicine that she made could be used to fight Alzheimer’s. Except that research is not published, because it is not economically convenient for the pharmaceutical company.
You speak of checks by public authorities, but often the regulators themselves are financed by pharmaceutical companies.
Ema, the European Authority, is 84% of them. Silvio Garattini, moreover, observes: the authority is called to establish whether a drug is safe and effective, but not whether it is useful.
So?
The regulator should also consider whether a medicine that is about to be placed on the market adds something to the existing ones. But we need, in fact, a control structure that does not depend economically on who is controlled. Even according to liberal orthodoxy. And another example proves it.
Which?
The mechanism by which public facilities buy drugs.
What’s going on this time?
The price of medicines purchased by AIFA must remain secret.
And do pharmaceutical companies promise discounts to everyone?
To laugh. The former director of AIFA told me: we in the sector find ourselves in these rallies, we all bought the same drug, nobody can reveal how much he paid for it, but we are all convinced that he got the lowest price. Obviously, that’s not true. Is price transparency not fundamental in a liberal system?
Certainly.
Instead we only privatized everything and we find ourselves a private-controlled controller and purchase mechanisms for opaque drugs. Have you tried to see how much the Regions pay for a medicine?
What would I find out?
That the same drug, one pays him, say, 7 euros, and another 700.
What about funding for doctors?
The so-called “transfers of value”, in the files – also difficult to download and consult – published by the pharmaceutical companies, are divided into two groups. In one there are the names of the doctors and associations that have received grants; and then there is a single aggregate entry, referring to those who have not consented to the publication of their name.
And do you suspect that the most serious conflicts of interest are hidden in the middle?
Already it is strange that those who have to prescribe a drug take money, albeit few, from those who produce it. Imagine what is hidden in the unpublished part of the data. And this poses another problem.
That?
All names of those who take money must be made public. And not on the basis of an act of “liberality” by the pharmaceutical companies. To which, at least on this, it must be acknowledged that they have taken a step forward in terms of transparency.
Ranieri Guerra, WHO deputy director, says that Italy is ready to vaccinate 100% of the population against the flu. Still, there are studies according to which the flu shot not only does not help the differential diagnosis of Covid-19, but can even aggravate respiratory diseases caused by coronavirus. Do you also see a lack of transparency on this story?
I don’t want to pass as an enemy of science. But science must make sure that it is credible. If some scientists make me suspect that not a public interest, but some economic interests, are behind a campaign like the flu vaccination, it is damaging science. And this also applies to other vaccine-related issues.
Type?
I hear about “right of first refusal”. There can be no pre-emption right on a vaccine! I’m not a No Vax. And for this very reason, I want vaccines to be guaranteed to everyone, but where and when it is needed.
Do you trust WHO?
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