Overview

"Advocates of rapid access to medicines and critics fearful of inadequate testing both argue that globalization will supersede national medical practices and result in the easy transfer of pharmaceuticals around the world. In Pharmacopolitics, Arthur Daemmrich challenges their assumptions by comparing drug laws, clinical trials, and systems for monitoring adverse reactions in the United States and Germany, two countries with similarly advanced systems for medical research, testing, and patient care. Daemmrich proposes that divergent ""therapeutic cultures"" - the interrelationships among governments, patients, the medical profession, and the pharmaceutical industry - underlie national differences and explain variations in pharmaceutical markets and medical care. Daemmrich carries the United States-Germany comparison from 1950 to the present through case studies of Terramycin (an antibiotic), thalidomide (a sedative), propranolol (a heart medication), interleukin-2 (a cancer therapy), and indinavir (an AIDS drug). He points to important differences in government policies and in the distribution of power among key social actors. Daemmrich advises that international regulatory harmonization and globalization in medicine must retain flexibility for social and political variation between countries, even as they achieve technical standardization."

Full Product Details

9780807828441

Table of Contents

Reviews

This clear and persuasive book is the first to provide a detailed cross-national comparison of the politics of pharmaceutical drug regulation. Anyone concerned with understanding how governments, social movements, professional groups, and corporations determine which drugs end up on our pharmacy shelves should read this book carefully.(Steven Epstein, University of California, San Diego, author of Impure Science: AIDS, Activism, and the Politics of Knowledge )

Author Information

Arthur Daemmrich is assistant professor of business administration at Harvard Business School.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available