McKinsey Proposed Paying Pharmacy Companies Rebates for OxyContin Overdoses

This is why people say we have a legal system not a justice system.

The views in my comments are no more reductionist than the parent comment I was replying to. I would also suggest that rejecting psychological egoism as reductionist is a rather blatant anti-science point of view.

However whether reciprocity was involved doesn’t at all change the existence of a self-interested motive. It’s simply irrelevant.

Furthermore, in this case there was reciprocity. In this instance the big corporate interests were selling a product for which doctors had a demand to treat their patients. You’re welcome to have an opinion about the integrity and value of that reciprocity, but that goes for anybody in regards to any relationship. A cynical person could come to that conclusion about any relationship, and offer you a justification for it supported entirely by a leading thesis from the field of ethics.

~10 years ago I was visiting the Bay Area (I live in EU), and developed knee pain (rather strong). I went to the emergency room in a city hospital, and long story short, I was given a prescription for paracetamol or ibuprofen and something called Norco, which is apparently some kind of opioid.

In the pharmacy (CVS i think), the pharmacist was calling somewhere to confirm the prescription and my identity and was trying to understand hard my foreign-issued driving license. After an hour of this identity verification circus, I left the pharmacy with this opioid drug and a pack of Paracetamol/Ibuprofen. Back in the hotel I read about it, and seeing something about opioids I threw it away (I guess, for no reason except that it sounded like it sounded like it's related to drugs) and treated myself with paracetamol (which worked). The experience in the hospital: 6h waiting and check-up straight in the reception room with 20 people watching, plus a doctor whose biggest concern was that I remember that his name is Lim and not Lime, plus being treated like a potential drug abuser in the pharmacy was a bit surreal.

After getting back to EU, the hospital and my international insurer started negotiating price for this 6h waiting and 10 min check-up and an xray. It started with 2000 USD, in the end they settled on 1000 USD or so. Fortunately, I didn't pay anything cause international insurance.

After a few years, when playing football in Switzerland, I stomped badly and sprained my ankle. I went to the local orthopedic clinic, where I was treated at once in doctor's office. Cost: 250 CHF (~250USD), xray included.

I think it's pretty easy to act outraged and say "somebody should be punished," and most people I know, and most politicians, do.

As for actually doing research, thinking about it, and bothering up to come up with a proposal... I guess nobody actually cares THAT much.

I would suggest that projecting evil motives onto others implies a far greater sociopathic tendency. Keep in mind that all of the worst things we’ve managed to accomplish as a species tended to start with dehumanization as the first enabling step.

I’d also suggest that this comment would also necessarily include dismissing just about every psychologist, philosopher or ethicist who studies the nature of self-interested motives as being a sociopath as well.

If you really wanted to be cynical however, I’d suggest you start by asking who’s benefitting from us having this conversation. I’d say it’s the regulators, and to a greater extent the executives who have been in charge of those regulators, who are the people statutorily responsible for these failures. I can’t imagine how happy they’d be with us debating how culpable big pharma and their management consultants are for it.