Come on pharmaceutical companies! (revised)

It only takes a glance at the TV screen, watching the world news, or reading the local paper to see the worsening conditions in Haiti.  The cholera epidemic in is spreading across the impoverished country like wildfire, and is threatening the neighboring Caribbean.  Haiti was already a poor country ravished by natural disaster, and now faces a terrifying epidemic that has already killed more than a thousand and has no signs of slowing.  In the following paragraphs we will explore how cholera is spread, what is being done to prevent more outbreak, and why there isn’t enough vaccine going around.

Cholera is a disease caused by bacteria that affects the intestines.   It causes dehydration, diarrhea, vomiting, and in one out of 20 cases, according to MedicineNet.com, death.  This disease is most commonly found in areas with poor water filtration and third world food standards.  It is spread when feces from an infected person contaminates the food or water supply.  In a country like Haiti, with the conditions they are currently under, it is no surprise that the disease is running amok.  Haiti’s water conditions were terrible before the hurricanes and earthquake hit; now they are unimaginable.   The relief efforts are a raindrop in the ocean of what really needs to be happening.

In the forefront of these relief efforts is the W.H.O., world health organization.  W.H.O. is making small strides to put an end to the epidemic by gathering all of the available vaccine for approval and shipment.  Be that as it may, there is only enough vaccine to treat 250,000 people.  The population of Haiti alone is just under 10 million.  If the epidemic were to spread outside of Haiti, there would be no vaccine left to inoculate anybody.  We have access to a powerful vaccine, but there is not enough produced to go around.

So, why isn’t there enough vaccine?  In an article on NPR’s website, they suggest money plays a big role.  Why would a for-profit drug company create mass amounts of a drug which prevents a disease that only affects that world’s poorest and underdeveloped corners?  Their goal is to make money not save lives.  This is a scary thought.  We live in a world where you could find ample amounts expensive but nonessential drugs available.  However, not enough vaccine to stop an epidemic that kills more than 100,000 peoples a year. Not to mention that Cholera could be prevented altogether with one simple vaccination. 

Money plays a factor and the cholera vaccine is not free to make.  Even so, drug companies make enough money from pharmaceutical sales that they could, in turn, do something to benefit the human race as a whole.  Most nights of the week you can find drug company representatives wining and dining doctors at swanky restaurants.  Perhaps if they could look into their own souls, they would forgo those dinners for some humanitarian effort.  If one company stopped having those presentations alone in one month on average they could have saved 700 lives.  That is only one presentation dinner a week for a month.  Four dinners to save 700 lives, I bet that would make any doctor lose his appetite.