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Deadly Monopolies: The Shocking Corporate Takeover of Life Itself—and the Consequences for Your Health and Our Medical Future
From the award-winning author of Medical Apartheid , an exposé of the rush to own and exploit the raw materials of life—including yours.
Think your body is your own to control and dispose of as you wish? Think again. The United States Patent Office has granted at least 40,000 patents on genes controlling the most basic processes of human life, and more are pending. If you undergo surgery in many hospitals you must sign away ownership rights to your excised tissues, even if they turn out to have medical and fiscal value. Life itself is rapidly becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of the medical- industrial complex.
Deadly Monopolies is a powerful, disturbing, and deeply researched book that illuminates this “life patent” gold rush and its harmful, and even lethal, consequences for public health. It examines the shaky legal, ethical, and social bases for Big Pharma’s argument that such patents are necessary to protect their investments in new drugs and treatments, arguing that they instead stifle the research, competition, and innovation that can drive down costs and save lives. In opposing the commodification of the body, Harriet Washington provides a crucial human dimension to an often all-too-abstract debate.
Like the bestseller The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks , Deadly Monopolies reveals in shocking detail just how far the profit motive has encroached in colonizing human life and compromising medical ethics. It is sure to stir debate—and instigate change.
Think your body is your own to control and dispose of as you wish? Think again. The United States Patent Office has granted at least 40,000 patents on genes controlling the most basic processes of human life, and more are pending. If you undergo surgery in many hospitals you must sign away ownership rights to your excised tissues, even if they turn out to have medical and fiscal value. Life itself is rapidly becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of the medical- industrial complex.
Deadly Monopolies is a powerful, disturbing, and deeply researched book that illuminates this “life patent” gold rush and its harmful, and even lethal, consequences for public health. It examines the shaky legal, ethical, and social bases for Big Pharma’s argument that such patents are necessary to protect their investments in new drugs and treatments, arguing that they instead stifle the research, competition, and innovation that can drive down costs and save lives. In opposing the commodification of the body, Harriet Washington provides a crucial human dimension to an often all-too-abstract debate.
Like the bestseller The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks , Deadly Monopolies reveals in shocking detail just how far the profit motive has encroached in colonizing human life and compromising medical ethics. It is sure to stir debate—and instigate change.
448 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2011
About the author
Harriet A. Washington
8 books433 followersHarriet Washington is the author of Deadly Monopolies: The Shocking Corporate Takeover of Life Itself and of Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present, which won the 2007 National Book Critics’ Circle Award and was named one of the year’s Best Books by Publishers’ Weekly. She has won many other awards for her work on medicine and ethics and has been a Research Fellow in Ethics at Harvard Medical School, a fellow at the Harvard School of Public Health, a Knight Fellow at Stanford University, a senior research scholar at the National Center for Bioethics at Tuskegee University and a Visiting Scholar at the DePaul University College of Law.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
January 18, 2017
One night as you are walking down a street, you get hit by a car. As the rescue squad takes you to the hospital, you may be given an experimental drug without your consent. In the operating room, tissue, blood or some other part of your body can be removed and sold by the hospital, again, without your consent. If you die and an autopsy is done, the coroner might remove your heart valves, corneas or skin to sell to a medical supply company, without your consent. Most Americans would be surprised to learn that not only are these practices legal, they go on every day. It is only recently that the stories of Henrietta Lacks and John Moore have come to light, but they are chilling, nevertheless. The Supreme Court has ruled that individuals hold no property rights to their own bodies.
Colleges get billions in public funds to research diseases. They then sell their research to pharmaceutical companies who market drugs for big profits, forgetting that it was the people's dime that developed them. The patented drugs often continue only as long as they are profitable. Heaven help you if you need a rare drug to stay alive. Companies merge driving up drug prices into the stratosphere. One in five prescriptions are never filled because of cost.
Drug trials often take place in third world countries, unsupervised by the FDA. They hire ghost writers to write articles that are patently false for publication in medical journals. Many of these drugs are later found to be toxic or lethal. The military forced servicemen and women to take an anti anthrax vaccine that was neither safe nor manufactured in a sterile environment. If you didn't take it, you were dishonorably discharged.
Drug companies are immoral, one gave pregnant African women tiny doses of an anti HIV drug that they knew was effective at a higher dose. They wanted to see if they could save money, it mattered little to them if the mother and her child died. Another gave an untested, unauthorized anti meningitis drug to African children, when a drug that could cure them was available. Many died.
This book will really open the reader's eyes to how capitalism runs many medical industries, to the detriment of our health.
On a totally unrelated note, whoever was responsible for proofreading this book did a lousy job.
Colleges get billions in public funds to research diseases. They then sell their research to pharmaceutical companies who market drugs for big profits, forgetting that it was the people's dime that developed them. The patented drugs often continue only as long as they are profitable. Heaven help you if you need a rare drug to stay alive. Companies merge driving up drug prices into the stratosphere. One in five prescriptions are never filled because of cost.
Drug trials often take place in third world countries, unsupervised by the FDA. They hire ghost writers to write articles that are patently false for publication in medical journals. Many of these drugs are later found to be toxic or lethal. The military forced servicemen and women to take an anti anthrax vaccine that was neither safe nor manufactured in a sterile environment. If you didn't take it, you were dishonorably discharged.
Drug companies are immoral, one gave pregnant African women tiny doses of an anti HIV drug that they knew was effective at a higher dose. They wanted to see if they could save money, it mattered little to them if the mother and her child died. Another gave an untested, unauthorized anti meningitis drug to African children, when a drug that could cure them was available. Many died.
This book will really open the reader's eyes to how capitalism runs many medical industries, to the detriment of our health.
On a totally unrelated note, whoever was responsible for proofreading this book did a lousy job.
March 12, 2018
“No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money changer.” (Thomas Brown, Religio Medici)
“Should”, I wish (considering human nature).
Chapter by chapter, I screamed “Murderers”(as if to someone specific), a respite taken at Epilogue where solutions (not against human nature) shown effective.
An ultimate read of a true, deep, and comprehensive account on drug industry and medical research in our time.
“Should”, I wish (considering human nature).
Chapter by chapter, I screamed “Murderers”(as if to someone specific), a respite taken at Epilogue where solutions (not against human nature) shown effective.
An ultimate read of a true, deep, and comprehensive account on drug industry and medical research in our time.
August 29, 2017
A very dense, very depressing book. The best of the analysis is in Chapters 2-4, which discuss the monopolization of the pharmaceutical industry, the inflation of drug prices, the crowding out of research and innovation by patents, and the proliferation of unethical drug development practices. I was less satisfied with the later chapters on biocolonialism, and Washington's proposals in the Epilogue - her proposals for legal reform are not nearly radical enough to address the scope of the problems raised.
January 2, 2012
This was a tedious and confusing book overall, but the biggest problem was the poor sourcing and falsehoods. There is no smallpox in the developing world. There are no terminator seeds. And those were only the simple situations. This author should have been able to know better. But she clearly has an agenda and facts were no barrier to her.
August 5, 2015
Too many minor factual errors made me wary of taking this book at face value, and I gave up on it. It's a great subject, though!
January 17, 2022
This is a treasure-trove of information about the healthcare industry. It focuses more on biotech and Pharma than hospitals or clinicians.
Would recommend this to everyone wanting to become more familiar with this field. Other books for consideration An American Sickness: How Healthcare Became Big Business and How You Can Take It Back for a more balanced view into healthcare with more focus on hospitals and unfair medical billing. Or White Coat, Black Hat: Adventures on the Dark Side of Medicine in you want to focus more on doctors, researchers with conflicts of interest and the dark world of medical/academic publishing-corruption.
Would recommend this to everyone wanting to become more familiar with this field. Other books for consideration An American Sickness: How Healthcare Became Big Business and How You Can Take It Back for a more balanced view into healthcare with more focus on hospitals and unfair medical billing. Or White Coat, Black Hat: Adventures on the Dark Side of Medicine in you want to focus more on doctors, researchers with conflicts of interest and the dark world of medical/academic publishing-corruption.
June 15, 2019
The dreadfully amoral behavior of the corporations described in this book are a mere translation from past iniquities to the present. Not surprisingly the worst victims of the corporate violence of the pharmaceutical and chemical companies described in this book are people of color and entire populations in the developing world. Tale after sickening tale of abuses of people, covering up of deadly side effects and outright lies to patients and consumers come out in this book.
As she did in “Medical Apartheid”, the author thoroughly researched and documented all of the events with considerable care and detail. One day, perhaps, if humanity has the opportunity and will to reflect on the era of capitalist atrocities this text will be one of the documents used to highlight specific crimes against humanity.
Of course I highly recommend reading this book.
As she did in “Medical Apartheid”, the author thoroughly researched and documented all of the events with considerable care and detail. One day, perhaps, if humanity has the opportunity and will to reflect on the era of capitalist atrocities this text will be one of the documents used to highlight specific crimes against humanity.
Of course I highly recommend reading this book.
March 19, 2020
Harriet Washington's Deadly Monopolies is a masterpiece that addresses areas doctors usually find taboo to discuss - the big pharma industry. Through careful research and documentation, she shows a trial of heinous, irresponsible and malignant behavior by each of the Pharma giants on the American people and in the third world. As a medical student, we are never taught about this side of medicine so I found the read to be particularly helpful.
January 14, 2022
Brilliantly informative and topical. Somewhat dark, though, because it seems to be true that the pharmaceutical industry’s corruptive influence is so intertwined in our society that there’s little we can do to combat it. Also anger inspiring because it becomes immediately clear that the medical/pharmaceutical industrial complex have well-earned the widespread distrust which causes so much damage in the case of anti-vaxers, for example, but also in so many other instances.
January 29, 2018
This book provides a ton of essential information about the medical industry that will really give you a new perspective on it all, but it is incredibly dense and filled with medical, legal, and technical jargon that is difficult to follow at times. I wish this book had been written with the average person more in mind.
July 11, 2019
Truly impressive work of scholarship.
Does the thing that good non-fiction does, which is to craft a view of a complex topic that would be hard to attain otherwise, but easy to see when pointed out and explained.
Highly recommend.
Does the thing that good non-fiction does, which is to craft a view of a complex topic that would be hard to attain otherwise, but easy to see when pointed out and explained.
Highly recommend.
May 3, 2024
thoroughly necessary for anyone that would like to develop a deeper understanding of corruption throughout the pharmaceutical industry and healthcare field as a whole, especially with patent culture as a root
April 20, 2012
I put this one on hold since it's a fairly cynical, if honest, look at the current state of affairs in big pharma, patents, and how this affects one's access to health care. I was reading it pre-surgery and didn't think I was doing myself any favors. I got about 220 pages into this 350 page book, and here are my thoughts.
If you're not fascinated by the subject matter, like many works of non-fiction, you may get bored. I, however, found the depth of the information fascinating and the synthesis of the data easy to understand.
This is the first book I've read by Washington and her style is a bit distracting. She uses a lot of big, fancy S.A.T. words, and uses the same ones frequently throughout the book, sometimes, in my opinion, unnecessarily. While a boon to me, as I'm studying for the GMAT, perhaps a bit overdone and somewhat distracting. Once you get used to it, though, the information she presents is not disappointing. Both fascinating and infuriating for the reader, this should be better publicized information, globally. If blissful ignorance regarding your medical care is your preference, avoid this book.
If you're not fascinated by the subject matter, like many works of non-fiction, you may get bored. I, however, found the depth of the information fascinating and the synthesis of the data easy to understand.
This is the first book I've read by Washington and her style is a bit distracting. She uses a lot of big, fancy S.A.T. words, and uses the same ones frequently throughout the book, sometimes, in my opinion, unnecessarily. While a boon to me, as I'm studying for the GMAT, perhaps a bit overdone and somewhat distracting. Once you get used to it, though, the information she presents is not disappointing. Both fascinating and infuriating for the reader, this should be better publicized information, globally. If blissful ignorance regarding your medical care is your preference, avoid this book.
June 14, 2016
I didn't get to finish this because someone had a hold on it at the library and my 2 weeks were up. Difficult to rate. The information was fascinating and well researched, but the introduction was very heavy handed and I always feel like that weakens the persuasive power of any book. This is a topic that is personal to me and Washington's views on the current state of the industry are similar to my own, but I think I don't care for the writing. Probably will not pick this one up again, though I'd definitely use it as a resource.
July 16, 2012
An eye-opening look inside the medical-industrial complex that will leave you shocked, saddened and infuriated by the legislation, policies and practices that enable the pharmaceutical and biotech industries to place profit over safety and our individual and collective public health. I will never look at the FDA, university research labs, clinical trials, etc...in the same light. Next time I'm at the doctor I might just be compelled to ask what they do with the foreskins from male circumcisions.
February 10, 2015
Most people won't find the core concepts of this book "shocking" - that universities accept corporate funding for research, that drug patents can be used to restrict beneficial medication, that big pharma doesn't always have your best interests at heart. But there are plenty of cautionary tales and frightening case studies here that may make everyone rethink their jaded assumptions. A good book for anyone in the fields of patent law, healthcare, pharma, or university research.
August 13, 2012
This book was a biased look at the corporations that control a lot of healthcare spending (Pharma, genetics) in the US and other parts of the world. But even if you recognize that it is one-sided, the control that these corporations have and the tricks that they play, should keep you up at night with anger.
September 7, 2013
It is amazing how the idea of making money can wild excesses that have nothing to do with a decent living but screwing as many as possible. This is a very informative, well written and documented study.
April 6, 2013
I liked it. I learned is that our tax dollars are being used at universities for medical research, corporations are getting involved, taking the products of that research, patenting it, and then making tons of money.
April 29, 2016
This is a great book about the flaws of patents and how pharmaceuticals have become very good at this game of patenting everything including human genes . This help explains the consistent high returns in this industry...great sector to invest in!
August 2, 2013
Excellently researched, but as one progresses, also exceedingly tedious.
June 6, 2012
An interesting topic, but this book really started to drag. I was glad when it was over.
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February 15, 2013338.47615 W318 2011
December 3, 2013
You will never look at drug companies and medication the same way again!
February 6, 2012
Somewhat informative but such a slanted point of view that it lost my interest quickly.
February 12, 2013
It is better not to know.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews