Is medicalization always harmful? When does medicine overstep its proper boundaries? The aim of this article is to outline the pragmatic criteria for distinguishing between medicalization and over-medicalization. The consequences of considering a phenomenon to be a medical problem may take radically different forms depending on whether the problem in question is correctly or incorrectly perceived as a medical issue. Neither indiscriminate acceptance of medicalization of subsequent areas of human existence, nor criticizing new medicalization cases just because they are medicalization (...) can be justified. The article: (i) identifies various consequences of both well-founded medicalization and over-medicalization; (ii) demonstrates that the issue of defining appropriate limits of medicine cannot be solved by creating an optimum model of health; (iii) proposes four guiding questions to help distinguish medicalization from over-medicalization. The article should foster a normative analysis of the phenomenon of medicalization and contribute to the bioethical reflection on the boundaries of medicine. (shrink)

Celem artykułu jest podsumowanie filozoficznego sporu na temat autentyczności emocji wywoływanych przez środki psychofarmakologiczne. Praca jest głosem w szerszej bioetycznej dyskusji na temat ulepszania ludzi, a w szczególności ulepszania nastroju. W pierwszej części pracy przedstawiono dwa przeciwstawne bioetyczne stanowiska: wrogich idei ulepszania ludzi biokonserwatystów oraz entuzjastycznych transhumanistów. W drugiej części artykułu wykazano, w jaki sposób nieporozumienie między obydwoma stanowiskami może wynikać z innego sposobu definiowania pojęcia autentyczności. W trzeciej części problem autentyczności emocji rozpatrzono na hipotetycznym przykładzie przyjemności wywoływanej przez „pigułkę (...) szczęścia”. (shrink)

The pharmaceutical industry and drugs advertisements are sometimes accused of “creating diseases”. This article assesses and describes the role of that industry in fostering medicalization. First, the notions of medicalization and pharmaceuticalization are defined. Then, the problem of distinguishing between harmful overmedicalization and well-founded medicalization is presented. Next, the phenomenon of disease mongering is explained and illustrated by the case analysis of medicalizing pain and suffering in three contexts: (1) the general idea of medicalizing physical pain, (2) the medicalization of (...) grief and (3) disease mongering of pseudoaddiction—a condition promoted in order to increase the demand for opioid pain relievers. (shrink)

The goal of the text is to show which actions of the modern pharmaceutical industry are morally controversial. There are several burning issues that we need to face on this field, such as: How to deal with the conflict of interests within the medicine? How to mark the vanishing boundaries between information and advertisement concerning the pharmaceutical education? How does the drug advertisement lead to the pharmaceuticalization of society? In the text all of these problems will be briefly analysed. The (...) article has an introductory character, it may serve as an overview of the burning issues in the pharmaceutical industry ethics – all questions that are posed in the text need further examination. (shrink)

The goal of this text is to elaborate the notion of pricelessness. The issue of pricelessness is distinguished from other important points in the Moral Limits of Markets debate. The proposition of the meaning of pricelessness is presented and discussed. I argue that the notion of pricelessness should not be identified with the notion of dignity or the highest value. The value which is a basis for the pricelessness claim does not have to be a moral value, the notion of (...) pricelessness functions at the crossroads between different kinds of values (moral, aesthetic, scientific, sentimental, commercial etc.). I argue that the core intuition associated with pricelessness refers to the incomparability of values. It is expressed as being price-less because money is seen as a universal comparator - it has a potential to translate any other values. Further, I distinguish three models of relation between commercial and priceless realms, named as: 1) contamination model, 2) contractual model, and 3) contextual model, in order to show that the attitudes toward the intuition that pricing itself may corrupt intrinsic values, depends on the presuppositions one shares. I argue that the conviction about corrupting force of money might be also explained by the intuitive concerns related to purity and degradation under Moral Foundations Theory. Using Radin's concepts, I claim that both non-commodities and incomplete commodities might be meaningfully called priceless. Finally, I recognize the limits of the argument from pricelessness and admit that it is rarely strong enough in itself to justify prohibition of commodification. (shrink)

Relationships between physicians and pharmaceutical sales representatives (PSRs) often create conflicts of interest, not least because of the various benefits received by physicians. Many countries attempt to control pharmaceutical industry marketing strategies through legal regulation, and this is true in Poland where efforts are underway to eliminate any practices that might be considered corrupt in medicine. The present research considered Polish medical students’ opinions about domestic laws restricting doctors’ acceptance of expensive gifts from the industry, the idea of compulsory transparency, (...) and the possibility of introducing a Polish Sunshine Law. A qualitative, focus group-based, interview method was used. Data were gathered from nine focus groups involving 92 medical students from three universities located in major Polish cities. The article presents a classification of opposing student views with regard to the consequences of introducing different legal solutions; this should be useful for policy makers deliberating on how to optimally regulate pharmaceutical marketing. The study’s results are discussed in the context of the public bioethical debate in Poland. (shrink)