Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-xfwgj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-06T17:05:17.087Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Pharmaceutical Meaning-Making beyond Marketing: Racialized Subjects of Generic Thiazide

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2021

Extract

If we want to understand the allure of pharmaceuticals, we need to look beyond both medical efficacy and profit motives. The success (or failure) of a drug depends not only on these, but also on how it mobilizes prior conceptions of identity. The extent to which a drug is taken — or talked about — is related to commodity properties that exceed the physiological and the economic. In implicit contrast to the discussions of BiDil elsewhere in this collection, I explore how the links between race and pharmaceuticals can be both unstable and generative even when the drug in question is old and generic. By attending closely to an encounter around generic thiazide outside of a medical or marketing context, I show that although pharmaceuticals can seem to rely on scientific data and marketing for their power, they are, in fact, also subject to claims on many more registers that cannot quite subsume or refute each other.

Type
Symposium
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics 2008

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Fryer, R. G., “Understanding the Racial Difference in Life Expectancy,” presentation at the WEB Dubois Institute for African American Research Colloquium, October 20, 2004.Google Scholar
Dubner, S. J., “Toward A Unified Theory of Black America,” New York Times Magazine, March 20, 2005, at 54.Google Scholar
The fullest explication of the theory can be found at Wilson, T. W. and Grim, C. E., “Biohistory of Slavery and Blood Pressure Differences in Blacks Today: A Hypothesis,” Hypertension 17, Supplement (January 1, 1991): I122I128; and more recently in Grim, C. E. and Robinson, M., “Commentary: Salt, Slavery and Survival — Hypertension in the African Diaspora,” Epidemiology 14, no. 1 (2003): 120–122; discussion 124–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The argument has been well-described and critiqued by epidemiologist J. S. Kaufman in both nonacademic and academic venues. Kaufman, J. S., “The Anatomy of a Medical Myth,” Social Sciences Research Council Forum Is Race Real?, available at <http://raceandgenomics.ssrc.org/Kaufman/> (last visited May 21, 2008); Kaufman, J. S. and Hall, S. A., “The Slavery Hypertension Hypothesis: Dissemination and Appeal of a Modern Race Theory,” Epidemiology 14, no. 1 (2003): 111118. These pieces suggest that the theory has been widely accepted by medical professionals and the media despite the lack of any evidence for it because of the normalcy of racial essentialism in medicine, and argue that the theory fails on the bases of historical evidence, population genetics, the physiology of hypertension, and evolutionary biology.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Work Fryer did with his advisor, Steven Levitt, which also involves economists reaching well out of bounds of their own discipline to find surprising answers to social problems from other fields, has also found broad appeal. See Levitt, S. D. and Dubner, S. J., Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything (New York: Harper Collins, 2005).Google Scholar
The historian was Evelynn Hammonds, who referenced Philip Curtin. His critique can be found at Curtin, P. D., “The Slavery Hypothesis for Hypertension among African Americans: The Historical Evidence,” American Journal of Public Health 82, no. 12 (1992): 16811686.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
According to Marx, a commodity is an external object that satisfies human needs of whatever kind and has a dual nature of both a use value and a bearer of value. Though all commodities are expressions of human labor, and so are purely social, they come to be understood outside of social relations and take on a magical quality. Marx makes an analogy with religion to explore the peculiar agency commodities come to take on. Like gods, commodities are “products of the human brain [that] appear as autonomous figures endowed with a life of their own, which enter into social relations both with each other and with the human race.” Marx, K., Capital, trans. Fowkes, B., vol. 1 (London: Penguin, 1867 and 1976): at 165.Google Scholar
This taxonomy is analogous to that of Sherry Turkle regarding the computer. Turkle, S., “Whither Psychoanalysis in Computer Culture?” Psychoanalytic Psychology 21 (Winter 2004): 1630.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
See especially Dumit, J., Drugs for Life: Managing Health and Identity through Facts and Pharmaceuticals (Duke University Press, forthcoming, manuscript cited with permission); see also Greenslit, N., “Pharmaceutical Branding: Identity, Individuality, and Illness,” Molecular Interventions 2, no. 6 (2002): 342–345.Google Scholar
Althusser, L., “Ideology and State Aparatuses,” in Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays, trans. Brewster, B. (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1971): at 171.Google Scholar
Haraway, D., Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium.Female-Man©_Meets_OncoMouse™ (New York: Routledge, 1997): at 50.Google Scholar
See Dumit, , supra note 9.Google Scholar
For example, Gates, H. L. Jr., ed., “Race,” Writing, and Difference (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986); and Gates, H. L. Jr., Figures in Black: Words, Signs, and the “Racial” Self (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987).Google Scholar
Gates himself can be understood to be signifying the narrative process he describes in Gates, H. L. Jr., The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988).Google Scholar
Barthes, R., “The Reality Effect,” in The Rustle of Language (New York: Farrar, Stauss, and Giroux, 1986): At 141–148.Google Scholar
Nelson, A., “Bio Science: Genetic Genealogy Testing and the Pursuit of African Ancestry,” Social Studies of Science (forthcoming, manuscript cited with permission).Google Scholar
This is connected to the theory of the cynical subject: Zizek, S., The Puppet and the Dwarf: The Perverse Core of Christianity (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2003).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, P., “Salt in the Wound,” The Nation, June 6, 2005.Google Scholar
Indeed, groups with high standing have had their credibility on their support of BiDil suffer because of financial interests. The NAACP received $1.5 million from NitroMed when they agreed to a strategic partnership; see “NAACP and NitroMed Announce Partnership to Narrow Disparities in Cardiovascular Healthcare,” Business Wire, December 14, 2005. Many mentioned the money in the case of the Association of Black Cardiologists, in language such as the following: “Nitromed did what other pharmaceutical companies have always done. It gave money to people who later gave its medication the thumbs up. The Association of Black Cardiologists co-sponsored the clinical trials for Bidil, received $200,000 from Nitromed, and enthusiastically supported the drug's approval.” Kimberly, M., “Rx for Black Hearts,” available at <http://www.blackcommentator.com/143/143_freedom_rider_rx.html> (last visited May 21, 2008). (last visited May 21, 2008).' href=https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Indeed,+groups+with+high+standing+have+had+their+credibility+on+their+support+of+BiDil+suffer+because+of+financial+interests.+The+NAACP+received+$1.5+million+from+NitroMed+when+they+agreed+to+a+strategic+partnership;+see+“NAACP+and+NitroMed+Announce+Partnership+to+Narrow+Disparities+in+Cardiovascular+Healthcare,”+Business+Wire,+December+14,+2005.+Many+mentioned+the+money+in+the+case+of+the+Association+of+Black+Cardiologists,+in+language+such+as+the+following:+“Nitromed+did+what+other+pharmaceutical+companies+have+always+done.+It+gave+money+to+people+who+later+gave+its+medication+the+thumbs+up.+The+Association+of+Black+Cardiologists+co-sponsored+the+clinical+trials+for+Bidil,+received+$200,000+from+Nitromed,+and+enthusiastically+supported+the+drug's+approval.”+Kimberly,+M.,+“Rx+for+Black+Hearts,”+available+at++(last+visited+May+21,+2008).>Google Scholar
The Antihypertensive and Lipid Lowering Treatment to Prevent Heart Attack Trial, available at <http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/allhat/facts.htm> (last visited May 21, 2008). This trial, which ended in 2002, is the largest anti-hypertensive trial ever conducted, with over 42,000 participants, a third of whom were African American. It was conducted by the NIH to compare three classes of newer, more expensive antihypertensive drugs with a thiazide-type diuretic.+(last+visited+May+21,+2008).+This+trial,+which+ended+in+2002,+is+the+largest+anti-hypertensive+trial+ever+conducted,+with+over+42,000+participants,+a+third+of+whom+were+African+American.+It+was+conducted+by+the+NIH+to+compare+three+classes+of+newer,+more+expensive+antihypertensive+drugs+with+a+thiazide-type+diuretic.>Google Scholar
At a conference for the International Society for Hypertension in Blacks that I attended, an investigator on ALLHAT was criticized as biased because he was funded by the NIH, which already has an incentive to recommend cheap old drugs and perhaps can more easily get away with doing so on disadvantaged populations. In the newsletter of the American College of Physicians, the sense that low price may be correlated with low value is both acknowledged and disavowed. The piece suggests that “[b]ecause diuretics cost less and are much older than ACE inhibitors and calcium channel blockers, patients switched to diuretics from more high-profile drugs may think they are getting substandard care.” Seeking to “dispel that notion,” a Yale clinical professor of medicine said, “We aren’t advocating good medicine for people who can afford it and bad medicine for people who can’t. The data are clear: The less expensive medication is at least as good.” van Steenburgh, J., “Diuretics for Hypertension Get a Big Boost, But Will Data Change Prescribing Patterns?” American College of Physicians Observer, April 2003.Google Scholar
Greene, J. A., “Releasing the Flood Waters: Diuril and the Reshaping of Hypertension,” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 79, no. 4 (Winter 2005): 749794.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Greenslit, N., unpublished material shared in personal communication, November 8, 2004.Google Scholar
In this, I am inspired by Keith Wailoo, who has described sickle cell as a commodity, exchanged through the 20th century between three groups of stakeholders: Networks of emerging molecular medicine in the New South, political liberalism, and articulations of civil rights and black identities. Wailoo, K., Dying in the City of the Blues: Sickle Cell Anemia and the Politics of Race and Health (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001). There are at least two key differences between sickle cell and HTN/thiazide. First, the possibility of treatment reduces stigma. Second, these thiazide stakeholders are not yet fully in dialogue with each other, but after Fryer's piece is published, it will be a fascinating debate to continue to track.Google Scholar