Social responsibilities in the Pharmaceutical Companies
RUNNING HEAD: SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES
Social responsibilities in the Pharmaceutical Companies
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27th March, 2011.
The Social Responsibilities and Intentions of Walmart Company
Since its establishment in 1969, Wal-Mart’s operations have been successful in a majority of countries. With the various environmental improvement initiatives, and charitable activities, they conduct as in the case after the hurricane Katrina tragedy where they donated foodstuff to the victims, Walmart has acquired a positive reputation from many. This is despite the fact that there still are a few critics who point out various issues concerned with the labor operations of the company. In addition, their step to sell organic milk and buy organic cotton earned them a great deal of support from the local communities. Thus the establishment of a new Walmart store in any community exhibits positive and negative effects in the form of competition as well as development of road and rail networks respectively.
As opposed to the positive response, most labor unions and Christian organizations criticize Walmart for their policy against unions which results in the non membership of their employees, their environmental policies. Additionally, they condemn the company’s excessive sourcing of foreign products, employee and product suppliers treatment, the usage of public subsidies in addition to its impact on economy in the local community within which it operates.
To counter such critics, Walmart engaged its PR department in conducting campaigns and invited journalists to write articles on the company. Previously it was accused of maltreating their employees by locking up night shift workers, paying them minimum wages, provision of low health covers or too highly priced health insurance and exposing them to health hazards. Due to this, Walmart promised to increase their starting salary by a third on 8th of August. There have also been allegations of their discrimination against women with regards to pay and promotions (Ghemawaty & Mark, 2006).
Despite all these, I think Walmart has an intention of implementing its policy towards attainment of better lives through price reduction and numerous employments. This is because most of the value it creates is pocketed by its consumers who enjoy low prices.
Social responsibilities of Pharmaceutical Companies
Among other companies present in the United States, there are a large number of pharmaceutical companies which include Pfizer pharmaceuticals and the Johnson and Johnson. The difference between pharmaceutical companies and the other types of companies lies in their social responsibilities. They include the provision of medication, making sure that medical services are improved by performing research and releasing new drugs, creating awareness to the public on how various diseases can be prevented, diagnosed and treated. This is in the effort to contribute to the overal well being of the community. It for example has a social responsibility that relates to HIV/AIDs (Bale, 2010).
Priorities Given to Stakeholders in the Pharmaceutical companies
The major primary stakeholders in the pharmaceutical companies include the government, suppliers, shareholders, employees, insurers, the community and the investors. The community which represents the consumers is the less prioritized according to (Martino, 2007), because of the fact that profits are prioritized than the patients. The public in return does not appreciate the services offered by these companies which have disregarded their original vision of improving the lives of humans health wise. If this gap continues to widen it will put the success of these companies at great risk.
High Drug Costs
The cost of drugs which varies from 50$-500$ is still quite high and especially for those who are not insured. In my opinion the pharmaceutical companies are charging so much on the drugs hence should adjust their charging policy (SUNS, 2010).
On the other hand, they continously exploit the market through the manufacture of generic drugs which are cheap to purchase. This can be proven by the differences in drug prices between the United States and Europe where the prices are much lower. The chief reason is the government’s control over drug prices. Therefore, despite the excuse that research plus development involved in the production of a new drug is costly, most of these companies can cut down the costs of drugs.
References
Bale, H, 2010. The pharmaceutical industry and corporate social responsibility. Corporate
responsibility. Retrieved 27 March 2011 from <http://www.responsiblepractice.com/english/insight/ifpma/>
Ghmawt P., and Mark, K. (2006).The Real Wal-Mart Effect. Retrieved 27 March 2011 from
< HYPERLINK “http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5474.html2011” http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5474.html2011>
Martino, M. 2007. Consumers and Pharmaceutical Companies Far Apart on Views of Pharma
Industry.
Retrieved 27 March 2011 from <http://www.fiercebiotech.com/node/5167#ixzz1Hq48qF7t>
SUNS, 2001.Ever rising high drug prices not needed for R&D, says new report. Retrieved 27
March 2011 from <http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/rising.htm>
