Thursday, March 20, 2008

How does lung cancer affect the Economy

How does lung cancer affect the Economy?
I'm doing this essay and looked all over the web and there is NO information of it anywhere! Can you help?
Cancer - 4 Answers
Random Answers, Critics, Comments, Opinions :
1 :
lung cancer is caused mostly by cigarettes through first hand or second hand inhalation. Lung Cancer is a negative externality of cigarettes. Research externalities and relate it to the cigarette case.
2 :
The effects on the economy are mostly considered "indirect" costs. Lung cancer is hard to cure, or even put into remission, and the medical costs of treating it can be huge. The effects are in increased medical insurance costs, higher costs to to the government for those that rely on public assistance or that are covered by government medical payments. There is also lose of productivity for those with lung cancer. They often must work at least fewer hours, and sometimes must go on disability, and can not work at all. Those that can't work, or must work less result in a decrease in tax revenue to all levels of government. There are other effects as well, but these are the highlights of the effect on the economy. Once you look at these, you can work out the effects on other parts of the economy. Good luck on your essay
3 :
Each cancer patient is worth about $300,000 dollars to the medical industry. That money goes through several hands, but most of it ends up in the hands of the drug industry. The drug companies throw huge bags of money to politicians to promote their agenda and this in turn stimulates the politicians to go to the general public and get them to buy health insurance. The money brought in by health insurance ends back at the politicians lap from the drug companies again. It's a vicious cycle. If Lung Cancer were not here, a huge chunk of the cancer money would not be available. The CEO of a drug company has to look at his market as sick people. If people were well, there would be no revenue coming in. If cancer were addressed as a preventative thing, drug companies would not make any money on it. How long do you think a CEO of a drug company would last if he told the board of directors that he wanted the company to produce preventative treatments to reduce the amount of drugs they would sell? About as long as it took for him to say that. So by extracting money from the public, funneling it back through to the drug companies, politicians make lots of money and doctors get huge perks for promoting and selling the drugs. It stimulates the economy and removes cash from private citizens. good luck
4 :
The government makes a lot of money off taxing cigarettes, but in the end it's not worth it because it causes many diseases (lung cancer is just one) that become a big drain on governmental health resources. If I were you, I'd look up cigarette tax, medical/hospital costs of lung cancer, economic benefits of smoking cessation programs, stuff like that.

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