The Problem With Western Medicine In Foreign Countries

KYW's Medical Reports Sponsored By Independence Blue Cross

By Dr. Brian McDonough, Medical Editor

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Scientists in India are saying they have a problem with the United States and other western pharmaceutical companies.

According to these doctors there are among dozens of unproven and often risky drugs and drug cocktails that western drug makers have been marketing there for years, and in many cases still are even though they are not approved in their home countries.

They are asking, why would you sell something to Indian patients that you're not permitted to sell to American ones?

They state that for a multinational company to know that its product would not be approved or was actually removed from the market in its own country, to then go and sell that in India is both cynical and wrong.

India's Ministry of Health recently banned over three hundred such drugs.

The thought is that there needs to be greater sharing of medical knowledge and research throughout the world.