Kicking the Kickbacks

The National Institutes for Health (NIH) is taking steps to ban all income that member scientists and researchers receive from drug companies. This obvious conflict of interest is more than just that an ethical issue though, many economic implications stem from this sort of behavior. It is in the nature of Healthcare as a commodity to have irregular demand. Unfortunately uncertainty is a major factor of all health problems. It is because of this that the market for medical treatments is very one sided. The new guidelines to be set by the NIH will help prevent any doctor driven demand for products that are not necessarily safe. The medical market may never have completely independent supply and demand factors but this is a good step in keeping the market in check.