Ghana And American-Western Greed ...

... IN THE MEDICAL PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY Dear friends,

Why are some of these grease-fingered people in the drug and medical industry so greedy and desperate in the West, while the good doctors and nurses are squeezed everywhere and denied their due income. Why are our people spending so much on drugs such as malaria drugs and our so-called smart-talking politicians dipping their hands in public funds to buy luxury $75,000 cars, but our Scientists at research institutions in Ghana don't get funding and many driven away overseas to feed their families? Why can't these so-called smart “boys and girls” in politics see the game?

I was disgusted to see Ghanaian young men and women peddling goods and supplies all along the Accra major roads at traffic intersections, sometimes endangering themselves to sell one or two items to eke out a living for the day. They have no choice but to try and survive. The globalization bait means our people stay unemployed whiles European and Americans are allowed to ship us anything from paper clips, tractors, drugs, automobiles, to rice and cheese sticks. Now I see similar things done on the Internet in America! I don't know where these people get my email address from, and I don't know if you have been able to hide from them, but every day I have to delete at least 10 email messages from these folks trying to peddle drugs from Canada and so forth. I am not even adding those writing me “Dear Friend” letters from Nigeria, Europe, Philippines and so forth from all over the globe telling about how their father who was Head of the Bank of Nigeria or South Africa died and left $20 million and need my assistance to cash it and give me 10%! Come ooon!! Do these people think I was born yesterday!

When can a man drive freely on the Accra boulevards without seeing these young panhandlers driven there by the forces of globalization and our weak clueless leadership to the streets? And when will these Americans get off the Internet traffic without panhandling us trying to read our email and surf the net in peace?! For those not aware, American medical care and pharmaceutical industry have been hijacked by the same “big boys” who had used brute force to acquire most of the money for over 100 years, and now own the insurance companies, forcing every one of us to buy from them and then taking over the medical incomes of our fine doctors!! A friend Doctor told me now you have to work 3 times as hard and see 3 times more patients to earn the same income they used to make years ago, and all to satisfy the greed of these same boys who own the medical insurance companies. And the World Bank and IMF are in bed with them as American author John Perkins (2004) nicely illustrates in his book “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man”. This is the kind of outrage that made Lee Kuan Yew write in his book that every nation has to look for the interest of their people, and hence he as leader decided to have designed for his people of Singapore their own health care and retirement system, which has now been rated better than that of UK and America at the extreme ends of the social-economic spectrum.

Folks, as our youth endanger their lives to cross traffic to eke out a living on our streets, let us learn to take advantage of strategies others have used to utilize their medical and pharmaceutical people to come out with new drugs that are billion dollar income earners. Our pre-colonized brothers like India are trying and doing better. Singapore has completely getting out of the dirt, squalor, and corruption of third world status! At least if government subsidized research and do a joint venture with our Ghanaian private entrepreneurs willing to invest money to promote new drugs, we can employ our top bio-Chemical talent, use our Lawyers with savvy and create our own patented and globally tested drugs that can be sold world wide. I am not saying it is easy, but for God's sake “Kote-denden aduro” [if you don't know what I mean, you are lost! I won't translate this one!] could have been marketed ahead of these boys in the industry! We have medicines that are used to help reduce high blood pressure and diabetes, all needing scientific testing and leadership. Why are we allowing these Europeans to come in an learn the tricks and take them home whiles our boys line up the streets and our Scientists die overseas with their acquired knowledge? Why? Didn't our local medicine men know the secrets long ago? A good leader can set up a system to make our local knowledge base and intellectual property globally marketable. We then stand a chance at the global competitive world.

It's leadership. Me dear friends! Leadership!!

Cheers,

Kwaku A. Danso, President, Ghana Leadership Union, Inc. (NGO) www.GhanaLeadership.com Fremont, Ca.94539 & East Legon, Accra,Ghana