Drug advertising, lobbying raise consumers' costs

To the editor:

The news has it that national and state legislators are struggling to find ways to help people with the cost of prescription drugs. What a charade. Realistically, much of the increased cost of prescription drugs is due to the tremendous cost of consumer advertising. Other countries prohibit this. Even if America were the only one prohibiting this, it is the obvious thing to do.

This advertising cost coupled with the large cost of lobbying are probably the greatest of the price-increase components. It's really not a problem to determine this in view of the billions spent for this. Legislators should have no struggle at all to make a determination.

As things stand now, legislators may continue receiving large sums from drug company lobbyists and put on a good show struggling to find ways to simply have government aid the public while the show goes on and the drug companies continue their bombardment.

If we write letters to our representatives, we simply receive a nice letter in return thanking us for our input and assuring us that they will keep our message in mind while they continue the charade.

GILBERT DEGENHARDT

Cape Girardeau