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"Philosophy of Education"

2020 year, number 1

THE PROBLEM OF COMMERCIALIZATION OF THE MEDICAL SPHERE AND MEDICAL EDUCATION: SOCIO-PHILOSOPHICAL AND ECONOMIC ASPECTS

E. V. Ushakova1, T. S. Kosenko2, N. S. Sidorov1
1Altai State Medical University of the Russian Ministry of Health, Barnaul, Russia
2Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University, Novosibirsk, Russia
Keywords: коммерциализация, медицинская сфера, медицинское образование, статус врача, commercialization, medical field, medical education, doctor status

Abstract

Introduction. In modern medicine, there has been a pronounced tendency to commercialization, manifested in various forms. For example, this happens when a doctor becomes a co-owner of a hospital; when the doctor prescribes those drugs to patients that the manufacturer wants to be sold; when the doctor conducts a paid admission of patients at commercial prices; when medical education is commercialized, etc. A medical university, the purpose of which is to train qualified personnel for the healthcare sector, is responding to this trend by commercializing the medical education itself. There are quite different opinions about the commercialization of medicine and medical education: from positive to neutral and negative. The purpose of the paper is to analyze different views on commercialization of medicine, medical education and the impact of the consequences of these social processes on ensuring the health of the country’s population. Methodology and methods of the research. The research material was literary sources, statistics on the problem of commercialization of medicine and education. The methods of epistemological and praxeological analysis of scientific material are applied, a comparative assessment of the analyzed characteristics of the commercialization process, integration of the results on a socio-pedagogical basis. The results of the research. Today, in developed countries, the concept of socially responsible business is being increasingly introduced, including in medicine, which is justified as especially important in the conditions of a highly developed knowledge economy, where high-tech intellectual activity is considered to be the center. It is proved that doctors in these conditions also acquire a high social status, have high salaries, as a result of which they no longer need to profit from patients illegally. However, while the country lacks a developed, well-balanced socio-economic system, the introduction of commercial medicine and similar education leads to the fact that many people are not able to provide themselves with paid medical care, even those working, not to mention the unemployed. Some medical workers and specialists from this field get an opportunity to immorally use the hopeless situation of patients. Most doctors, however, only slightly increase their low (in these conditions) economic status. The extreme positions of attitude to this process are as follows. Medical activity can be reduced to exploiting the patient’s addictive position for commercial gain. On the other hand, one can skillfully work with patients, regardless of social transformations, requiring only decent life sustenance. One can treat the patient with love and with understanding of the doctor’s own responsibility as a healer in existing social conditions. Due to the existence of different points of view on the problem of the commercialization of medicine and education, it requires serious comprehensive analysis taking into account existing social conditions. Conclusion. Commercialization of the humanitarian spheres - medicine, education, etc., aimed at capitalization of these areas - is not human-conformable, but human-destructive and socially deforming. Of course, along with the state, the creative sector of organizations of individual social activity of especially gifted teachers and healers is necessary, but its goal is not to accumulate capital due to the urgent needs of the population, but to expand the potential of human life and health.