You take Lipitor/Plavix when you are at risk of certain blood flow related diseases (heart attack, stroke). The goal is to prevent these diseases or delay their onset in people with an elevated risk. Isn't that what we mean by preventative?
Vaccines probably also fall into this category. They are more widely used, although not exactly moneymakers [1].
[1] They used to be a small, positive revenue stream. Drug companies are trying to get out of the business now, due to fear of lawsuits by Jenny McCarthy and her ilk.
Hummm, I think "preventative" for me means focusing on causes. Such drugs may act on symptoms (I don't know how effective they are, wouldn't surprise me in light of this article if they are not, esp. considering side-effects), but would not IMO be in the same class of preventative measures as exercising regularly, sleeping well, eating well, socializing regularly, de-stressing, etc. - all of which act "upstream" on our overall health levels.
In other words, if you eat fast food, watch TV for hours each day, don't exercise, work too much and sleep too little, then develop bad numbers on your blood tests, taking a drug to improve those numbers a bit shouldn't be considered preventative.
If you define "preventative" to mean "lifestyle factors", then you are correct that drug companies won't spend much effort researching them. Similarly, if you define "search" to mean "searching for oil", then Google doesn't do much research on search.
You may disagree with the colloquial usage/meaning of the word "preventative," but in the context of health care, I'd argue it's a worrisome sign when the scope of that word expands from lifestyle changes (which even doctor friends would often argue for) to also include drug interventions. Though certainly the pharma industry would love that being true.
Disagree with your other analogy: I don't think anyone outside the oil industry would confuse the word "search" to mean surveying for oil. Oil-men have their own vocabulary for that anyway.
That doesn't make a lot of sense.
(Incidentally, the #1 and #3 drugs are preventative, not curative. http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/medicine/prescription-drug-s.... )