Sample medicines, Global warming!

So at the end of the day, the table is piled with packets of all size and colors- ‘samples’ they say it. But don’t be mistaken by the size of it, the actual sample that come out of it often will not satisfy a single patients daily requirement. They play with the size and volume of the packing.  Do they really think, the doctors are so childish to reckon on the size and color? Quite often we feel embarrassed on finding just two tablets in a cigarette packet sized box. So if we want to give those samples to one of our patients, we need to unpack each packet, and then put ten packs worth to a single box, ‘cause we don’t want to belittle ourselves and our patients. We are used to this cheating but the patients are not!
These are all our personal inconveniences. Forget it! Let’s consider the real situation.  I have just opened up a sample packet, which contained just two small capsules. (The pink one in the picture.)  A 25x15 cm sized glossy card paper, with color printing. How much you would have paid for that if you had bought that as a greeting card? How much simple notebook or textbook pages it would have made with the same amount of pulp and energy?  This is the situation of just two capsules. Now think of the total amount of paper, then trees, electricity, manpower etc etc wasted for the entire lot of that medicine. Now think of the wastage on the other products of that company. Even worse, think of the total wastage of the precious resources made by the 6000 and more odd pharmaceuticals that operates in India! And if you care, imagine the amount of carbon dioxide produced in the process.
I know.. I know about recycling. But I bet, 90% of these sample packets never go for recycling. They end up in hospital or home incineration.
I don’t have exact figures. But my mental arithmetic tells me, it could provide every poor child in India with their books if they could save all those paper.  If they don’t believe in charity, they could at least save a thousand acre of forest or so much of polar ice. But that won’t sell the drug!
But I have decided. I won’t accept samples in disproportionate packing, hereafter. I am concerned. . I do care.