(NaturalNews) The pharmaceutical industry is generally known to be a greed-driven, profiteering racket. However, the real danger for average Americans isn't just getting ripped off while suffering horrific side effects as a result of taking drugs — it's the threat of going bankrupt simply due to having a chronic illness for which the medical-industrial complex now prescribes "cures" that cost upwards of tens of thousands of dollars to manage.

Cancer is arguably the biggest profiteering disease of all. It's the one condition that will never have a cure — at least, that you'll hear about in the mainstream media — and will perpetually be assigned "experimental" treatments that would drain your entire bank account in a year or less. Here's an overview of some of these so-called experimental drugs and the costs associated with each:

1. Portrazza (necitumumab) by Eli Lilly & Co.
This experimental lung cancer drug doesn't cure lung cancer, of course, but its manufacturer claims that when combined with chemotherapy, it might help extend a patient's lifespan by a mere month and a half. The cost? As much as $1,309 per three-week cycle, according to The Washington Post. This translates to a cost of more than $22,500 annually.

The average working American earns about $46,500 annually in taxable wages, according to the Social Security Administration (SSA). This is just slightly more than double the cost of getting treated with necitumumab for a year, assuming a person making this amount of money actually saved $22,500 of his earnings for such treatment.

However, the reality is that the average American household — not individual, since the the amount for an individual is probably a lot lower than this — saves about $4,900 of its annual earnings in the bank for a rainy day. At $1,309 per three-week cycle, treatment with necitumumab would drain a family's yearly savings in less than three months.