Big Pharma spends a lot of money to develop a new pharmaceutical product. I get that. Increasingly the industry is struggling to deliver products that deliver substantial differences and that translates into a bad business model because buyers refuse to buy. Much like pricing discussions, this is an industry that detests a real free market or capitalism. Not that it doesn't stop them from pretending as though price negotiations are somehow communist and against capitalist principles. (The bigger the lie, as they say.)
Governments and insurance companies run their own tests and look for some level of increase such as an increase in the lifespan of a patient. All too often in recent years, the industry has not been able to show enough of an increase to justify newer products. The response by the industry has been consistent. Big Pharma has enjoyed a lax regulatory environment in the US so they promote their products for uses outside of the original intent. The Independent:
AstraZeneca launched a public relations push to get doctors to prescribe its best-selling psychiatric drug Seroquel for a string of uses that were not approved by safety regulators, according to a damning internal document released yesterday.This is the industry who Obama is going to work with to build a new health care system. Does anyone really think they will join easily? This industry relies on bilking the American system so they will not go down without a fight.
The UK's second biggest drug maker is being sued by 16,000 patients in the US for "spinning, skewing and concealing" information on the drug's potential side-effects, including diabetes and weight gain, and lawyers unearthed emails and strategy documents showing what they say are repeated violations of the law.
The company was forced on to the defensive yesterday after more than 230 internal documents were made public, supporting a legal assault that wil cost it hundreds of millions of dollars if successful.
