Forgive me for mindlessly parroting a piece from the LA Times – this is as engaged as my brain will be for several days. Hope they don’t sue me – the content is 100% Greg Critser. Hard to pass up, though.
A quiz on how the drug companies interact with the healthcare industry.
By Greg Critser
August 9, 2009
With the pharmaceutical companies at the bargaining table on healthcare reform, and Congress considering new restrictions on drug advertising, it may pay to bone up on some facts about the industry with the following quiz:
1. What percentage of Americans over the age of 65 take at least one prescription drug on a daily basis?
a. 20%
b. 40%
c. 60%
d. 75%2. In 2005, what percentage of all continuing medical education for physicians was paid for by Pharma?
a. About 25%
b. About 50%
c. About 75%
d. About 90%3. Who told a congressional panel in 1983 that “we believe direct advertising to the consumer introduces a very real possibility of causing harm to patients who may respond to advertisements by pressuring physicians to prescribe medications that may not be required.”
a. The chairman of the Federal Trade Commission
b. The chairman of Abbott Laboratories
c. The head of the Food and Drug Administration
d. The head of the Consumers Union4. In the same hearings, who said, “The potential pressures of public advertising of prescription drugs on the scientific decisions of the physician are both unwise and inappropriate.”
a. The chief of the FDA
b. The chief of Eli Lilly & Co.
c. The chief of the Sioux Nation
d. The chief of the House Committee on Science and Commerce5. Who, in 1983, first proposed that the FDA roll back its regulation and allow drugs to be advertised?
a. The chairman of the FTC
b. The chairman of Abbott Lab- oratories
c. The head of the FDA
d. The head of the Consumers Union6. In 2003, what did the head of Pfizer pharmaceuticals say was the key to the industry’s future success?
a. That “we should push as hard as we can to get patients to talk to their doctors about our newest drugs.”
b. That “we should give patients good, solid facts and encourage them to use logic to make their decisions.”
c. That Pharma “must move toward the emotional way of marketing, because in that way we can move toward the spiritual-ethical method.”
d. That Pharma should “really think about free Krispy Kreme coupons as a way of encouraging sales.”7. Today, most new prescription drugs are expected to show profitability within:
a. 90 days
b. 120 days
c. one year
d. three years8. According to the leading scholar on the subject of attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), Ritalin, a stimulant, became the leading treatment for ADHD because:
a. It was effective
b. It was safe
c. It was not called amphetamine
d. It made teachers happy9. In 2002, who said “we are entering what could be the golden age for kids and pharmaceuticals”?
a. The head of PhRMA, the powerful pharmaceutical lobby
b. The head of Eli Lilly
c. The head of Pfizer
d. The head of the drug committee for the American Academy of Pediatrics10. In ancient Greece, “pharmakon” meant:
a. An untrustworthy agricultural worker
b. A reformed criminal
c. A delicious beverage
d. Both “remedy” and “poison”Answers: 1-d; 2-d; 3-b; 4-b; 5-c; 6-c; 7-a; 8-c; 9-d; 10-d
Greg Critser is the author of “Fat Land,” “Generation Rx” and the forthcoming “Eternity Soup: Inside the Quest to End Aging.”
Piece of Mindful 
I guess its all about money.
When the state controls it, will the right money decisions be made?
“The state has a financial incentive to offer death instead of life: Chemotherapy drugs such as Tarceva cost $4,000 a month while drugs for assisted suicide cost less than $100.”
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Pharma is far more interested in drugs that people have to take daily, and so has been busy inventing diseases and advertising to the public.
As is typically the case, Tarceva was discovered and developed by a small company and marketed by the larger companies, who do little of that type of research.
Your comments about control of life and death are so far wide of the mark as not to be worthy of comment.
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Addressing the questions, can I have follow up?
#1 How many Rx drugs that seniors take are generic, and offer little or no profit to the company that developed the drug?
#2 Is it ok for any industry to subsidize continuing education in its own field?
3# Why is the photo op the only thing that comes out of a congressional hearing?
7# How long are drugs profitable?
10# See my previous comment.
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#1 How many Rx drugs that seniors take are generic, and offer little or no profit to the company that developed the drug?
Companies have patent protection for seven years, and then often do cosmetic reformulations to renew the patent. Anyway, nothing unfair going on. The companies that market the drugs are usually not the ones who developed it. That’s generally small start-ups who are gobbled up, or NHS.
#2 Is it ok for any industry to subsidize continuing education in its own field?
It’s pure conflict of interest and bribery.
3# Why is the photo op the only thing that comes out of a congressional hearing?
Not true.
7# How long are drugs profitable?
How long is a piece of string?
10# See my previous comment.
See my previous comment.
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Mark I’m not sure you should be down on “Big Pharma” right now.
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Published: August 8, 2009
WASHINGTON — The drug industry has authorized its lobbyists to spend as much as $150 million on television commercials supporting President Obama’s health care overhaul, beginning over the August Congressional recess, people briefed on the plans said Saturday.
The unusually large scale of the industry’s commitment to the cause helps explain some of a contentious back-and-forth playing out in recent days between the odd-couple allies over a deal that the White House struck with the industry in June to secure its support. The terms of the deal were not fully disclosed. Both sides had announced that the drug industry would contribute $80 billion over 10 years to the cost of the health care overhaul without spelling out the details.
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Yeah – I knew about it. Put two and two together – they told him they would either run $150 million in ads for him, or against him. Either your signature or your brains will be on that piece of paper. He caved.
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