May 3, 2005
Pharmaceutical Industry Question
Even though its growth rate has declined from the hot 18% of 2001 to 10% the pharaceutical industry still had a pretty darn good year in 2004:
in 2004 the U.S. pharmaceutical industry reached the quarter trillion dollar mark for the first time, with $251 billion in product salesI suspect the industry would prefer the 18% growth rate but there are some pressures holding them back:
According to NDCHealth, four factors have contributed to the overall pharmaceutical market growth decline: generic erosion; safety issues and product withdrawals; increased consumer switching to over-the- counter (OTC) medications and a lack of new blockbuster drugs.On the other hand market penetration for some drugs appears significant:
-Among all patients receiving a drug in 2004, 10% were on Pfizer's Zithromax® and 5% were on Pfizer's Lipitor®.Here is the question: Is it in the interest of the $251 billion pharmaceutical industry to have a healthier or a sicker customer base?
Based on your answer and given this data:
Overall, drug companies spent $78.1 million on lobbying in 2001, bringing the total lobbying bill for 1997-2001 to $403,071,467. (See Table 2) The companies employed 623 different individual lobbyists in 2001 – or more than one lobbyist for every member of Congress.what was the industry trying to accomplish and what types of programs would they support? Do you think Pfizer would rather have more or fewer people taking statins and Lipitor® in particular? Posted by Steve on May 3, 2005
I think that it is in their best interest to convince us that things we used to live with are actually debilitating health problems. Hence the Prozak nation.
It is in their best interest to convince us that health problems that could be handled without drugs can be handled more easily with drugs.
All of which is to say, no, I don't trust them. I'm not particularly antagonistic toward them, either, though. I just take their stinkin' drugs.
Posted by zombyboy at May 3, 2005 7:36 AMI think they're making the big bucks off all the people who had the flu which ended up into sinus infections. I now have to take another dose of meds because the first didn't totally take care of my sinus infection. And then there's the thyroid problem so many of us experience. Synthroid definitely has a share of the market. There are the sleep aids many people have prescribed because they're all stressed out and can't sleep, too.
Posted by oldwhitelady at May 3, 2005 9:17 AM
