On Oct 15, 2009, at 4:22 PM, Mark Smith wrote: > > On 15.10.2009, at 22:04, David Patrick Henderson wrote: > >> On 15 Oct 2009, at 12:46, LuKreme wrote: >> >>> There's enough Democrats whose souls have been bought and paid for >>> by >>> Big Pharma to keep any railroading from working. >> >> The Pharma industry favors government expenditure on healthcare as >> they've benefitted greatly from the changes to medicare and have been >> suffering from tremendous sales losses during this recession as >> people >> switch heavily to generics to save $. > > What "people" would that be ? There is no one "big pharma". Big Pharma > in terms of the big companies with massive pipeline dependency have > very little interest in competing with generic manufacturers once > Patents expire. As soon as a generic manufacturer can legally start > selling a particular drug, the market switches en mass to the generic, > regardless of the prevailing economic conditions. > > I'm sure you know at least a little about "pipelines". Those "big > pharma" companies complaining about losses (when what they actually > mean is reduced profits) are those that haven't maintained their > pipelines. The number of big pharma companies in pipeline difficulties > is currently high, but this also has nothing whatsoever to do with > prevailing economic conditions. > > Big Pharma buys political clout in the same way that the oil, banking > and car manufacturing industries do, so it is neither better nor worse > than these. I'd be surprised if it was the case in the US, that big > pharma "owns" dem votes to a greater extent than it owns republican > votes. A converse might however be true, that other industries rampant > with lobbyism are less successful in buying dem votes.
I think the particular Big Pharma problem in question is that they cut a deal directly with the Obama admin (remember the promise of transparency? Obama doesn't either..) From HuffPo.. "The memo, which according to a knowledgeable health care lobbyist was prepared by a person directly involved in the negotiations, lists exactly what the White House gave up, and what it got in return. It says the White House agreed to oppose any congressional efforts to use the government’s leverage to bargain for lower drug prices or import drugs from Canada — and also agreed not to pursue Medicare rebates or shift some drugs from Medicare Part B to Medicare Part D, which would cost Big Pharma billions in reduced reimbursements. In exchange, the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers Association (PhRMA) agreed to cut $80 billion in projected costs to taxpayers and senior citizens over ten years. Or, as the memo says: “Commitment of up to $80 billion, but not more than $80 billion.” All done out in the open just as he promised.. I have his words exactly. (2nd day in office) "The way to make government responsible is to hold it accountable," "And the way to make government accountable is make it transparent so that the American people can know exactly what decisions are being made, how they're being made, and whether their interests are being well served." And I have a bridge in New York for sale. =c= _______________________________________________ OSX-Nutters mailing list | [email protected] http://lists.tit-wank.com/mailman/listinfo/osx-nutters List hosted at http://cat5.org/
