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On Mon, 17 Dec 2001 21:59:01 -0500 Perry Cohen <[log in to unmask]> writes: > Business Europe: Big Pharmaceuticals Take the Gloves Off > By Stephen Pollard> > 12/17/2001 > The Wall Street Journal Europe Thanks Perry - this was an interesting and also disturbing article. The pharmaceutical industry, as this article reports, seems to be blaming European governemnts who institute price controls on drug prices, for driving up the cost of drugs in the U.S. An industry represnetative is quoted : >" The crux of the matter is this. European governments demand severe > discounts on pricing. With a base price of 100 in the U.S., the > average French price for a drug, for example, is 42. With research > and development funded by profit, the PhRMA companies argue that the > Europeans are in effect after a free lunch -- access to innovation > without having to pay for it." --- It seems like the industry might be hoping to take criticism off the pharmaceutical companies and the high prices of medicines in the U.S. by trying to pit consumers from diferent countries against each other. This type of "divide and conquer" mentality does not help any of us. It also diverts attention from the fact that there is still no Medicare prescription coverage and that many workers and unemployed Americans lack insurance for their medications, and must pay hundreds of dollars a month for their meds, out of their pockets. i remember hearing a very different interpretation on prescription drug pricing last year at the Families USA confernence and dug up the handout from a talk by Stephen Schondelmeyer, who teaches at the Un. of Minnesota and directs the PRIME Institute (Pharmaceutical Research In Management & Economics) He suggested that the U.S. should also adopt price controls, such as the European countries have done. Comparing drug prices among different countries for 1999-2000, while prices increased close to 6%in the U.S. they decreased from 4 - 6% among EU countries. Comparing U.S. and U.K. prices for the same drugs - the costs in U.K. were 40% less. Why? They analyzed the expenses of the drug firms in both country and found that "Nearly 2/3 of the U.S. -U.K. price difference appears to be due to expenses in the U.S. for marketing, advertising and administrative expenses." So we, the consumers are paying for all those drug commercials on T.V., ads in medical journals, freebies to doctors, etc. The article also states: " If pharma companies do not find the EU "hospitable" -- for which read profitable -- then > there is nothing to force them to stay or, perhaps still more importantly, to offer their latest treatments to European patients. " -- Besides the ethical issues of threatening to withold treatments from the sick - wouldn't the drug companies loose even more money if they don't market their new products throughout the world? And as the article concludes - patient groups are becoming organized and would not stand for this type of mistreatment. Any other reactions ? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn