Year 2003. If one could imagine the worst time to
publish the book that praised the Merck's pharma business, then the
author Fran Hawthorne couldn't have done the better job.
Published on eve of Merck's Vioxx scandal, this book provides mostly
positive, though superficial look at Merck's history and its
tradition to put "the patients first".
Within 1 year, Merck's Vioxx scandal was an example of what is wrong
with big pharma (suppression of negative data about drug's
side effects, pricing of drugs that are based not on actual drug benefits but on market tolerance threshold and widespread abuse of
patent law to prevent cheap version of the drugs to reach the
market).
Book itself is easy to read but it is totally
useless. After first few chapters, the author's focus wanders around
and discusses among other things how pharma sales reps used to
interact with medical providers (i.e. doctors).
One things is clear from this book: when
the company goes public, all hell breaks loose. Until Merck went
public in 1995, Merck was the best pharma company in the world (in
basic pharma research, in number of drugs developed and approved, and
consistently listed among the best and the most admired
companies).
The author's mission was to show to the
reader how Merck is (or was) so different from other pharma
companies. However, in the end, Merck appears to be no different at
all. There is no surprise here. Publicly-traded companies are subject
to shareholders pressure. Only thing that matters afterwards is a
profit. Prestige, reputation, curiosity and culture go out of
window.
posted by David Usharauli
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