The Stats About Pharmaceutical Companies

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, and all thou this picture is full of worlds, i think its worth a couple billion for what is shows us.

There's a reason you see more ads for pharmaceuticals then any other product on tv. The massive dollar signs alone should alert you as to why natural remedy's and anything that isn't produce by these specific company's (vitamins as of late) are being labeled as bad for you (of course they're bad for you they dont make these company's billions )

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/c0f71ba1419f.jpg[/atsimg]

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[edit on 7/17/2010 by Alaskan Man]

Besides the college site, do you know where the stats really come from?

I have no doubt we are getting ripped off, just want more info if possible.

Good information, most appreciate your sharing.

No wonder US citizens cannot afford health care these days.

Harm None
Peace

reply to post by jam321


i wish i had more information for you but i found the picture as is, with no more information relating to it (otherwise i would have linked to source).

i guess it was wrong of me to jump on the "it must be true!" bandwagon without doing backup research but it rings of truth to me, still tho i need to learn more about it before i except it as an absolute.

But while the rhetoric is stirring, it has very little to do with reality. First, research and development (R&D) is a relatively small part of the budgets of the big drug companies—dwarfed by their vast expenditures on marketing and administration, and smaller even than profits. In fact, year after year, for over two decades, this industry has been far and away the most profitable in the United States. (In 2003, for the first time, the industry lost its first-place position, coming in third, behind “mining, crude oil production,” and “commercial banks.”) The prices drug companies charge have little relationship to the costs of making the drugs and could be cut dramatically without coming anywhere close to threatening R&D.

www.nybooks.com...

I think it is well known these companies take advantage of people even if the stats turn out to be too misleading.

Pharmaceutical companies are currently cutting more jobs than any other business sector of the economy, and plan to hire the fewest workers back, according to a survey by recruitment firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. The numbers are only a snapshot from the January-February period this year and last year, but they suggest that the glory days of Big Pharma are behind it and won’t be coming back any time soon.

industry.bnet.com...

Does the above article mean more profit since they have less workers?

reply to post by Alaskan Man


There is a lot of expense in developing drugs. There is R&D and FDA approval. They say by the time you hit FDA approval you have spend nearly a billion dollars, plus you must take into account all the times you spend close to a billion dollars and a particular drug doesn't recieve approval. Add to that the need to set aside funds in case something goes wrong and you face class action law suits, etc....

reply to post by ZuluChaka


True, however not only are they off loading those costs as fast as possible but they also include things like marketing research as part of the R&D budgets.

The books are cooked to vastly inflate any costs they cover.

I was watching Charlie Rose on PBS this week, I believe his guest was Paul Kruger (I didn't reinstall my TV Tuner until a couple days later, sorry). One of the things that they were talking about was how Big Pharma is now lobbying the FDA and US Gov to assume more of the research burden. They are pushing the idea that this research is better done in publically funded labs: Their main point is that University and Gov labs can be directly guided by the needs of society and benefit from larger numbers of researchers available.

I searched for the interview without any luck because it is defintiely worth watching. Not only do they want the public to foot the bill for their research, but the guest flat out promised that even with the Genome project's help there will be nothing but small, incremental advances in big ticket research for the next several decades.

No breakthroughs, no cures, only the status quo.

I found it really disturbing to watch this man guarentee that there will be no revolutionary advances in the treatment of any disease at any point in the next 30-40 years.



[edit on 18-7-2010 by [davinci]]

In the past, I would have jumped at the chance to criticize the pharmaceutical companies. But, that was before I learned some of them have programs which provide necessary drugs to those who can show a definitive financial need, at no cost.

I know this to be available, because my wife receives an expensive script from the manufacturer, free. This is extremely helpful, at this time, as she has no insurance coverage.

The best part is it is completely voluntary, on the part of the company, and doesn't require the government to administer.