Healthy Skepticism Library item: 16126
Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.
Publication type: news
Pettypiece S, Burger TJ.
Drugmakers May Fund $100 Million Ad Campaign on Health Overhaul
Bloomberg.com 2009 Jul 28
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601202&sid=aHMaDF4PRvMQ
Full text:
Drugmakers may ramp up their push for an overhaul of the U.S. health care system by spending $100 million on ads starting as early as September, said a person familiar with the discussion.
The Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, the industry lobbying group, discussed funding the advertising campaign during a meeting last week in Washington, the person said. PhRMA senior vice president Ken Johnson said no decision has been reached on the group’s campaign strategy for when Congress reconvenes after the August recess.
PhRMA will be running television commercials in August, in states where pharmaceutical companies have operations, asserting the importance of the drug industry for the economy, Johnson said. The drugmakers, by offering to lower drugs costs by $80 billion over 10 years, became one of the first industries to reach an agreement with the Obama administration in its efforts to revamp the health-care system. The drugmakers said they would oppose legislation allowing the government to negotiate prices on medicines sold through the U.S. drug program of Medicare.
“We are always preparing to fight back against bad public policy that would hurt patients and our ability to discover and develop new life saving medicines,” Johnson said July 24 in a telephone interview.
Ad Campaign May Grow
Two people familiar with the discussions in Washington said the amount of money put into ads may increase to $120 million.
Washington-based PhRMA represents 28 drugmakers, including New York-based Pfizer Inc. and GlaxoSmithKline Plc, with headquarters in London.
The content of the ads will depend on the legislation crafted in the House and Senate, where different procedural and political dynamics are at work.
Representative Henry Waxman, a California Democrat and chairman of a House committee writing health-care legislation, said this month that the deal Pfizer and other companies made to discount brand-name drugs for the elderly with gaps in Medicare prescription coverage was “really a Senate agreement.”
The industry’s $80 billion pledge was negotiated with Senator Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat who is chairman of the Senate Finance Committee and senior White House aides. Baucus is struggling to reach a bipartisan deal on his panel before the Aug. 7 recess.
Democratic leaders postponed a vote by the full Senate until September. Leaders in the House, which is scheduled to adjourn July 31, are fighting to contain a party split over the $1 trillion cost of the proposed health-care bill.
Drug Imports
Drugmakers have said they will fight efforts by Congress to allow drugs to be imported into the U.S. from Canada, where they are sold for less. No such proposal has been made under the current health care overhaul being discussed by Congress and the White House.
“We are strongly against reimportation from a safety standpoint,” Richard T. Clark, chief executive officer of Merck & Co., said July 21 in a telephone interview. “If it is an issue, we will have to fight that because we think that is the wrong thing to do from a patient standpoint.”
Pfizer Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Kindler said the industry supports the current health-overhaul proposal by the Obama administration. Pfizer opposes importing drugs from Canada or allowing the U.S. government to directly negotiate Medicare Part D drug prices.
Such pricing policies would “provide disincentives to the investment in research necessary to produce life-saving treatments,” Kindler said in a July 22 telephone interview.
Merck and Pfizer spokespeople directed questions about the proposed $100 million ad campaign to PhRMA.
This month, drugmakers revived the “Harry and Louise” characters used to scuttle health legislation sought by the Clinton administration in the 1990s, this time to support current overhaul efforts. The television ads will run for three weeks and cost about $4 million. Families USA, a Washington- based nonprofit group, and PhRMA are paying for the commercials.
