A bitter pill for Pfizer
Every day with my morning bowl of oatmeal, Dr. Jarvik, creator of the artificial heart, joins me. It's during the commercials when the news program takes a break, of course—he's not at my actual kitchen table.
I think of him as the face of Lipitor, as he has been a long-time, visible proponent of this blockbuster drug.
And by the frequency of airtime lately, it's obvious that Pfizer is nervous. It has no intention of losing market share without making a Herculean last-ditch effort to sway us to remain solidly in their camp.
But doctors and patients have great incentive: The alternative generic drug, simvastatin, is reported to work exactly the same as its name-brand counterpart—for a whole lot less cash. The only difference is in name, and doctors would be challenged to find a good reason to convince their patients to pay more for that.
To add to the drama, Pfizer is parading a shoddy study as a good enough reason to stick with their baby. According to their study results, patients who transferred from Lipitor to simvastatin invited a whole lot of trouble for themselves in the form of heart attacks and death.
Keep in mind that this study they're using was done by none other than Pfizer itself, so here we go again. Data shows that 80 percent of all drug studies sponsored by a company favor the company's drug. Does anyone actually believe that they would come forward and be a proponent for making the switch and say that there's no difference between their pill and the generic version? You'd have to have been born yesterday to think that would ever happen.
Those in the know are obviously not convinced by Pfizer's study and its too- convenient findings. There are actually multiple studies available that show that both drugs work the same at reducing LDL cholesterol (and no doubt, they carry the same side effects, too). Price tag is the only difference, with the generic version costing over two-thirds less (and depending on where you purchase, a ridiculously-low fraction of even that cost can be found) than paying to have the name "Lipitor" on the bottle.
Pfizer must be crying at the thought of not only losing the patients they've already got on their pills, but all of those potential ones from the bottom-swell that will grow the ranks of those "in need" of cholesterol drugs. It's a sweet irony to think that they have pushed and pushed to lower the bar in order to swoop up more patients at ever-younger ages—and someone else will now profit from all of their slick and aggressive marketing.
It's hard to pity a company that has profited so greatly—and at the cost of so many unnecessary and costly prescriptions and needless side effects. Just think of all the useful prevention programs in communities around the country some of that money could have been spent on, instead of being channeled into Pfizer's coffers. Sales in just 2006 hit the underside of $13 billion. That should give them enough to purchase truckloads of tissues to wipe their tears, not to mention finance their next stab at a blockbuster drug.
