Thursday, September 25, 2008

Great stuff on Merck and Schering at Ed Silverman's Pharmalot -- of "Transparency". . . .


He is right on time, here -- do go read it all:

. . . .Today, Merck has joined the party. The drugmaker issued a statement saying next month, grants to patient groups, professional medical societies and other organizations will be posted on its web site. Next year, payments to docs who serve as speakers will also be posted. Also next month, Merck will post study results on the ClinicalTrials.gov site.

These steps are occuring before the Physicians Payments Sunshine Act even becomes law (back story). Who’s next? How far will they go? And what about Schering-Plough? Will it win the Tin Ear award again next year?

I'd bet the Whole Ranch on it, here, Ed! Strongly bucking yet a[nother] clear trend in pharma, Schering's political donations in 2008 (image) remained heavily skewed to the Republican side of the ticket, in most races. Most of its fellow-pharma big-hitters have come much closer to parity, this year -- and several (including JNJ) have actually given more to Democrats than Republicans.

[I realize it's a tangent, above, but I've been meaning to post on it for about a week -- having noticed that Ed had also posted, this week, on the larger trend, earlier.] Here is Schering's earlier letter on the topic -- it is largely non-responsive, as you will see -- just for the record:

No comments: