Power Alley: The Wildly-Outsized Pfizer Q4 2020 Lobby Spend, And What It Bought -- As Trump Fell Into... Irrelevancy

As the graphic at right indicates, Mr. Frazier at Merck likely was able to see that Baby-T's reign of chaos was drawing to a close, by the early Fall of 2020. So he cut his lobby spend. In truth, Pfizer has been more than doubling Kennilworth for nearly six years, running now -- but most larger life sciences companies pull back -- as a Presidential cycle draws to a close, since the new Administration may see things differently than the prior one. In my lifetime, that has never been more true (except as a close second, with 2008 and the arrival of BHO 44 and what became the ACA of 2010 looming), than in this cylce.

Mr. Biden was clear that real health care reform would be one of his priorities. And he was the rowing oar, on passing the ACA (or Obamacare), through Congress in early 2010. So, while Baby-T accomplished nothing on any pharma related front in four years, it was clear Mr. Biden would -- and he already has, with his executive orders on access, just 10 days in. Which brings me to. . . why did Pfizer keep spending, apace, in Q4 2020? Did it miss, in seeing the truth, through the fog of the sinking "Boaters for T"? Or the super spreader rallies? Who knows? Who cares, really? It certainly was. . . stupid. Here's a bit of where that money went:

. . .▲ Drug Pricing, Biosimilars, Drug Shortages, Out of Pocket Costs, Rebate Reform, Vaccine Infrastructure and Drug Importation. . . .

▲ Medicare Part D, Coverage Gap, Rebate Reform, Out of Pocket Costs, Price Transparency and International Reference Pricing/Most Favored Nations. . . .

▲ Comprehensive Corporate Tax Reform, International Tax Reform, OECD Profit Allocation, and Manufacturing Credits. . . .

▲ Foreign Market Access Issues (including IPR), NAFTA/USMCA, International Supply Chain/Buy America, U.S.- U.K. Trade Negotiations, and U.S. - Kenya FTA. . . .

We see that Baby-T's vaccine logistics game was woefully deficient; perhaps (being charitable here), Pfizer was trying to help Congress see that T was botching it -- as over 420,000 died. Who knows?

Onward, grinning -- at the perfectly azure skies, and the blazingly white thick carpet of snow here. . . . be excellent to one another -- it is almost 40 degrees in the afternoon sunshine!

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