Like a hoot potato
Posted: 4:42 AM | May 02, 2006

Conrado R. Banal III
Inquire

Published on Page B2 of the May 2, 2006 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer

The court reset the hearing of the harassment case of the US-based Pfizer -- the world's largest bully drug company -- against this cute administration.

Reason: The judge was on leave.

And so far, the court has yet to set the date for the resumption of the hearing.

The billion-peso question therefore is, can the postponement of the case affect the plan of this cute administration to lower the price of a particular medicine for hypertension as soon as possible?

You see, Pfizer holds the patent for the medicine known as Norvasc, which Pfizer sells in this poor country at P45 per five-milligram tablet.

In other countries such as India, Pfizer sells the same medicine under a different name - Amlogard -- at only P6 per tablet.

That makes the drug only about 650 percent more expensive here than in other countries.

And so this cute administration wants to import the drug from India as soon as the Pfizer patent expires in June next year. The state-owned trading firm Philippine International Trading Corp. (PITC) has started the process of getting permits and such.

But Pfizer went to court to stop PITC from starting the long process. By filing the case, Pfizer can expect to have at least 18 more months to sell the drug at that killer price that is 650-percent higher. After all, Pfizer stands to make a profit of about P2.5 billion due to the delay.

In various websites of US-based NGOs that monitor drug companies, particularly their abuses, Pfizer has been described as "aggressive." I think that the company is heartless.

One website noted that, in the Philippines, where 95 percent of the population cannot afford the Pfizer medicine Norvasc at that exorbitant price, Pfizer chooses the strategy to cater only to the rich.

In other words, what Pfizer is telling the majority of poor Filipinos who also need the anti-hypertension medication is this: TOUGH!

Now, based on reports from abroad, the management and the board of Pfizer are dealing with unrest among its stockholders.

Among the major issues is the huge pay for the chair and CEO, Hank McKinnell, who gets $65 million a year, plus $80 million upon retirement.

Reports said that stockholders are hooting against the Pfizer board for giving top potato McKinnell such a fortune of a pay.

That guy gets such a huge income of course at the expense of poor and sick people in countries like the Philippines.

I just don't know if the Pfizer executives here can sleep at night.