Pfizer chief goes on TV, laments RP drug stance

PFIZER Inc. chief executive Jeff Kindler said he was “disappointed” after the Philippine government ordered a reduction in drug prices, including the price of the company’s cholesterol treatment Lipitor.

“We are disappointed by the government’s action to impose a price control on our medicines,” Kindler said in a telephone interview on Bloomberg television yesterday.

“We don’t think it’s the right answer for the Philippine people.”

President Arroyo ordered a 50-percent price cut on five medicines on July 27 after drug makers failed to reduce prices on their own, according to a statement on the Philippines’ official Web site.

The reductions would take effect Aug. 15, the statement said.

The five medicines include Lipitor, the best-selling drug in history with global sales of more than $12 billion last year, and Pfizer’s Norvasc, a hypertension treatment that generated about $2.2 billion for the New York-based pharmaceuticals company.

Philippine officials have claimed that the medicines sold in the country are among the most expensive in the world, and among these are the drugs taken against life-threatening ailments like high blood pressure, clogged arteries and heart problems.

Some officials also claim that the drugs commonly used in the Philippines are sold at prices as much as 200 percent higher than those in countries like India and Thailand.

Pfizer Philippines yesterday said it could lose P650 million a year as a result of the new law cutting drug prices.

The cuts would hit the multinationals’ bottom lines and “kill the local drug companies,” country manager Albert Mateo told Pfizer employees.

Earlier, the drug industry estimated that its offer to cut prices voluntarily would reduce sales by P7 billion to P10 billion a year.

Both local drug makers and the multinationals oppose price controls, saying the maximum retail prices mandated by law are a form of regulation.

Meanwhile, Customs officials said they would join Zuellig Pharma officials this weekend in destroying P10 million worth of expired medicines that were illegally released from the airport warehouse.

The 575 kilos of dextrose and regulated medicines arrived on Jan. 24 aboard the Dutch airline KLM, and someone claiming to represent Majestic Freight Forwarders managed to have them released without Zuelling Pharma’s knowledge, officials said. Bloomberg, with Elaine Ramos Alanguilan and Vito Barcelo