Summit Notebook

Exclusive outtakes from industry leaders

Swine flu sales: windfall or hard work?

Nov 12, 2009 16:09 EST

Swine flu is turning out to be a sales bonanza for drug companies – just don’t call it a windfall, says GlaxoSmithKline.

As one of the world’s top suppliers of both vaccines and antiviral medicine, CEO Andrew Witty resents the implication that billions of dollars of business simply fell into his company’s lap when the World Health Organisation declared H1N1 a pandemic in June.

“For me the word windfall means you’re walking down the street and something fell out of the sky,” he told the Reuters Health Summit. “We’ve spent the best part of 15 years investing for this situation and our ability to manufacture and supply potentially 500 million or so doses (of vaccine) is all because of these investments.”

Comments

No Pandemic SARS,no Pandemic Aviarian finally Pandemic swine flue and the target is finally reached. Excellent performances with little new Pharma in the pipeline.
Excellent shot!

Posted by Nino Ferrari | Report as abusive
 

Many governments buy flu shots for their people. Is the flu shot really working ? Are there side-effects ? How long the immunization last ? What indemnity is payable to a person getting swine flu after injection ? No stats, no answers too.

Posted by McCory | Report as abusive
 

Post Your Comment

House Rules:
  • We moderate all comments and will publish everything that advances the story directly or with relevant tangential information
  • We try not to publish comments that we think are offensive or appear to pass you off as another person, and we will be conservative if comments may be considered libelous.
Summit Notebook BLOG