With U.S. automakers close to collapse and financial services companies in turmoil, drug makers are positioning themselves as a premier American industry that deserves support from policymakers.
   “The pharmaceutical industry is a national treasure,” Joe Pieroni, head of U.S. commercial operations for Japanese drugmaker Daiichi Sankyo, said at the Reuters Health Summit in New York.
   “We are probably at the forefront of technology in terms of numbers of jobs, numbers of innovations, numbers of patents,” he added.
   Drug makers are touting their contribution to the health and economy of the nation as traditionally critical Democrats prepare a major effort to overhaul health care. The companies are expected to face pressure to lower prices often attacked as too high. Manufacturers say that could hurt their ability to invest in research for new medicines.
   Pharmaceutical companies are working “to convince people in Congress that, instead of bashing the industry, try to work with the industry in establishing the U.S. as truly a foundation for this high technology workforce,” Pieroni said.
   Other executives who spoke to the Reuters summit also waved the flag. 
   “Here is a chance for the U.S. to keep doing what it is very good at, which is to innovate,” Schering-Plough Corp Chief Executive Fred Hassan said.
   With the auto and computer industries, Hassan said “unfortunately a lot of that went over to Asia a long time ago. But we are the preeminent industry around the world … and this is a crown jewel of the U.S.,” Hassan said.
   The health-care sector is “a very important source of jobs and innovation and economic growth,” Pfizer Chief Executive Jeff Kindler said.

    Aetna CEO Ron Williams is one of the highest profile African American executives in the United States. On Wednesday he reflected on the election of Barack Obama, who is about to become the nation’s first black president.     
    “I thought it was terrific that the country was able to judge him on the basis of what they felt he could do for the country. I felt proud of the country. I thought it was an important milestone in the evolution of the country, and having done that, like the seat I sit in, now our shareholders want to know, ‘what are you going to do for us?’
    “I think he is off to a good start working on critical issues,” said Williams.

    Many risk factors for developing heart disease are well known, such as smoking, obesity, high cholesterol and high blood pressure. Last week, a study suggested that elevated C-reactive protein (CRP) levels in the blood may indicate higher risk of heart disease.
    AstraZeneca Chief Executive David Brennan has identified a few more risk factors and may be ready to start taking his own cholesterol medicine.
    “I don’t know about you guys but I’m having my CRP tested. Why not know? I’m 55 years old, Type A personality, an executive, that’s a risk factor right there. Working in the pharmaceutical industry is a risk factor,” Brennan said, only half joking.

From time to time, John Jenkins is puzzled by the press releases he reads from drug companies.
   

Jenkins, the director of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Office of New Drugs, said when companies communicate an FDA action on their products to investors, they sometimes don’t convey it so accurately.  Click here to listen to his comments.
   

“We don’t monitor what the company says routinely about every action that we take,” Jenkins told the Reuters Health Summit in New York. “But there are times when we become aware of what the companies are saying relative to what we know is in the letters and we don’t think they add up.
   

“There are occasions where we call the companies and voice to them our concern that what they’re saying about what’s in the letter versus what we think the letter actually said are not consistent. There have actually been cases where we’ve referred some of those situations to the (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission).”
   

Jenkins said it was “very rare that we see something that we actually go to the trouble of referring to SEC.”
   

But, he said, “it’s less rare that we see something that we would we call the company up and say, ‘We noted your press release said that no new studies were required for approval, and maybe you didn’t read the letter to the end, but we asked you for a new study.’ “

With 35 million members, WellPoint is the largest U.S. health insurer by enrollment. But the company realized it had finally arrived when it turned up in a quiz show question.

“Wellpoint was the answer to a Jeopardy question,” Chief Executive Angela Braly beamed, referring to the long-running television quiz show. “The question was, ‘what does WellPoint provide to 1 in 9 Americans?’ The answer is health insurance but the contestant said ‘life insurance’ which our life people are really excited about because we do sell life insurance but that was not the answer.”

“We are a very diverse as a company,” she added

Like Kodak’s failure to shift from away from film faster in the face of digital cameras, the world’s top drug makers are dragging their heels in rethinking they way they do business.

At least that’s the view of Bain & Co partner Tim van Biesen, who told the Reuters Health Summit there were clear parallels between the revolution in photography and the looming slump in sales and profits as old blockbuster drugs face a cliff of patent expiries.

“Next month’s film sales were so overwhelmingly profitable that it was very hard to pull away from that business model. Pharma today is still faced with that same dilemma,” he said.

Click here to listen.

With at least $60 billion in U.S. annual sales of brand name medicines going off patent between now and 2012 — Medco is in a sweet spot.

The question on investors’ minds? What will spur growth beyond the generic windfall five years out? CEO David Snow told the Reuters Health Summit expansion plans in Europe will be one of those drivers, and said talks are going on right now.

Biogenerics in the U.S. will happen — it’s just a matter of when, according to Teva Pharmaceuticals’ head of North America.

George Barrett told the Reuters Health Summit that while next year is a toss-up given it’s an election year, setting up the regulatory pathway for biogeneirics to get to market is critical in the next two years ahead of wave of patents due to expire in five years.

Barrett was one of the featured speakers in the final day of the annual Reuters Health Summit speaking from our New York headquarters.