Time for Mr Taurel to smell the cofee
Mr. Taurel, of course, uses the example of Lilly’s potential new blood thinner Presurgel. It seems that, at least according to him, some data was leaked and that the subsequent momentum of word of mouth, caused by the media, cost Lilly over $6 billion in market capitalization. If Mr. Taurel is a reads the Wall Street Journal I am sure he can find numerous instances when companies have lost a lot of money in market cap by potential rumors, innuendos and unsubstantiated fact. But Mr. Taurel takes it a step further and feels that the media should try and understand the data so that they can report the whole story. Surely he has been watching and reading different news stories than I have. Sensationalism is in Mr. Taurel and MBA analysts are only interested in the bottom line and do not have the time or skill set to “interpret data”.
He went on to say that “statistical data can be interrupted in different ways” but in reality why should anyone trust data that pharma presents? What has pharma done to earn the trust of patients, the media, and physicians? Pharma companies have a vested interest in presenting data that is positive to their products, as he states data can be interrupted many ways. As a recent example, Johnson & Johnson allegedly misled docs and the FDA for years by altering and withholding medical data about the patch, according to a motion filed in federal court in Toledo, Ohio, Bloomberg News reports.
The company “withheld and altered data from the clinical trials which proved that the patch delivered significantly higher levels” of estrogen than oral contraceptives. “Obviously unaware of the withheld information, the FDA approved Ortho Evra for marketing.
J&J faces lawsuits by 2,400 women who claim the patch releases high levels of estrogen that cause strokes, heart attacks, and blood clots in the legs and lungs. Internal documents and pre-trial interviews with J&J scientists show the company learned the risk in 1999 and misled the FDA when seeking approval in 2001 to market the device, Bloomberg writes in citing the filings
So with this credibility issue physicians are not gullible anymore to pharma company “claims” or data and are now turning to each other to determine whether to prescribe products and on product claims. Sales people, fresh out of school, who are programmed to pitch the company bottom line have become no more than overpaid sample delivery people for most products.
As someone at CNBC wrote in response to Taurels article”
I think Taurel is shooting the messenger. Lilly had to know that the original story about the halted clinical trials was going to break. And, if so, it had a golden opportunity to try to get out in front of it and do some spin control. For example, offer up high-level executives to reporters immediately. Put out a more detailed statement than the one it released. The company might argue that its hands were tied because of the pending embargo on the larger clinical trial results which were soon due to be presented at the American Heart Association meeting and published in "The New England Journal of Medicine."
But I suspect that given the extraordinary circumstances--the news of the two smaller studies being halted and the steep $6 billion decline in LLY's market value because of it--that the company might have been able to convince AHA and/or NEJM to loosen up a little and let its officials discuss at least some of the results in an open forum, pre-embargo
We are slowly being transformed into an information economy There is way too much information to "analyze data and pieces of relevant information can be very valuable. The fact that Mr Taurel chose the Wall Street Journal to voice his opinion indicates to me that his primary target was investors and the street but the reality is that it will always be the bottom line to Wall Street. Lilly is going to have a hell of hill to climb to make presurgel a winner. One of the lessons should be “how do we use the media to our patients, customers and company advantage rather than “we need to tame the beast” , cause that ain’t gonna happen anytime soon.