Time's Karen Tumulty and Michael Scherer have a thoroughly enlightening, and thoroughly depressing, article in the new Time about how the drug industry got its way in health care reform. The industry spends more than $600,000 a day in lobbying, they note. And, from the looks of things, it's money well spent.
The focus of the article is the debate over "exclusivity" for biological drugs--that is, the period during which the maker of a drug can manufacture and sell it without threat of generic competition. Reformers, like Representative Henry Waxman, had been pushing to cut the exclusivity period down to five years. The industry wanted twelve. Guess who won?
The power of special interests is an old story, of course. But the reach of pharma's influence is still something to behold, as it goes well beyond the usual game of campaign contributions and revolving door connections:
