Pharmacy is BIG business

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090903/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_pfizer_settlement

Excerpt from the above link from the Associated Press:

"WASHINGTON – Federal prosecutors hit Pfizer Inc. with a record-breaking $2.3 billion in fines Wednesday and called the world's largest drugmaker a repeating corporate cheat for illegal drug promotions that plied doctors with free golf, massages, and resort junkets.
Announcing the penalty as a warning to all drug manufacturers, Justice Department officials said the overall settlement is the largest ever paid by a drug company for alleged violations of federal drug rules, and the $1.2 billion criminal fine is the largest ever in any U.S. criminal case. The total includes $1 billion in civil penalties and a $100 million criminal forfeiture.
Authorities called Pfizer a repeat offender, noting it is the company's fourth such settlement of government charges in the last decade. "
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Pfizer makes some of the top selling drugs, including Lipitor and Viagra. If you don't take these drugs, you probably know 27 people who do. How does it feel to contemplate the notion that the hard-earned money you paid for your expensive medication was partially used by Pfizer to ply "doctors with free golf, massages and resort junkets"? So that your doctor would choose Lipitor for your medication, which costs you and your insurance company more than a generic statin? Your collective prescriptions for these drugs and some others added up to $43 billion in sales for Pfizer last year. That's $43,000,000,000. That's a 43 and nine zeros. That's BIG. Do you think that a fine of $2.3 billion means that much?