This year, Bloomberg launched a deep examination of how the drug industry uses patent laws, secret labs, obscure regulations, and aggressive sales practices to hold onto the revenue from its most profitable products for years.
The reporting uncovered the business practices that were behind the resignations of the CEO and CFO of one of the world’s (at the time) most highly valued biotechnology companies, showed how the cosmetic drug Botox became a blockbuster locked in an impenetrable fortress, and how the industry has taken advantage of the nation’s laws and regulations to block competition.
As the story neared publication, Alexion announced an overhaul of some of the tactics, and Bloomberg also broke news about investigations into the company by law enforcement and regulators, as well as operational and management changes. The Botox piece was the result of a long trust-building exercise with the company over a period of months that eventually led to an extremely rare visit to one of the most secure biotechnology facilities in the world.
Additional reporting showed how the industry uses a complex set of patient laws and safety regulations to keep drugs from going generic for years past when patients expected to get cheaper versions of some of the world’s costliest drugs.