Pharma Blog Watch

Drug Manufacturing Inefficiency (On Pharma)
In her entry, blogger Agnes Shanley discusses the report released last week by the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Research Project that said the drug industry is wasting more than $50 billion each year due to factors such as poor decisionmaking and ineffective use of IT and outsourcing.

"Interestingly enough, the study suggests, manufacturing decisions appear to improve, the lower down the 'chain of command' one goes. Those doing the work, when trained and empowered, can make the biggest difference in results, a lesson that more drug companies are slowly learning," she writes. "Findings may also have some implications for pharmaceutical process analytical technologies (PAT) programs."

Print vs. TV DTC Ads (Pharma Marketing Ads)
In his blog, John Mack discusses wonders whether PhRMA's guiding principles for direct-to-consumer (DTC) ads, which were released last year, have led to an increase in print DTC ads, since the guidelines mostly relate to TV advertising. "The share of pharma spending on print ads in magazines in the first half of 2006 is up sharply, according to a TNS Media Intelligence study cited in a report by MM&M," he points out. "In comparison, the share allocated to TV DTC decreased from 64% to 59%."

"Following the money, we may need to pay more attention to print DTC than we have in the past," he writes. "For example, how 'balanced' are print DTC ads? If it's easier to achieve balance in print than in TV ads, then we should see more balance in print, right?"