J&J Profits on Taxpayer-Funded Pharmaceutical

The first to the finish line in the race to develop a coronavirus vaccine is positioned to make a fortune. U.S. pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson got a head start late last month with a half-billion-dollar matching investment from the U.S. Government. J&J CEO Alex Gorsky has been making the rounds of national news media touting his pledge to make the potential vaccine available on a not-for-profit basis.

The announcement inevitably drew public accolades. But what exactly does that pledge mean? And who, if anyone, outside of the company will have access to the documents and insider knowledge to verify that the pledge is upheld? And for how long?

“The devil is in the details.” David Mitchell, founder of Patients for Affordable Drugs, told the Financial Times in an article published April 5.

Read on Financial Times: Johnson & Johnson Chief Looks to the Greater Good

Mitchell noted that “the promise was only for the duration of the pandemic.”

If past is prologue, then J&J’s history with another life-saving drug, Bedaquiline, is worth a closer look. Bedaquiline, which came on the market in 2012, is considered a game-changer treatment for people with drug-resistant tuberculosis.

“Bedaquiline was developed with considerable taxpayer, non-profit and philanthropic support. Much of the critical work to inform the use of the drug and demonstrate its therapeutic value was conducted by the TB research community, health ministries, and treatment providers including MSF, and was financed by taxpayers and other donors,” according to an article posted Jan. 20, 2020 on the website of doctorswithoutborders.org.

Read on DoctorsWithoutBorders.org: MSF Calls on Johnson & Johnson to Lower Price of Lifesaving TB Drug

J&J holds the patent on Bedaquiline, according to Doctors Without Borders (Medicins Sans Frontieres). The medical organization, which calls itself the largest nongovernmental provider of TB treatment worldwide, reports that J&J has priced Bedaquiline beyond the ability of most patients in poorer countries to pay.

Although 484,000 people develop drug resistant TB annually, a total of only 37,000 have received Bedaquiline since the treatment was approved in 2012, the article states. Doctors Without Borders kicked off protests in October 2019 in front of J&J offices around the world calling for the company to cut the price of Bedaquiline in half to $1 a day for people with drug resistant TB.

Read on MSF.org: Johnson & Johnson Must Halve Price of Lifesaving TB Drug

In January 2020 when J&J released its 2019 earnings report showing $82.1 billion in sales, Doctors Without Borders and its supporters protested in front of the New York Stock Exchange.

 

 

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