Why medicine comes with fewer pills but costs more

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The healthcare industry took one of the biggest blows during the economic crisis. Marked by ever-increasing costs that trickle down to the patients, the medical sector has been thrown under the political spotlight and has been the topic of heated public debate for years. While several solutions and policy amendments have been put into effect, improvements are slow to materialize and are inconsistent across the nation.

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One of the upsets in the healthcare industry was fueled partially by the patent expiring for several fast-selling drugs. Generics took the opportunity to cash in and, in effect, made it difficult for Big Pharma companies to maintain their profits. The decrease in demand inevitably resulted to a cut back on supply, but with profit loses on all fronts, branded medicine makers could not afford to reduce their prices. In fact, to compensate for the loss that would result from producing fewer medicines, patent-holding medical companies had to increase their prices to maintain profit margins.

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Having accepted defeat in some arenas, branded medicine does little to attempt outselling or even competing with generics. Instead, it continues to market expensive, branded drugs to a select group of buyers who have grown to trust and prefer branded pills over generics. To remain competitive, Big Pharma companies have also taken to developing drugs that they can still hold the patent for, such as blood pressure-regulating pills or cholesterol-reducing supplements.


As a marketing executive in the healthcare industry, Mary Szela, the senior vice president of Global Strategic Marketing and Services at Abbott Laboratories, is one of the first to know about changes in the medical and healthcare industry. Stay updated on current developments by visiting this website.

When health care comes at too high a cost

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National health care is a heatedly debated topic, particularly when its rising cost is focused on. In the last decade, several healthcare policies have been signed into effect, all of which aimed to reduce the cost of medicine, medical services, and health insurance; yet the average citizen will attest to the fact that prices for all three have only been rising. Even more alarming, recent studies have shown that the average life span is shortening, lending evidence to the claim that more expensive healthcare has not led to better quality services or healthier lives.

In an economy where Americans struggle to put food on the table, paying for medicine and insurance is hardly a priority. The price of insurance has become so difficult to maintain that people would rather risk paying for the costs if they fall ill than shell out premium installments on a monthly basis. Although this predicament aims to be addressed by the upcoming healthcare exchange, the latter does not answer the question of why healthcare has become so impossible to afford. A close look at the distribution of wealth in the healthcare sector may provide some answers.

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On average, non-medical hospital staff in America, such as members of the board and the hospital CEO, are found to be compensated a significant portion of the income- money that might instead go to improving facilities or reducing costs for patients. The pharmaceutical industry has also come under fire, as surveys showed that a drug in America will cost anywhere between three to eight times its price in other parts of the world. Where there is no blanket solution for this, it is clear that the government and healthcare sector need to re-arrange their financial priorities to alleviate the burden on the industry’s main client: its patients.

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As an executive in the pharmaceutical industry for more than a decade, Mary Szela is in a good position to provide insights into the changes in medicine and healthcare. Visit this website for updates on the field.

Empowered women: Female execs in pharmaceuticals

While the executive positions in most giant pharmaceutical companies are held by men, the number of women holding executive positions in the industry have grown in recent years. Below are three females making a name for themselves in the field of pharmaceuticals:


1. Beatrice Cazala, Executive Vice President (Commercialization Operations) of Bristol-Myers Squibb



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Beatrice Cazala heads the development of the company’s BioPharma strategy through proactive innovation and the implementation of global external company policies across all regions. Having been with the company for 30 years, she joined BMS in 1982 as a product manager based in France.


2. Mary Szela, Senior Vice President of the Global Strategic Marketing and Services division of Abbott Laboratories



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Mary Szela has been with Abbott for more than 20 years, and prior to her current role, she held leadership positions in various divisions of the company, including SVP for U.S. Pharmaceuticals and SVP for Pharmaceutical Operations.


3. Sue Mahony, President of Lilly Oncology and Senior Vice President of Eli Lilly and Company




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She is formerly the company’s SVP of the Human Resources and Diversity division. She joined Lilly in 2000 after more than a decade of holding sales and marketing roles in oncology/hematology and cardiovascular medicine for Schering-Plough, Amgen, and Bristol-Myers Squibb.


These women execs have been in the pharma industry for quite a while, and are backed by a solid education background. They serve as inspiration to other females who want to pursue a career in pharmaceutical sciences to help cure and treat a wide variety of medical conditions.


This Mary Szela Twitter page shares updates on the latest in medicine.

Dragging aid workers roughshod into political conflicts

Despite their noble efforts, aid workers in marginalized countries remain easy targets in political crossfire. It’s easy enough to predict. In most cases, they are volunteers working outside an official system, or for non-profits. Their security is not necessarily bankrolled, nor is their safety prioritized by military interventions in conflict zones.

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In cases where they aren’t victims, they are suspected of being intelligence operatives. Forgood reason. As Katherine Bigelow’s controversial film Zero Dark Thirty reveals, health programs such as community vaccinations are usually set up by First World intelligence agencies to gather information for counter-terrorism missions. The film shows this happening through a polio vaccination program. Fact-checkers for the movie, however, reveal this as a hush-hush tribal infiltration mission in real life through a CIA-sponsored hepatitis B vaccination program in the hunt for bin Laden.

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One of the controversial pressures on Bigelow now is the growing distrust for aid workers arising from her movie’s reception in Pakistan. Truth or assertion, the portrayal of aid workers has its reprisals, with Taliban community heads disallowing polio vaccinations or aid workers now marked out as enemies by tribal leaders. The article also reports the murder of six polio vaccinators. Whether they were murdered as war’s collateral damage or on account of the suspicion they incite is another question.

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Such fate is not unique to aid workers. But for years, the dodgy place is where they get inadvertently thrown. Ironically, it’s no coincidence that conflict-zones need them more.


The efforts of aid workers go hand in hand with the obligation of pharmaceuticals to promote public health. Mary Szela, an immersed representative of this industry, tackles its work through this webpage.

To curb child obesity, move to cleaner air

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Child obesity is a recognized epidemic in America. Over the last year, parents, pediatricians, and elementary school teachers have launched an aggressive campaign against sugars and fats. While effective, a recent study shows this attempt to remove fatty food from a child’s diet is futile if the child is predisposed to obesity. While it is true that obesity can be genetic, even children from families without the gene can be exposed to the dangers of obesity while still in the womb. This does not– as one might think– depend entirely on what the mother eats while pregnant. The prenatal factor that has been proven to lead to obesity is in fact what the mother inhales.




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The debate over air pollution has possibly existed longer than the concern for obesity has. Air pollution has been known to cause allergies, lung infections, and respiratory failure. A study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology found that exposure to air pollution during pregnancy is associated with an increased chance of having heavier children. The research concluded that air pollution contains endocrine disruptors and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs)– endocrine-disrupting chemicals found in cigarette smoke and car exhaust. Like estrogen, PAHs interfere with some developmental and metabolic functions. According to the research findings, children born to mothers with the highest PAH levels during their third trimester had a 79% greater risk of becoming obese.




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While it is difficult to avoid air pollution– particularly for expectant mothers living in cities– it is possible to consciously avoid the worst sources of PAH exposure. This means avoiding second-hand cigarette smoke and similar exhaust. Knowing that air pollutants can cause child obesity– which is known to lead to diabetes– should be motivation enough for pregnant women to stay vigilant.



Child obesity is known to lead to type 2 diabetes– a growing issue for children in America. As the former Senior VP of Global Strategic Marketing and Services of Abbott Diabetes Care, Mary Szela takes this issue close to her heart. Read more about her advocacy on this website.

The historical research model of pharmaceuticals

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Admittedly, some big pharmaceuticals have come under fire for their failure to produce safe drugs. Internationally, damages filed against them have drained the resources of some and put to question their models for producing drugs.


These backlashes have naturally tainted their operations, undermining the strong historical foundations of their operations. Pharmaceuticals were once hailed as indices for the advancement of medical technology.




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This exposé by The New Yorker cleverly runs the reader through the development of pharmaceutical companies to what they are now. With billion-dollar mergers behind them, today’s hyphenated pharmaceutical names are a triumph of forgetting the sophisticated Swiss and German models that launched their relevance. Admittedly, pharmaceuticals that have come under fire for failing to produce relevant drugs have failed to derive success from these models after years of trying to develop them.


The Swiss and German laboratories of yore were at the forefront of assiduous discovery and testing of new compounds that form the basic components of drugs. In theory, they have provided a valiant backbone in the crusade against the multiplication of diseases. These models are expensive to maintain, but fruition could have attenuated the costs. However, The New Yorker also points out that despite such a strong foundation, there is still a want for new, innovative drugs that are not of the “me, too” kind.




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Perhaps what’s left for big pharmaceuticals to do is forgo aggressive expansion in favor of getting down to productive research. The world is in desperate need of new, safe drugs to combat the rising statistics of mortality and morbidity from diseases.



The pharmaceutical industry is the subject of many analyses for its continuing improvement. For more insights, consult this Facebook page offering the outlook of Mary Szela, a well-placed executive of Abbott Laboratories.

Big pharma, small countries

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Pharmaceuticals don’t necessarily carry the image of grassroots doctors and aid workers going around underdeveloped countries and crossing warzones to distribute cheap drugs to the world’s poorest populations. However, a report from The Guardian broke down the contributions of the biggest pharmas to the production of accessible and affordable drugs made available in third world countries.



It seems like a case of developing conscience. Or, it could merely be a recognition of conquering markets by volume. The good in all of this is that medicines for epidemic-level diseases are no longer the preserve of rich countries. Logically, diseases such as tuberculosis, diabetes, and malaria are more common in poorer societies. The global pressure to address them is, of course, a by-product of government policies on health in concert with those of the World Health Organization (WHO).

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Pharmaceuticals like Glaxosmithkline, Sanofi, and Johnson and Johnson have notably adjusted their pricing. They are also pledging ethical practices in research and testing, a far cry from the days some of the biggest ones in the industry were being accused of inhuman procedures.


Population boom could also have ushered economies of scale in drug development and production. Diseases have become more common, necessitating a ready supply of specific medications. The drive for perfecting vaccines for diseases such as malaria has intensified. It might really be just a good time to produce drugs.

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Read more about the pharmaceutical industry from this Mary Szela Facebook page.