The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 279 No 7462 p100
28 July 2007

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• White Paper
• Agenda for change
• Opiate addiction
• Pfizer
• Retention fees
• CPD

Letters to the Editor

Pfizer

Think again!

From Mr E. A. Goran, MRPharmS

I was pleased to see the letter from Roger Pilsbury (PJ, 7 July, p20) in defence of the position of his company in the Pfizer “refusal to supply” argument and the other letters bemoaning Pfizer in the same issue. Pfizer’s subsequent silence is deafening.

Four months into the new distribution system and my level of satisfaction remains at rock bottom. On a day-to-day basis, it has created extra workload and the distribution is not as effective. In my particular case, early cut-off times for UniChem ensure that effectively I am on a once daily delivery system for these products and delivery of my morning order can be at any time from 9am to as late as 11.30am.

Clearly a master of spin, David Watson, director of trade at Pfizer, has claimed that the recent cases of fake product in the supply chain vindicate its decision to alter their distribution system. Might I remind Mr Watson that these fake products were parallel imports and that like many other independent contractors, poor discount on Pfizer products is forcing me to source as many parallel imports as possible. So how does this make the system less vulnerable to fakes?

I could not agree more with my colleague, Duncan Livingstone (ibid), that Pfizer just does not get it. We now have a supply chain that does not get the product where it is wanted as promptly and reliably as previously, a source that can simply refuse to supply for no apparent good reason and a system that actively encourages the use of parallel imported product.

For goodness sake, Pfizer, stop swallowing your own propaganda and think again about the whole system. AstraZeneca and the others take note too.

Elliot Goran
York, North Yorkshire

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