August 2005 - Association of Dutch Businessmen

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REVIEW ADB networking beach BBQ @ Coastes Sentosa By Barry Doesburg This very successful event was held on Thursday evening June 2nd 2005. In the perfect setting of a trendy beach bar at Siloso beach over 50 people enjoyed the food, drinks, talks and a nice evening breeze. Menno Douwes Dekker, Marius de Beer, Lineke van Nederpelt, Gita de Beer, Claudette Douwes Dekker-Dumoulin Paul Schreuders, Marjorie Schreuders, Marleen Keunen, Edith Van der Horst, Charlotte Ruegg Walter Leijen, Paul Hoogwaerts, Remco Muzerie Jeroen de Koning and Michael van Ommeren Annabelle Deken, Marga Kroon, Marijke den Ouden, Sascha Roosen Gilbert Ruegg, Robert Andriessen, Raymond van der Horst Arjenne Plaizier, Raymond van der Horst, Ruud Lantinga, Jeroen Keunen, Mieke Doesburg Arjen Hendrikse, Freddy Meindertsma, Evelein Boeren, Laurence Feijt Mieke Doesburg, Hans Peter Borgh trying the buffet Arjenne Plaizier, Mariken Berns, Anouk Kooymans Mirjam Bout, Gene Kwee, Michiel Boeren, Evelein Boeren, Mieke Doesburg, Laurence Feijt 3 Vol.15 • No. 6 • July/August 2005
REVIEW Myths and facts about medicine Review of presentation of Taco van Tiel at the Hollandse Club at 17 May 2005 By Debby Reemers Why would an increased risk in getting breast cancer by 30% for a certain medicine not be a reason to stop producing it? The questions from the audience for Taco van Tiel are not at all the easiest to answer. By nature the pharmaceutical industry has always been surrounded by controversy. A company making its profit on supplying expensive medicine to sick people: the topic will always remain a highly intricate and tricky one. Still though, Taco van Tiel regional marketing and sales manager at Organon, not only managed to show us an in-depth view from the industry point of view he also presented a lot of interesting research results and other related issues on the pharmaceutical industry to an interested and critical audience at the Hollandse Club. Van Tiel concentrated on three main subjects to address the broad topic of ‘Myths and Facts about Medicine’ - The perception versus reality of doing business in the pharmaceutical industry; - How does Singapore (Asia) differ from Western Europe and the USA; - Building brands in the pharmaceutical arena. This article will highlight the first and second topic as these were more elaborately discussed. Perception versus reality Pharma companies will market drugs despite the fact they know they are potentially harmful. Most drugs are dangerous, you can read it in the papers every day! According to Van Tiel, this is the most common misunderstanding that people have on how companies like Organon operate. He explains about the extensive research procedure a drug has to go through before it even gets to the FDA for final approval. From an independent study in 2003 by Drug Discovery Today (December 2003) on several leading pharma companies it was concluded that on average only 1.2 out of 57 projects that result from a ‘discovery’ would make it through the drug registration phase by the drug regulating authority, after which only 1 project on average actually gets launched. In fact, during the internal clinical trials 90% of all research projects are already stopped during the first (out of the total of 4) clinical development phase. The quality of research projects in the U.S.A., the most important market for Organon, is continuously monitored by the independent U.S. Data and Safety Monitoring Board. If a project does not adhere to their standards, the research project is stopped. Van Tiel adds, that Organon is one of the few pharmaceutical companies that continues testing its products after the launch, unlike its main competitors. The controversy of certain medicine and the way media reports on them is illustrated by a drug used in Hormone replacement therapies (HRT) with the name of Tibolone. This HRT drug helps women to soften the symptoms of the menopause which includes hot flushes and night sweats. The drug also helps to strengthen the bones. Media reported headlines such as ‘600,000 women warned to stop taking combined HRT medicines’, therewith inciting what Van Tiel calls a ‘hormonophobia’. These headlines were based on a global study called ‘Million Women Study’ (MWS), as published by the British medical journal ‘The Lancet’ in March 2005. The MWS claimed a 30% increase in the risk for breast cancer when using HRT. Van Tiel explains why the results from this study are not fully valid. The study is a so called observational study, as opposed to a clinical trial. Observational studies do not make use of placebos (i.e. sugar pills with no active ingredients) which means they lack control groups. As a result you will not know how many of participants would have gotten cancer while using a placebo in stead of the tested drug. The lack of a controlled environment also causes other research problems. In the case of the MWS, several women stopped using the drug during the trial, took the drug on an irregular basis, or even switched drugs. In addition, the MWS test group was already seeing the General Practitioner (GP) for particular hormone related symptoms. Possibly this group of women is anyhow running a higher risk on developing breast cancer than a randomized group of women. Therefore such group cannot be considered representative for the general population of the UK. Several national authorities have publicly questioned the results of the MWS based on the above mentioned limitations. Still though, the media seem to take these studies out of their contexts and turn these into unsubstantiated headlines. A possible negative effect resulting from this could be that potential beneficiaries from medicine will not make use of HRT and other ‘demonized’ medicines. There are also other 4 Vol.15 • No. 6 • July/August 2005
Page 1 and 2: Jul/Aug 2005 MITA 373/03/2001
Page 3: A monthly publication of the Associ
Page 7 and 8: REVIEW Networking for business succ
Page 9 and 10: BUSINESS The top twelve e-mail mist
Page 11 and 12: SINGAPORE The New Downtown, Over th
Page 13 and 14: INTERVIEW Questions to Anne Jonkhan
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Page 20 and 21: BIZZ AGENDA Health & You Seminar &
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Page 24 and 25: EMBASSY INFO Matchmaking Event - En

August 2005 - Association of Dutch Businessmen

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