MYTH 2: We charge high prices so we have money to reinvest into new drugs.
BUSTED! The majority of financial return on medicines isn’t even spent on R&D. Big pharma (obviously) aren’t keen on being transparent about this issue but as you can see from the table below drug companies spend far more on marketing drugs – in some cases twice as much – than on developing them. Gilead have also admitted that the price of their new Hep C drug Sovaldi has got nothing to do with the amount they spent developing it. Price is determined by market demand and that is that!
