Like the vast majority of kids growing up in England, I wasobsessed with soccer. But during the 1980s and early 1990s, English soccerteams—particularly the national team—were blighted by the hooligan behavior oftheir fans.

In truth, the vast majority were well-behaved, decent,law-abiding folk who simply loved the game. I know, because I was one of them.But the behavior of the violent minority quickly led to areputation—hooliganism became known in the ’80s as “the English disease” andall English soccer fans, good and bad, were tarred with the same brush.

The problem is, not only is it difficult to shake such areputation, but every little incident thereafter, however minor, is sucked upby the media and blown all out of proportion. You could be forgiven forthinking that if you attended a game, you would surely end up the victim of aviolent attack.

Similarly, images of relatively minor scuffles involvingfans would be cropped and edited to perfection, so that a few chants and acouple of thrown chairs might look like a war zone.

I wanted desperately for this epidemic to disappear.Throughout it, I genuinely believed that things might change, but seeminglyevery week, the TV cameras would at some point swivel away from the beautifulgame toward the crowd, where the ugliness would erupt. And, each time, itsaddened me that my faith in soccer fans might have been misplaced.

Right now, I feel something similar about the pharmaceuticalindustry.

I am writing this in the immediate aftershock of the Vytorinquake. At its epicenter are not so much the results of a rather small andisolated clinical trial, which indicate that Zetia does little to enhance theeffects of its off-patent bedfellow Zocor, but the allegations that these data,however (in)significant were withheld for the best part of two years.

There is not a scenario in which this could ever look good,especially in this industry of all industries. And while it may not be thebiggest scandal of our time, it certainly leaves me with that same, hollowfeeling I had about hooliganism in the ’80s.

The vast majority of pharma employees are decent, ethicalfolk, but a few bad decisions by a few poor-decision makers have, over theyears, given the industry an unwelcome reputation—one that is not onlydifficult to shake, but that encourages unbalanced, often unwarranted, mediacoverage. Sound familiar?

I know it won’t be easy, but I would like to think thisindustry can eventually turn around its negative image and regain the trust ofthe media and the public—and there are numerous examples to show some of the progress that has been made inthe past couple of years.

So, why any pharmaceutical company would risk a scenariothat would attract this kind of coverage, especially post Vioxx, is beyondcomprehension. And each time there is a setback to pharma’s efforts to regaintrust, it saddens me just a little that my faith in industry transparency mighthave been ever-so-slightly misplaced.


MM&M Awards 2008

On a brighter note, The MM&M Awards 2008 programlaunches this month. You have until May 30 to get your entries together, sobreak out your genius and make this your year. See pages 38-39 for moreinformation. Good luck.