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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.
Monday, February 8, 2016 | B1
Drugmakers Bid to Burnish Image
Trade group targets
lawmakers with ads,
lobbying against efforts
to cut prescription costs
BY JOSEPH WALKER
The pharmaceutical industry,
under fire this election season
for rising drug prices, is ramping up a new advertising campaign designed to improve its
reputation with lawmakers as it
lobbies against any effort to rein
in prescription costs.
The sector’s largest trade
group, the Pharmaceutical
Research and Manufacturers
of America, or PhRMA, says it
intends to spend several million dollars this year, and 10%
more than in 2015, on digital,
radio and print ads that emphasize the industry’s role in
developing new drugs and advancing medical science.
Many of the ads are running
on social-media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, because PhRMA wants to target
federal and state lawmakers,
policy analysts and other political “influencers,” said Robert
Zirkelbach, senior vice president of communications at
PhRMA, which represents
nearly three dozen of the largest drugmakers, including
Pfizer Inc. and Amgen Inc.
Websites such as Facebook
promise to deliver ads to specific audiences based on characteristics including their location,
occupation
and
keyword search history.
The campaign is primarily
directed at policy makers in
Washington, but ads will also
run in some select states that
have yet to be determined, Mr.
Zirkelbach said.
Many of the ads feature patients who have been helped by
new medicines, and company
scientists working on drug development. Others highlight the
financial assistance companies
provide to the poor and uninsured, through copay assistance
and free-drug programs.
The ads, which don’t mention drug prices or potential
U.S. Probes
Possible
Fraud by
Pharmacies
legislative changes, are aimed
at improving the industry’s
image amid calls to have the
government play a greater
role in controlling drug prices.
PhRMA wants to “make
sure the patient story is frontand-center in any discussion
of the biopharmaceutical industry and drug costs,” Mr.
Zirkelbach said.
The campaign comes amid
what some congressional aides
call a significant uptick in
PhRMA’s lobbying activity. The
Please see LOBBY page B2
BY DEVLIN BARRETT
The Justice Department is
investigating what authorities
suspect is half a billion dollars
in health-care fraud linked to
specialty creams used to treat
pain and other ailments, and
believe an insurance program
for veterans may have been the
biggest victim.
Sales of these so-called compounding creams have surged
recently thanks in part to a
marketing blitz, including
pitches by retired NFL quarterback Brett Favre, that has promoted them to the elderly, athletes and others. Investigators
are looking into allegations that
some of the products provide
little to no medicinal value, and
that some pharmacies sent
more product than was or-
Super Bowl Ads Bring Lighter Tone
BY SUZANNE VRANICA
WSJ
.COM
Watch and vote on
2016 Super Bowl
TV commercials at
WSJ.com/
SuperBowlAds.
Amy Schumer and Seth Rogen, top, rustle up people to join the ‘Bud Light Party’ in a Super Bowl TV spot. A Mountain Dew Kickstart
commercial featuring a puppy-monkey-baby creature, left, and the Heinz Ketchup ‘Wiener Stampede’ spot also made appearances.
Redstone Trust Looms
Over Viacom and CBS
BY KEACH HAGEY
AND JOANN S. LUBLIN
After barely surviving a
Boston hotel fire in 1979,
Sumner Redstone was treated
for his injuries at Massachusetts GenINSIDE
eral HospiAMERICA’S
tal.
The
BOARDROOMS media mogul showed
his
gratitude by donating millions of
dollars to its burn unit.
Mass General could play a
key role in the next chapter of
Mr. Redstone’s story as the
92-year-old’s health deteriorates. At least one of its doctors would help decide
whether he relinquishes control of a $40 billion media
empire that includes Viacom
Inc. and CBS Corp.
dered, overbilled, or automatically refilled prescriptions
without being asked, according
to people familiar with the
matter.
Some
companies
charged more than $10,000 for
a single tube or prescription of
cream.
Tricare, the health-insurance
program for U.S. military personnel, veterans, and their families, is believed to have been
bilked for the most money in
the suspected fraud, though
Medicare, Medicaid and private
insurers were also billed, according to people close to the
investigation. It is illegal to
charge government health programs for medical services not
provided, not necessary, or not
ordered.
The investigation is still in
its early stages, and no one has
been charged with any crime,
said people close to the probe.
The creams are often
pitched on the Internet or by
telemarketers as a safe way to
help athletes heal quickly or alleviate types of pain or cramping, according to officials investigating the industry. The
creams also are often marketed
to seniors as a way to ease the
aches of aging, they said.
Mr. Favre, who was named
to the Pro Football Hall of
Fame Saturday night, has promoted a pain cream called Rx
Pro made by World Health Industries Inc. of Jackson, Miss.,
which is one of the companies
under investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
according to people close to the
probe.
World Health Industries also
Please see FRAUD page B2
Mr. Redstone stepped down
last week as chairman of CBS
and Viacom, and the chief executives of those two companies slid into his role.
But the real transfer of
power is yet to come, since
Mr. Redstone continues to
have overwhelming control of
the companies through ownership of 80% of the voting
shares.
Despite famously claiming
he would live forever, Mr.
Redstone did plan what
would happen to those controlling interests should he
die or be deemed incapacitated. They will go into an irrevocable trust that would be
managed by seven of his associates, relatives and board
members.
According to people familPlease see VIACOM page B7
How Economists Would Help Cupid
T
HERE’S no human interaction the Internet
can’t make even more
alienating, and that goes double for finding a mate. But
perhaps one way to make online dating
less fraught
is to treat it
with the
kind of clinical detachment that
KEYWORDS
allows huCHRISTOPHER mans to becalm their
MIMS
misleading
emotions
and succeed at related enterprises, from stock trading to
hiring the best employees.
With Valentine’s Day near, it’s
time to bring on the economists.
“Dating markets are a
good example of matching
JEAN-CHRISTOPHE BOTT/ASSOCIATED PRESS
ONLINE:
Sales of specialty
creams have surged,
thanks in part to a
marketing blitz.
TOP: BUD LIGHT; BOTTOM LEFT: MOUNTAIN DEW; BOTTOM RIGHT: HEINZ
What do comedian Amy
Schumer, an overly active fetus and the singer Seal have in
common? Each appeared in
commercials Sunday during
Super Bowl 50 that scored big
with viewers.
Bud Light, which ran a
funny election-themed ad featuring Ms. Schumer and actor
Seth Rogen enlisting supporters to join the “Bud Light
Party,” seems to have gotten
its marketing mojo back, according to ad executives and
consumers surveyed by The
Wall Street Journal.
“Well done and great casting,” said Ewen Cameron, cofounder of Berlin Cameron
United.
Getting Bud Light’s advertising back on track is critical
for parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev. Bud
Light sales have struggled for
more than a year and the
brand has had trouble finding
the right marketing message.
Wieden & Kennedy created
the spot for the big game.
“Awesome Bud Light ad,”
said Tyler Piluzza, a 31-yearold fashion designer from
Newport Beach, Calif.
The National Football
League—which has been dealing with controversies that include concussions, domestic violence and the air pressure of
footballs—hit a high note during
the game with an ad that shows
babies, children and adults, who
were born nine months after
their parents’ favorite teams
won the Super Bowl, singing
Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose.”
“The spot has universal appeal and makes you feel good,”
said Courtney Doyle, a partner
at Connelly Partners. The ad
was crafted by WPP PLC’s Grey.
Meanwhile, perennial fan
favorite Doritos got viewers
laughing. Its spot, created by a
Please see SUPER page B6
Stanford’s Alvin Roth says dating sites can be more effective.
markets,” says Alvin Roth,
who won a Nobel Prize in
economics in 2012 for studying such markets. “To work
well, they have to overcome
all the problems markets
have to overcome.”
Mr. Roth has designed
markets for matching patients to organ donors and
students to schools. And
while he has yet to design an
online dating site, he has no
shortage of opinions about
how to make them more effective.
The first thing an online
dating site has to do is create
a market that is “thick,” says
Mr. Roth. That’s economistese for a market that has a
lot of people seeking to link
up. But getting lots of people
to sign up for a dating site is
the easy part. Online at least,
“there’s always a thick market for people who are looking for someone else,” says
Paul Oyer, a colleague of Mr.
Roth’s at Stanford University
who wrote a widely cited
book, “Everything I Ever
Needed to Know about Economics I Learned from Online
Dating.”
The popularity of dating
apps leads to what econoPlease see MIMS page B4