With a 25% increase in lobbying over last year, pharma's trade organization paid about $22 million to influence laws governing our health in 2007, according to the Associated Press. Key pharma lobbyists are alumni from Congress.
A breakdown of pharmaceutical and health lobbying which is about $166 milliion, is available at Open Secrets.
Coincidentally, a reader sent an article showing the bonds between Texas politics, the Bush family and Eli Lilly, maker of Zyprexa. According to the 2004 article in the British Medical Journal:
Eli Lilly, manufacturer of olanzapine [Zyprexa], has multiple ties to the Bush administration. George Bush Sr was a member of Lilly's board of directors and Bush Jr appointed Lilly's chief executive officer, Sidney Taurel, to a seat on the Homeland Security Council. Lilly made $1.6m in political contributions in 2000—82% of which went to Bush and the Republican Party.
It should also be noted that a majority of the sales for this drug still come from Medicaid and Medicare.
