John Young (Pfizer)

John Young is the Chairman and Managing Director of Pfizer UK, a position he has held since early 2007. Prior to this he was the was the Chairman and Managing Director of Pfizer Australia and, between September 2005 to January 2007, the Chairman of Medicines Australia, the peak drug industry lobby group.

In an opinion column published in The Australian in August 2006, Young wrote that drug companies "do not fear scrutiny, nor do we fear criticism or accountability." He complained that recent media coverage of drug company gifts and subsidies for doctors as "bordered on the hysterical." 

"Advertising certainly helps create awareness of a new medicine, but to suggest that a patient is going to be inappropriately prescribed a medicine because the healthcare professional has seen a pen or box of tissues bearing the name of the product is, frankly, ludicrous," he wrote. 

Related SourceWatch articles

 * Drug industry
 * Patient Groups/Australia

External articles

 * John Young, "Hysteria rules doctor and drug company relationship debate", Opinion, The Australian, August 12, 2006.