The Stalwart: A Strange Employee: Dr. Peter Rost

Back in June, Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) VP Peter Rost did something that, you'd think, would have gotten him fired--he appeared on 60 Minutes to criticize his companies opposition to drug importation. Afterwords he found himself isolated from the company, and his employees stopped reporting to him, says Brandweek, but somehow he wasn't fired. In fact, he even got a raise.

Now he appears to have one-upped himself and written a review of his bosses book at Amazon.com:

Pfizer's CEO, Dr. Hank McKinnell has written an astonishing book in which he admits that he doesn't always believe in what he's saying [11], that drugs from Canadian pharmacies are safe [69] and that high US drug prices have nothing to do with past R&D expenses [46]. He also writes that "perhaps pharmaceuticals represent too low a percentage of total healthcare spending" [45] and he calls for "price controls to be lifted" around the world [64], because "It is time for Canadians and others to pay their fair share." [65]. He also calls for a doubling of drug patent life [185] which would result in a drastic reduction of new, low-priced generic drugs.

Dr. McKinnell starts his book with the surprising confession that he doesn't always believe in what he's saying. "They listened to my logic, but I could tell they weren't convinced, and to tell you the truth, I wasn't either." [11]

He also doesn't shy away from embarrassing facts, "Branded drug prices are anywhere from 25-100 percent more expensive in the United States." [50] He even admits, "Drugs from Canadian pharmacies are as safe as drugs from pharmacies in the United States." [69]

But his impressive mea culpa doesn't stop there. He slams everyone who makes a connection between drug prices and R&D. "It's a fallacy to suggest that our industry, or any industry, prices a product to recapture the R&D budget spent in development." [46]

Finally, in an astonishing intellectual somersault, Dr. McKinnell claims that "price controls always make prices higher in the long run." [64] And since he wants to give people lower drug prices, by eliminating price controls, he writes, "Starting with pharmaceuticals, I call for price controls to be lifted in Canada and elsewhere." [64]

Dr. McKinnell ends his book with a wonderful quote by Gandhi, for those who desire change. "First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win." [193] Dr. McKinnell just doesn't realize that he has become "them."

Dr. Peter Rost is a Vice President of Marketing at Pfizer. The views expressed here are his own opinions.

Honestly one has to wonder--especially if you're a Pfizer shareholder--why hasn't Peter Rost been fired? He clearly wants to be. Derek Lowe at Corante offers some more color on the situation from a post back in June:

I don't doubt that Rost is being treated by Pfizer as if he were giving off neutrons. Anyone who makes statements like he has, in any industry, is going to get the same, if they're not pitched out onto the street first. Rost has escaped that fate, apparently, because Pfizer's marketing of the growth hormone genotropin is under investigation, and Rost was in charge of that at Pharmacia when Pfizer took over. He's likely to be protected under whistle-blower law, and firing him would be a public relations problem for Pfizer under any circumstances. So, they can mostly hope that he leaves, and try to make that an attractive option, but that's about it.

There are worse fates. If you haven't lived in the area, "Peapack, NJ" sounds like it must be surrounded by oil refineries or something. It's actually surrounded by beautifully landscaped estates. That's the horsey, expensive part of New Jersey, not the asphalty 24-hour-check-cashing part. But Rost seems to be able to afford it, since at the very end of the article we find that his annual compensation is over $600,000. Many Times readers probably found themselves wishing that their own companies disliked them as much.

Dr. Rost is in an odd sort of whistleblower. His claims aren't really all that dramatic, and aren't likely to cause some sort of Enron-like investigation. But he is a nuissance, and a public one at that, who probably should leave the company. The investigation into genotropin also adds an interesting twist, though it's unclear how significant it is.