In 2007, PhRMA members invested approximately $44.5 billion in finding and developing new medicines, which include 88 for prostate cancer, 90 for breast cancer, 65 for colorectal cancer, and 113 for lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer death in the US. Other medicines currently being developed include some that will hopefully treat ovarian cancer, skin cancer, kidney cancer, brain cancer, and pancreatic cancer.
According to PhRMA President and CEO Billy Tauzin, ''The medicines now in the research pipeline will add to the substantial progress made in the last five years by biopharmaceutical companies in developing new and more effective cancer treatments. This strong commitment to research is a product of the determination of the men and women working for America’s pharmaceutical research companies…I am one of those patients who was diagnosed with cancer and was given a new treatment that brought me from the brink of death back to life.''
PhRMA’s research associates include such companies as Alkermes Inc., Enzon Inc., Reckitt Benckiser Pharmaceuticals Inc., Idenix Pharmaceuticals Inc., and Theravance Inc.
The employment center on PhRMA’s website offers jobs in areas like communications, federal affairs, alliance development, international opportunities, legal affairs, state government affairs, scientific and regulatory affairs, and policy and research.
Pharmaceutical manufacturing companies prefer to hire college graduates with strong scientific backgrounds (particularly in chemistry), excellent communication and interpersonal skills, and instruction in areas and technologies linked to pharmaceutical product development, evaluation, and manufacturing.
According to the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences website, pharmaceutical researchers ''participate in research to develop new medicines and to create new dosage forms and specification[s]; study the process by which a drug is absorbed, distributed, metabolized, and eliminated by the body; and ensure that drug labeling and literature are accurate and meet the requirements of State and Federal laws.''
Employment for pharmaceutical researchers is expected to grow by about 30% between 2004 and 2014, and there will be a high demand for physical and life scientists engaged in research and development particularly, because the aging population will need lifesaving new procedures and drugs to prevent and cure disease, according to the US Department of Labor.
Pharmaceutical companies’ job opportunities are often listed on their websites. For instance, the Yale Pharmaceutical Research Institutes lists such available positions as grant writer/project manager, organic chemist, cheminformatics scientist, pharmaceutical formulation chemist, and histotechnologist on their site, along with job descriptions and requirements.
