China
As there is decline in the health scenario in mainland China, pharmaceutical companies seem ready to reap the benefits. The combination of rising living standards, especially in the cities, and new health problems is good news for firms that have already established their roots including Johnson & Johnson, Bristol Myers Squibb, Hoffman La Roche and Hoechst Marion Roussel.
Known hiv cases number about 100,000 in China. Hepatitis and tuberculosis are rampant in many rural areas of southern China and are re-emerging in the cities brought by migrant labourers who live in squalid conditions. The World Health Organization estimates that nearly 60 per cent of the mainland population has the hepatitis-b infection and one expert estimates that six per cent to 10 per cent of the population are hepatitis-b carriers. Stress is also a significant syndrome among the Chinese.Sexually transmitted diseases which were rife in the mainland before 1949 and subsided later, have increased more than 72-fold since 1985.
Given this scenario, hundreds of Chinese doctors are being employed by multinational drug companies as medical representatives to persuade hospitals to buy their medicines. This is because foreign companies must sell their medicines to importers who in turn sell them to regional wholesalers.
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