Pfizer to cut 11% of its workforce in Spain
pharmafile | September 22, 2011 | News story | Sales and Marketing | Pfizer, Spain, job cuts
Pfizer will cut 220 jobs in Spain as the government reduces spending on pharmaceuticals to help offset its growing debt problem.
The cuts will affect administrative and sales forces, while employees at Pfizer’s production centres in Madrid and Olot in Girona province won’t be affected, according to the Spanish newspaper Expansion.
The cut represents a 16.5% reduction in the administrative structure and Pfizer’s sales network in Spain.
The US company confirmed the cuts to Expansion, saying it was making the cuts due to the: “Financial crisis in Europe today, and the increased costs of healthcare.”
The firm’s decision also comes after the Spanish government passed new laws to increase generic prescribing, in order to cut over 2 billion euro from the country’s drugs bill.
This new policy requires doctors to write prescriptions using a drug’s generic name, not brand names, which could hurt sales of drugs that have recently gone off-patent.
One such drug is Pfizer’s biggest selling product Lipitor (atorvastatin), which has already gone off patent in the country, which hit its first quarter sales hard earlier this year.
Spain is looking to make swingeing cuts across its healthcare system, which is funded both nationally and by private contributions, to help reduce its spiraling debt problem and the country’s new generics policy is set to erode pharma sales in the country.
The government recently announced it is trying to bring its budget deficit down from the high of 11.1% in 2009, to 6% by the end of this year.
This means more pharma firms may have to make similar cuts to their workforces in the future and Pfizer is not the first company to make cuts in the country – last year, Sanofi cut 200 jobs and Roche also approved cuts in its Spanish subsidiary.
Ben Adams
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