big pharma
noun1
Business Derogatory Large, prosperous pharmaceutical firms collectively, understood as a business group having significant economic, political, or social influence.
- "Biotech's only got about $1.5 billion in partnering funds today, but big pharma is spending $25 billion in R&D" each year with marginal results, notes Burrill.1994 September 26, “Biotech”, in BusinessWeek, retrieved 10 Oct 2013:
- Critics were indignant that a potentially dangerous drug was being used on a hunch, and suspected the influence of big pharma and its drive to expand its markets.2006 June 19, Daniel Williams, “Drugs Before Diagnosis?”, in Time:
1 more example
- The driving force, and substantial beneficiary, of this mass medicalisation is of course the pharmaceutical industry, or Big Pharma as it has pejoratively become known.2012, James Le Fanu, “Bitter Pills to Swallow”, in Literary Review, number 399:
- Related terms
- big government, big money