A new report from Public Eye, a Swiss NGO, has drawn attention to the scale of personnel flows between the pharmaceutical industry and the country’s public health institutions. The investigation, published on Thursday, raises concerns over potential conflicts of interest and urges stronger safeguards to prevent corruption.
The cushy transition between public office and private-sector posts is not new, acknowledges Public Eye. But the report, produced with the help of the research collective WAV, claims to be the first to quantify the extent of job-hopping between pharmaceutical firms, Swissmedic (the national medicines regulator), and the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH).
Over the past three decades, the authors have documented 284 cases of people moving between these groups. The majority—around two-thirds—involved moves from the private to the public sector. Such exchanges have grown more frequent in recent years, particularly in the pharmaceutical sector. In total, 40% of Swissmedic staff have worked in pharma either before or after their time at the drug regulator. The same figure for the FOPH is 13%.
What concerns the NGO is not just the volume of job hopping but their scope: they span all levels of hierarchy, from executives to scientific experts. While Switzerland has rules in place to guard against conflicts of interest, their application lacks transparency, argues Patrick Durisch, Public Eye’s health policy lead. There are many ways to exert influence on decisions of major consequence, he warns, citing the approval of new medicines as an example. Another potential conflict relates to setting the prices of medicines, a political flashpoint and driver of rising healthcare costs.
To bolster public trust, the NGO calls for a mandatory cooling-off period between roles in the public sector and subsequent employment in private firms. Such requirements, it insists, should apply across the hierarchy.
Swissmedic, for its part, defends its procedures. In a response to the report, the agency said it rigorously adheres to current laws and pointed out that drug approvals are made by committee, not individuals, which reduces the risk of undue influence.
Whether such institutional assurances will satisfy critics remains to be seen. But in a country where the pharmaceutical industry is both a pillar of the economy and a frequent subject of scrutiny, questions over regulatory independence are set to continue.
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Public Eye report (in French) – Take a 5 minute French test now
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