Book: The Aspirin Wars
-
Book: The Aspirin Wars
I’m curious if anyone has read this book. I stumbled upon it this evening.
The Aspirin Wars: Money, Medicine, and l00 Years of Rampant Competition Hardcover – November 5, 1991
by Charles C. Mann (Author)
” Aspirin makers have a remarkable perhaps unique history of competition they have been slugging it out over exactly the same ground since the end of the First World War. Some aspirin brands such as Bayer are pure acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) the scientific name for the chemical known as aspirin; others such as Anasin and Bufferin add ingredients like caffeine and antacids still others such as Ecotrin wrap the ASA in a special coating. Because ASA has remained unchanged since its invention in 1897, however, all aspirin brands, no matter how new and improved, have the identical active ingredient, and medical science has yet to show that any of these fancy versions are better than aspirin alone for headaches fever and inflammation.
In capitalist societies such a situation companies selling equally effective products with big potential profits virtually guarantees furious competition And indeed the aspirin makers have a record of industrial warfare that provides a vest pocket history of the mixture of marketing litigation technology and competition that characterizes so much of business in this century Another way to put it is that the annals of aspirin give a glimpse of the incredible lengths to which people will go to put something in a box and sell it.”
Log in to reply.