The Weekly Summary

June 9^th - June 15^th

In the general news, unexpected chaos broke out in Iraq, as insurgents of Sunni religion spread over from the Syrian border and took control of much of Western Iraq, while the Shia held on to Baghdad. In the U.S., the House Majority Leader, Eric Cantor, was stunned to lose his primary race.

In healthcare business news, Medtronic (MDT) is rumored to be making a $45 B bid for European Covidien (COV). Overseas cash will be allowed to be used. This comes one week after MDT looked into buying European Smith&Nephew (SNN). In other M&A, Merck (MRK) bought Idenix (IDIX) for a 230% premium, to obtain their Hep C nucleotide inhibitor IDX21437. Since Achillion (ACHN) has a similar drug, shares spiked 40% as well.

In other business news, The Dendreon (DNDN) CEO jumped ship as debt piles up. Sanofi (SNY) and MDT formed a diabetes alliance. Of note, SNY is another European company. AstraZenenca (AZN) licensed rights for Synairgen’s (SYNG) drug SNG001 to treat viral-induced asthma. Lastly, struggling makers of newly approved weight loss drugs, not selling well, are fighting each other in patent court now, as Vivus (VVUS) filed a lawsuit against Actavis claiming Qsymia infringes on patents.

On the data front, it was mostly bad news. OncoMed (OMED) halted enrollment in two cancer trials, and Eli Lilly’s (LLY) drug Cyramza failed in liver cancer. Lastly, Biogen’s (BIIB) Tecfidera, and Novartis’ (NVS) Gilenya for MS might have some competition from Receptos (RCPT) drug.

From the FDA, Bard (BCR) won approval for its peripheral paclitaxel drug coated balloon, which will compete with MDT’s. Lastly, MDT won approval in high-risk for CoreValve.

William Weeks, MD, MBA: Is a banker worth more than a doctor?

By Steven Greer, MD

As the populist rage grows over Wall Street banker pay, we interviewed William Weeks, MD/MBA, from the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice. He previously published studies looking at the work-hour-adjusted lifetime earning potential of various white-collar jobs, such as banking, surgery, law, etc. MBA grads earned the highest return on their school tuition investment and primary care doctors had the lowest.

We requested Dr. Weeks do for us a back-of-the-envelope update on his work plugging in the higher $600,000 “average pay” of Wall Street this year. The results were literally “off the chart”. Banker lifetime earning was on a different scale, and the wealthier 7-figure bankers were not included.

Specialists like neurosurgeons bring in more revenue for their institutions than a typical banker, yet are paid far less over their career span than a mid-level “average” banker at Goldman Sachs. Primary care doctors receive the least lifetime pay of the professions in the study.

A true market does not exist for doctors and the banking market is rigged to win, many would argue. This all raises the question of what society should be rewarding more, bankers or doctors, and by what method?