Allergan, Medicis lobby hard against ‘Botax’
While the pharma industry in general is lobbying hard for its cause vis-a-vis healthcare reform, makers of cosmeceuticals are battling on two fronts. The Senate’s reform bill includes a 5 percent surtax on various cosmetic procedures, including anti-wrinkle injections such as Botox. And that’s a tax Allergan and Medicis Pharmaceutical can’t believe in. The two companies are going all out with lobbying and PR campaigns against the proposal, the Wall Street Journal reports. Allergan launched a website, stopcosmetictax.org, to back a grassroots email-your-senator effort. The company is also handing out fliers for doctors to post in their offices and letters physicians can personalize and send to their patients. The crux of the company’s PR effort lies in making the tax seem like a levy on the middle class rather than on the rich. Senators “thought


