Seth Meyers takes a closer look at the CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals Martin Shkreli, who raised the price of a vital drug used to treat AIDS-related infections by over 5000%.
Shkreli appeared before a House Committee last week, doing nothing to change public opinion of him as the most smug little SOB to ever plead The Fifth to every question asked of him.
Seth doesn’t deny Shkreli’s lack of likability, but he points out that behind Shkreli are years of obscene price-gouging by American pharmaceutical companies. In fact, Shkreli’s big gouge is not a precedent-setting price hike. Shkreli just let the cat out of the bag about pharmaceutical gouging. It’s customary in pharmaceutical circles to keep the dirty secrets from the public. Shkreli seems to be power and publicity-mad. Perhaps his vanity will buy him an unwitting place as the place of poster boy for pharmaceutical reform.
The question is, will our lawmakers see that this is an opportunity to investigate an entire pharmaceutical industry – or will they just learn more than they need to know about collectible Wu-Tang Clan albums?