Eli Lilly, Pfizer, and PhRMA all oppose a pubic heathcare plan, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Instead, they’d like to see individual insurance mandates and an expansion of health savings accounts. But their top executives have health insurance plans which include cash payments of thousands of dollars and coverage that extends for years if they get laid off.

For most us, when we lose a job we lose our healthcare coverage pretty quickly after that. Sure, we’re offered Cobra coverage but unless you need long-term or catastrophic care, it’s often cheaper just to pay cash. Top execs at Lilly and Pfizer, however, don’t worry about any of this. If they get laid off their coverage continues for another two years.

At Lilly:

Basic employee benefits such as health and life insurance would be continued for up to two years following termination of employment. All executives, including named executive officers, are entitled to two years’ benefit continuation. This period will be reduced to 18 months beginning in 2010.

At Pfizer:

… eligible executives would receive a pro-rata target annual incentive for the year of termination as well as certain health and welfare benefits.

CFO Frank D’Amelio has a special deal just for him:

… for the two-year period following termination of employment (or, if earlier, until he becomes eligible to receive group health coverage from another employer), he will continue to receive group health benefits from Pfizer at our expense.

The other execs — CEO Jeff Kindler et al — do not currently meet the requirement for coverage so the company will award them between $108,000 and $142,000 each in lieu of benefits.

PhRMA, to its credit, is arguing for an extension of Medicaid.

What, exactly, Lilly wants to see in President Obama’s plan is a little confusing. The company’s new top  mouthpiece, Bart Peterson, told the Indianapolis Business Journal that Lilly doesn’t want to take “today’s” coverage and “make it available to everybody”:

The most important part of the message is the importance of preserving innovation. A lot of the health care debate has been about, how do we cover the uninsured, how do we reduce the costs of health care? These are very important issues, obviously.

But we don’t want to just take today’s health care system, today’s level of care, and make it available to everybody. We want it to get better and better.

That could mean anything. The one thing it definitely does not mean is, “We support a plan in which employers continue healthcare coverage for years after we lay off employees, and if employees don’t qualify we’ll pay them the cash value instead.”

View entire post here: http://industry.bnet.com/pharma/10003058/as-lilly-pfizer-lobby-against-obama-healthcare-plan-their-execs-enjoy-gold-plated-coverage/

By JONATHAN MARTIN | 3/9/09 12:11 PM EDT Updated: 3/9/09 3:43 PM EDT

President Barack Obama Monday rescinded the Bush administration’s limits on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research and chided his predecessor for putting politics ahead of science.

Obama also signed an order meant to put scientific research back in the forefront in government decision-making.

“It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda — and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology,” Obama said. He won loud applause and even a few cheers from scientists who joined him in the East Room ceremony.

Many on the left and in the scientific community believe that, from stem cells to climate change, George W. Bush manipulated or ignored data and research for political purposes.

But it is Obama’s move to lift limits on stem cell research that has reignited one of the country’s central ethical debates.

Bush restricted the use of federal funding on stem cells, except for those already in existence at the time of his 2001 order. Obama’s move would clear the way for a big increase in federal funding for the research.

“At this moment, the full promise of stem cell research remains unknown, and it should not be overstated,” Obama said. “But scientists believe these tiny cells may have the potential to help us understand, and possibly cure, some of our most devastating diseases and conditions.”

By lifting the ban, Obama offers what many scientists think could be the path to a breakthrough in the search for the causes and cures of afflictions such as Parkinson’s disease, spinal cord damage or Alzheimer’s disease.

Polls also show public support for embryonic stem cell research, something the president alluded to in citing a “consensus” for his move.

Yet many conservatives see embryonic research as tantamount to the destruction of human life. Harvesting the stem cells requires the destruction of embryos, which are usually recovered from fertility clinics.

Obama called the debate “a false choice between sound science and moral values. In this case, I believe the two are not inconsistent. As a person of faith, I believe we are called to care for each other and work to ease human suffering.”

Obama directed the National Institutes of Health to set new research guidelines within 120 days.

Some Republicans agree with him, most notably Nancy Reagan.

“I’m very grateful that President Obama has lifted the restrictions on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research,” the former first lady said in a statement. “These new rules will now make it possible for scientists to move forward.”

But the anti-abortion community — a group which Obama courted during his campaign — made clear its anger.

“It is a sad day when the federal government will fund research that exploits living members of the human species as raw material for research,” said Douglas Johnson, a spokesman for the National Right to Life Committee, who added that the move puts the country on a “very steep, very slippery slope” toward cloning.

Obama, in his usual effort to blunt such ideological differences, sought to pre-empt that argument in his remarks, promising strict rules and saying his order would not allow a move toward human cloning.

“It is dangerous, profoundly wrong, and has no place in our society, or any society,” he said of cloning.

View this article at: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0309/19785.html