Episode 67: Dr. John LaMattina on Drug Discovery, Pharma Innovation, and Industry Myths

Introduction

0:00Hi, you're listening to Let's Talk Chemistry, a podcast by Chemtalk. On today's episode, we interview Dr. John LaMittina, former president of Pfizer Global Research and Development and current biotech advisor. Dr. LaMittina remains active in the discourse regarding the future of the pharmaceutical industry and is passionate about helping the public better understand how new medicines are discovered and developed.

0:30We hope you enjoy.

Host Introduction

0:36Hello, I'm Porvi from Let's Talk Chemistry, a podcast by Chemtalk, and I'm joined by Amber and Nina. This is your primer for our interview on Dr. John LaMittina, a chemist who worked at Pfizer Biotech for 30 years, rising from a branch scientist to the head of global research and development. These days, Dr. LaMittina finds himself on various biotech boards and trustees as a scientific advisor. He also writes opinion pieces for publications like Forbes, advocating for a biocharmaceutical

1:06industry and particularly the need for investing in research and the need to balance drug pricing. Right. And this is something Dr. LaMittina is extremely passionate about. Before getting into some issues with drug pricing and misinformation, let's talk a little bit about the drug development process. Our audience has probably heard of Pfizer and are somewhat familiar with drug discovery, but it's easy to overlook the many, many steps and hours that go into bringing a new drug to

1:37market. According to the U.S. Congressional Budget Office, only around 12 percent of drugs entering clinical trials make it to the market, with R&D costs rising as high as $2 billion per drug. And that's if the drug is successful. It's so frustrating to work on a project for years and having to pivot because the outcome is not useful or worse, it's dangerous. That's so much time and money lost. As you'll hear later in our interview with Dr. LaMittina, he speaks out about the hard

2:09work and funding that goes into discovering new treatments, a context he feels is missing when people discuss the cost of drugs. And adding on to the conversation of drug prices, in many of his works, Dr. LaMittina specifically mentions the Biden administration's Inflation Reduction Act. So what does that legislation mention about drug prices specifically?

2:33The Inflation Reduction Act included legislation about capping the prices of certain drugs for patients that are on Medicare and Medicaid, the federal health insurance providers for elderly, disabled, and impoverished citizens. Among other things, this legislation limited the cost of many drugs that have been on the market for years in the wake of rising health care costs in the United States. The intersection between health care and policy is truly a complex and consequential space that

3:03affects every one of us. As with many of our episodes, communication is crucial to bridging expertise between fields. So stay tuned to hear from Dr. LaMittina and his direct perspective on these issues as a former research executive from one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the world.

Guest Introduction

3:26Hi, and welcome back to another episode of Let's Talk Chemistry. We're super excited to have you today. Could you start by introducing yourself a little bit and telling us about what you do? My name is John LaMittina. I am trained as a chemist many, many years ago, or I've been a chemist for many, many years. I had a 30-year career at Pfizer, where I rose from the ranks of being a bench scientist all the way eventually to the head of global R&D.

3:57I left Pfizer, and since that time, I have done a few things. I work with various biotech companies serving on their boards or as a scientific advisor. But I've also been active in expressing my opinions in a blog that I had at Forbes for many years, as well as writing a few books in the area. My advocacy is for the biopharmaceutical industry and really talking about the misconceptions that

4:29exist out there, the importance of the industry, the need to balance drug pricing, along with investing in research, and things of that nature. So I've really gotten a complete difference from many years ago getting my degrees in chemistry and moving on from there. Perfect. That sounds great.

Career Background

4:51And we'll definitely touch on everything that you do throughout this interview. But to start us off, I understand that you went to Boston College and the University of New Hampshire for your educational background. Could I ask what initially drew you to the field of organic chemistry, and did you always envision a career in the private sector? So I guess I was kind of a nerdy kid in that I really liked chemistry, and I got my first

5:22chemistry set when I was about 10 years old, and I basically just dabbled. I wasn't doing in-depth studies, but I knew I enjoyed chemistry. And so when it came time to go to college, two things. One, I graduated, I grew up in a lower middle class family, and so we weren't necessarily, while I was going to be able to go to college, I was probably going to end up commuting. I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and I was able to get a full tuition scholarship to Boston

5:55College. And so that had a really big impact in my life in a lot of ways, as you might expect. And I started out as a chemistry major, and when I took organic chemistry, I found I really liked it. I liked it for a variety of reasons. One is that the synthesis of molecules was very appealing to me, and then figuring out the synthesis of new molecules, ones that haven't been yet made or discovered, I thought

6:26was also pretty fascinating. So once I took organic chemistry, I knew I wanted to do that. I also knew that I really didn't want an academic career. I wanted to go into the private sector.

6:40A lot of that was probably due to how I grew up and wanted to have a more secure financial environment, to be frank, to raise a family in. So I knew I wanted the private sector, but I also knew that the thought of making molecules that were biologically active, I thought was very appealing. The thought that you can go in a laboratory and make something that, if you're fortunate enough, would be taken and improve the lives of millions of people around the world, I thought

7:14was a terrific career goal. And so when I went to the University of New Hampshire, I went specifically to work with the late professor, Robert E. Lyle, who specialized in heterocyclic chemistry, which is the type of molecules that most drugs are based on. And so I wanted to learn about that. And so that's where I ended up getting my PhD in synthetic organic chemistry to focus on

7:44heterocyclic chemistry. But then I also wanted to get even more, become more of an expert in heterocyclic chemistry. And so I went, I did a, I had an NIH postdoctoral fellowship to work with Edward C. Taylor, who was the preeminent heterocyclic chemistry in the world. And that was really helpful to me to both learn a lot more about heterocyclic chemistry, get a lot more experience in that area, and make my CV attractive to various pharmaceutical

8:17companies. And, and after my two-year postdoc at Princeton, I ended up getting a job offer from Pfizer. And I ended up working, coming to work in their main laboratories and here in Southeast Connecticut. Awesome. That sounds great. And thank you for sharing with us your journey and everything that led you up to your career at Pfizer. Um, that was like really insightful to like learn about your steps for, towards that career.

Research Experience

8:47And so early on in your career, you were working directly at the bench as a research assistant. Um, and looking back, what was that period like for you and what skills and lessons did you learn from that that were like extremely valuable as you transitioned into more of the leadership roles? So one of the great things about, uh, joining a place like Pfizer is that you're a member of a team. So I was a, a research chemist on a team that included biologists, uh, eventually molecular

9:20biologists, molecular biology didn't exist when I first started, uh, uh, drug metabolism experts, clinical experts, toxicologists, formulation experts, and you bring your special talent in my case and contribute to the team. And the beauty of being on a team like that is I learned a tremendous amount, uh, of how to do drug discovery and development. You know, you, I, I walk into my first team and he's, and my head is spinning. I mean, they're talking about, uh, all sorts of things, uh, compound stabilities and, and,

9:52uh, uh, in vitro activity and, and, uh, dosings and, and animal models and, and the kind of things you have to do in clinical trials. And it was sort of like drinking from a fire hose, but it was wonderful because you always want to be in a position where you continue to learn. And I certainly was learning a lot then, and I continued to learn each step of the way. Uh, what was particularly rewarding was I got to do what I wanted to do and make a novel, uh, uh, biological active, not as active as I would have liked perhaps, uh, nothing I did

10:29actually became a drug, uh, but certainly contributed to, uh, uh, learning about structure activity relationships and, and what you had to do to try and maximize activity and, and the molecules we were making. I also, though, and I'm pretty proud of this. And then during that tenure, uh, did a lot of novel chemistry and, and some, uh, uh, breakthrough, uh, work that enabled me to publish, uh, some of my, uh, work and variety of, uh, uh, chemical, major chemical, chemical journals, and, uh, also, uh, enable me to be invited to various conferences

11:04to talk about my work. And, and I thought that was a pretty important thing to do for a variety of reasons. Pfizer didn't have a, uh, uh, a requirement to publish your research. You mostly did it on your, your own time, so to speak. Uh, but it was something that I was proud of and also enabled me to, uh, gain a little bit of a reputation in the field and, and, and, and as well as internally, uh, at Pfizer and made people, uh, take notice. So, uh, I, I think that was an important add-on that, uh, uh, uh, stood me well, uh,

11:40throughout the rest of my career. Thank you so much for that. That was like, yeah, it was really great to hear about your, your time as a research scientist before moving into these leadership roles and what kind of, like, skills and values that were helpful for you. And, um, with that, like, publications that you were talking about, um, you did, like, publish in some large journals regarding, like, Medicare and R&D. And I was wondering, why is it important for, um, branch scientists to understand the political

12:13and economic landscape of the pharmaceutical industry? Uh, uh, uh, well, this is a topic very dear to my heart. I have found, uh, over my career that scientists have a tremendous, well, not tremendous, but a large amount of credibility with the general public. Scientists are not suave, uh, uh, or, or, or perhaps, uh, as, uh, cool as, uh, commercial people or people involved in the marketing and sales and stuff.

12:46And, and, and, uh, I, I found that, and not just me with others talking about the work they did, how hard the work was, how long it takes to go from an idea to even getting a drug into clinical trials. Uh, you know, we, it takes from having an idea about five years, if you're successful, uh, to get a trial, uh, worthy of, of going into human studies. And even then, you now have anywhere from five to 10 more years of, of working on, uh, a program

13:20with a new drug to hopefully bring a, a new, uh, treatment to market. It's incredibly difficult, incredibly frustrating, only about one in 10 drugs that start in the, uh, in clinical trials ended up becoming, uh, uh, getting, uh, regulatory approval. And even then, there's no guarantee it'll be a commercial success. So when you explain that to people and you talk about how you might've worked on a program for five or six years or more, and then, uh, the program gets ended because you just, you

13:53can't go any further, uh, people look and say, how can you work for so long on something and, and not have, uh, uh, have success in the end? That's the nature of the business. And so, uh, explaining that, and I try and encourage scientists, uh, in, in all, uh, companies, small or large, to talk about, uh, when they talk about their work, talk about how long it was and how difficult it was. Don't just talk about what worked and went on because you, you minimize the challenges. And I think by doing that, you have, uh, uh, uh, you, you begin to generate, uh, an understanding

14:30about it on the part of the public. It's also important for scientists to understand the issues. So, uh, yes, uh, drugs, uh, are expensive, but drugs have a finite period of time. Uh, drugs eventually go, uh, are, uh, on patent for maybe 10, 12 years of a drug's life. And then it goes generic. And when it goes generic, it becomes, uh, uh, unbelievably cheap. Uh, I, uh, and, uh, and the beneficiary of, uh, a Pfizer drug, uh, which was sold at a

15:06trade main Lipitor. I think everybody knows about Lipitor. Low is, uh, uh, bad cholesterol, LDL cholesterol. But, uh, uh, uh, and it goes by the generic name now of atorvastatin. Atorvastatin is the third largest prescribed drug in the United States, uh, for people with at risk of heart attacks and strokes. And it costs, and because I know this, because I take it literally pennies a day and, and has been known to cut a heart attack rate significantly, uh, in the Western world.

15:38Uh, that's something people ought to know about because when a person will complain, well, why is my drug so high? Well, it costs roughly $2 billion to bring a new drug to market. Every scientist who's involved in this industry should know that. Uh, and so how do you recoup that investment? You have to be able to charge a price to bring, uh, uh, to, to, to, not only, uh, pay for the development that you've had, but also to pay for the things going forward.

16:09And, uh, because I've already said you only have a one in 10, uh, uh, uh, chance of succeeding. So that's a pretty long speech to basically say scientists should understand, uh, what's involved and understand the realities of drug discovery and not just be totally, totally focused on their own work, but understand the issue so that they can help explain these things at, at Thanksgiving, when your favorite uncle complains about, uh, the price of his, uh, new, uh, blood pressure lowering medication or a new, uh, diabetes medication that he might

16:42be on and say, well, wait a second. You know, uh, uh, uh, uh, you have a hardcover book here on, on your, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, the coffee table, uh, that only costs about a nickel for the paper and the binding. Well, why didn't you pay the, uh, $22 to buy that book? Well, the author worked hard and it's been years on, on, on doing that. And then you, you have to market it and say, well, what do you think we do in the drug industry? We work hard. It's the same sort of thing.

17:12So, uh, understanding, appreciating those issues and then transmitting those issues to the public, I think is very important. Great to hear some of your insights on, you know, the, I guess, educational aspect that's

Public Perception

17:24needed, um, for scientists to kind of have to be good scientists. Um, and then on that same page in your three decades at FESR, moving from bench to executive suite, was there maybe a specific moment or project where I guess you realized you wanted to transition from science to leadership or was it kind of more just generally speaking? So going into management, isn't something you could say, walk into a boss's office one day and say, I want to be a manager. Uh, you have to really, uh, the company has to have a need for, uh, somebody in, in various

17:58management, which all big companies do, particularly if they're growing. Uh, but then also you have to have the capabilities, uh, to be able to, uh, uh, lead a program. And so there are a variety of factors that go into that. Uh, one is an ability to communicate well, uh, as a scientist, to be able to be in meetings, to share your insights, to share your concerns, uh, and, and to, uh, uh, be able to show upper

18:30management that, uh, you, you, uh, uh, know how to do this sort of thing. Writing also is important because number of reports you have to write, uh, and summarize things concisely to the point, uh, uh, is important. I can tell you that, uh, a person who became, uh, the, the really big boss and vice chairman of Pfizer preceded me as head of R&D. Uh, he told me, and he was a biologist, so he didn't know me from Adam as a chemist, but he said he first noticed me when he read some of my stuff, which he thought was outstanding.

19:01And I had never really gotten that feedback or something I did. So, A, so you have to show, uh, an ability to, uh, grasp the big picture and to write and communicate well. Uh, and then, and then the company has to think you have this stuff as well. That's some, that's an intangible, I guess, to show that, uh, you do have leadership, the leadership qualities, uh, that are needed to move forward. And then what happened to me was, uh, uh, I, I, I continued to do well and, uh, I was

19:32added responsibilities. And so after about having, running a lab, as well as being in a lower level management, uh, uh, level, I, uh, uh, uh, eventually had to give up, uh, my lab work because I had, uh, too many, uh, projects to be responsible for, for, on the chemistry side. Uh, and, and so that progressed to various degrees. And then I guess my first big promotion was being in charge of, uh, of, uh, of discovery research in our U.S. site.

20:03That was a pretty big deal because now I was not only responsible for chemistry, but also responsible for, uh, biology and some other disciplines. Uh, and that was a big deal. And this was one of the great benefits, uh, in, in my career in that I was always learning. So, uh, yeah, I knew chemistry pretty well, but then when I had to be responsible for biologists, I had to understand a lot, uh, grow a little bit in, in that area as well. And, and that continued along the way. And so that was probably one of the biggest promotions I, I had, even though I had bigger,

20:39larger ones, but that was one where I really expanded, uh, uh, disciplines that I was responsible for.

20:48Awesome. Awesome. And in that response, you kind of touched a little bit on communication.

Communication Skills

20:54Um, after your time at Pfizer, you went on to publish three books about the pharmaceutical industry and the cha, the challenges of, uh, drug development, what motivated you to start writing and what perspectives did you hope to, I guess, contribute to the broader discussion around the industry? So, uh, a few years before I left Pfizer, I was invited, uh, to be, uh, uh, give a major series of talks at where I had gotten my degree, uh, at the University of New Hampshire.

21:25And, and one, one of the talks I gave was science space, but the other talk I gave which was open to the general public, uh, in, in, in that town was about, uh, the challenges of drug discovery and development, much as I had been talking about and, and what goes into it and the misconceptions that people have, uh, like the drug industry is, is only interested in me too drugs. They're not creative. They're not original. Uh, they tied toxicology issues with, with the drugs, et cetera.

21:57And, uh, I gave an hour long talk to an audience of about 200, 220 people, but I, and these were not necessarily all scientists, these were the people in the community. And you can see as you were talking to them, how they would sort of say, oh, I never knew that. Oh, that's sort of interesting. And certainly, and the Q and A. So my talk was about 45 or 50 minutes. The Q and A went on for over an hour. Uh, and, and finally, the, the, you guys, we have to end this.

22:28We have a dinner. We have to go to about six o'clock at night. And so that really inspired me. Uh, and so when I left Pfizer, I wrote a book, uh, uh, called drug truths, uh, dispelling the myths of pharmaceutical R&D, where I talked about all those things. The, the, the industry isn't, the industry doesn't care about safety, the, uh, stupid, stupid stuff that you would think, but nevertheless, this is what, what people believe. And, and, and the, and the beauty of that book, uh, which still, even though it was published about, uh, 14, 15 years ago, still sells about 20 or 25 copies a year, because in each

23:05chapter, I talk about the issue. Uh, the industry is only interested in, in what was called me too drugs. Follow on drugs of other successful drugs. And I, I, I talk about why that's a misconception that, you know, the first drug in a class is never usually the best. Uh, interestingly enough, uh, people who, who take a certain class of drugs, some drugs work for them and some drugs in that class don't. And I use Lipitor as an example. Lipitor was the sixth, fifth or sixth statin that come to market and turn out to be the best.

23:38Uh, and so, uh, some people, and, but I had, uh, uh, uh, uh, my administrative assistant couldn't take Lipitor, uh, because it gave her headaches. And so she had to go to another stat when she needed a statin. So anyway, I, I talk about the, uh, uh, the misconceptions of that, but then I talk about the history of, of, uh, how that drug was discovered, which is a whole learning, uh, to begin with, I talk about how the, the, the Lipitor program almost, uh, ended, uh, because

24:09the company didn't think it was going to be successful in the clinic and how, uh, one of the key people on the program at a, at a meeting where they were going to kill the drug got on his knees and begged them to put the compound into phase one studies. And, and, uh, the, the, just to get him off their backs, they said, okay. And then when they went to phase one, they saw a miraculous kind of results. So each, each chapter talks about the issue and then, uh, goes into a discovery of, of, of, of a certain meta history of a certain medicine, which are still those, uh, 10 or

24:4111, uh, examples are all valuable history lessons in drug discovery. So it, it accomplished a few purposes and, uh, well, I'll give you a little bit more of my personal history. So, uh, then one day I got a call, uh, uh, from a television show at the Dr. Oz show. I don't know how many people know of Dr. Oz. He ran a, uh, uh, a talk show in, in the United States. Uh, and right now he's, he's, uh, uh, uh, in charge of, uh, uh, of, uh, healthcare, part

25:14of a healthcare system here in the United States under President Trump. Uh, and, and anyway, I went on Dr. Oz's show and, uh, I was set up a little bit. I won't go all the details. I talked about that in my second book. Uh, uh, uh, but, uh, I came away saying I have to get my message out more. And so that was when I, uh, I joined at the time with Twitter and I, and I started my blog and my blog was picked up by Forbes. And that led to, uh, another, uh, another couple of books, uh, and most recently Pharma

25:44and Profits, although, uh, coming from, uh, being invited to give a talk at the University of New Hampshire, uh, and, and going a little bit outside my chemistry comfort zone and talking about, uh, what we're all about. And, uh, uh, uh, led me to a whole nother part of my career. Thank you for that. I think it's great to have some more context on, you know, your publications and your major

Regulatory Impact

26:08emphasis on the importance of communication. Uh, I think on that same note of writing in some of your recent opinion pieces, uh, you talked a little bit about how public policy can influence pharmaceutical innovation. Um, from your perspective, how do policy decisions affect the development of new medicines and specifically, um, I guess, small molecule drugs? So, uh, you're touching on what was called here, uh, the Inflation Reduction Act.

26:41And despite its name, what the, the major part, for me anyway, the Inflation Reduction Act was the first time in the United States price controls were being put onto drugs. And, uh, in terms of answering your question, one of the key provisions of that was that if a drug has been on the market for nine years, the government can come in and then set a price for that drug, uh, at least those, for those patients on Medicare and Medicaid. And, and so every year, and this now has been in effect for, for two or three years now,

27:15a list of drugs is, is set by the government. Uh, it was initially 15. Now it's up to 20, uh, uh, drugs a year. Uh, and within a few years, I think most of the drugs that, uh, have been on the market for a certain period of time will, will be subject to price controls. And they said they'd call it negotiations. Basically, they'd tell you, here's the price we're going to pay, deal with it. Uh, so that has a variety of ramifications. But in terms of your small molecule question, the fascinating thing was what, what they set was for small molecules, anything that had been on the market for nine years, uh, would

27:51be subject to price controls. For large molecules, uh, they had more time. I think it was 13 years before price controls would be set. Well, suddenly now you had what was called a small molecule penalty, a penalty that, uh, you were basically going to start losing revenues on small molecule drugs after nine years, where if you're in large molecule drugs, you'd have a better chance of recouping your investment, uh, because you'd get, uh, uh, uh, 12 or 13, I forget what the answer, 12 or 13 years.

28:23So how did that impact things? Well, venture capitalists suddenly said, well, we're not going to invest as much in small molecules now because the return on investment isn't going to be as great. And they're not going to be potentially as attractive, uh, to, if you invest in a small molecule, uh, eventually it's not going to be, be as revenue generating as a large molecule would be. And so as a result, more revenue got shifted, uh, investment.

28:53Got shifted from small molecules to large molecules. And I would venture, and that, uh, this is the only speculation on my part, venture that it impacted the large pharmaceutical companies as well, because the marketing folks and the management would say, well, how much of our portfolio is small molecule based and how much of our portfolio is large molecule based? Because, uh, you know, if we have a portfolio that's a pipeline, that's 80% small molecules, that's not as good as maybe having a pipeline that's only 40% small molecules, 6% low molecules.

29:25So it had a definite impact on the direction of research, which is totally the wrong way to go because people, uh, do better if their medications are, if you can simply go to the pharmacy and get your pills and take them on a daily basis, as opposed to going to a physician's office or a healthcare clinic to get injections of, or in, in, in vitro, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, IV, uh, preps for your, uh, large molecule, uh, uh, drugs.

29:57And those, by the way, are far more expensive than a health care system. You go to a doctor's office every week, at least in the United States, for an injection of your drug or every two weeks. Those visits are usually billed about $1,000 as opposed to going to your pharmacy and getting a vial of pills. So it had those impacts. The other impact is that clearly the Inflation Reduction Act was designed to lower the country's bill, the United States' bills for drugs.

30:30That is something that is very popular, still very popular in the United States. Surveys show that 80%, 85% of people think drugs are too expensive. Well, that's all well and good. But when you cut the revenues of a company, you end up cutting research because 20% to 25% of all investments that a company makes into R&D come directly from top-line sales. So if you reduce top-line sales by $1 billion, that's $200 million less for R&D, maybe $250 million less on it.

31:06So you asked about what are the implications of regulatory actions. Here you, with the IRA, do the gamut of changing, really, the direction of research from small molecule to more large molecule, as well as impacting the amount, ultimately, of money in being invested in R&D. Looking ahead for the pharmaceutical industry in general, we know you also published some pieces on the rise of AI-driven drug discovery.

Future of Drug Discovery

31:35Could you share your perspective regarding that and how you think that's going to change? I think one of the beauties of AI, a variety of things in science, but let me talk about clinical trials. So, you know, we run large clinical trials in some cases for new drugs, say for heart disease. You have to run a clinical trial that's an outcome study where you take 10, 15, 20,000 patients and you study your drug in them over the course of five or six years

32:12to look to see if your drug actually reduces heart attacks and strokes. You can't run a trial for six months and say you get fewer heart attacks. It's a disease that's slow in coming as well as strokes. So those tend to be very expensive trials. AI will help tremendously in analyzing data from all those trials. I'm looking for potential trends, analyzing potential toxicities, looking at subpatient populations in a way that has never been able to be done before.

32:48So I think we'll be able to run better trials, maybe smaller trials, we'll keep our fingers crossed, maybe less expensive trials. The trials I just described cost around a billion and two billion dollars. And so hopefully it will help us in that regard. All other areas in terms of modeling of proteins and structures and stuff that's been happening will continue to happen. And so I think, look, more technology can only help and AI is clearly in that area.

33:22Yeah, thank you. And for regarding the role of big pharma changing over the next decade, how do you think it will change in relation to like smaller biotech startups? Oh, I think it's something people don't realize. Way back when I was at Pfizer, half of the drugs we had on the market, we licensed from outside of Pfizer. But in those days, there was no biotech. You licensed them from small companies in Europe or Asia that didn't have a global marketing presence.

33:59That has pretty much continued. I think most of the major pharmaceutical companies, still about half of their products are licensed from externally. Well, why is that? Well, no matter how big your R&D budget is, let's say your R&D budget is 14, 15 billion dollars, which is about a third of the NIH's budget. So one company could be spending almost as much as what the NIH does in research. And research, well, a significant amount. But you can still only cover a small part of all the R&D that occurs in the world.

34:35So having a substantial amount of money that you could invest in companies, in opportunities outside your own company, I think is also important to do. So having said that, what has grown during my career has been the biotech industry. And the biotech industry has really filled the gap of producing new small molecules, because now most companies are multinational. And so, yeah, it's part of the ecosystem. I think this will continue.

35:07And I think some biotech companies will tend to do more on the outskirts of traditional pharma R&D. I'll use the microbiome as an example, because it's one of the companies I've been involved with as Vedanta, as a microbiome company, a small biotech company. And with the early days of microbiome research was occurring, big companies were going to make an investment in that. It was too speculative at the time. But Vedanta has, and a couple of other microbiome companies have, and they've advanced the science quite a bit,

35:42such that, you know, around the verge of the products now coming to treat various issues like infections like C. difficile. So part of the ecosystem of drug R&D, the biotech industry is an important part of it, a strong part of it, will continue to be an important part of it going forward. Thank you for that context. And, yeah, it's just really insightful to hear how the big industries are always working with smaller biotech startups

36:14and how that continues forward. And just to kind of look towards the future, in terms of, like, any new books or major research projects, are you working on any right now? Or can you give us some more insight into some next projects that you're going to be working on? Well, if I did, I'd have to kill you. They're top secret stuff. But, no, really, I think a better way to look at this is where can we expect breakthroughs now?

36:46And what's happening in oncology is stunning. And, actually, in my first book, I predicted that, and that wasn't a great insight on my part, if you talk to people, experts in oncology and cancer, they would talk about how it was going to evolve into a chronic disease like diabetes, something where you continue to have to take medicines, but which would be not a death sentence. And that's really what's happened now and continues to happen. There are still some difficult cancers to deal with, brain cancer, pancreatic cancer, among the top.

37:18But, certainly, for treatments for breast cancer, progress is being made all the time now. People are living or have been diseased, they're diseased, cured now, and living past 15, 20, 25 years with breast cancer. It's wonderful to see. They still have a way to go, but it's been tremendous progress going forward. So, I think you'll continue to see that evolution of cancer from being a death sentence to a chronic disease, if not a cure disease.

37:48I think the bigger challenge will be Alzheimer's disease. Some drugs now are available. They're not the greatest of drugs. They forestall the disease a bit. They come with some toleration challenges. So, I think that's the greater frontier. As my generation gets older, Alzheimer's and cognitive issues become more and more plentiful. And then, finally, I think in the whole neuroscience area, there are opportunities.

38:22Drugs that we had, like SSRI, serve the purpose. But we need to learn more about the brain and come up with better treatments for depression, schizophrenia, Parkinson's, and things like that. So, I think those are the areas to watch going forward. But I'm hopeful. I think that the science continues to grow and builds upon every year, bills and bills. And hopefully, what we're talking about now, when you're my age, won't exist. That's so interesting. And I think it's just great to hear, you know, the evolution and how that's changed over several years of,

38:56you know, hard work from so many different people. And kind of just to wrap up this interview, in a sense, what is the most important piece of advice you would give to a young scientist interested in working in gun development? And also, maybe what skills or perspectives do you think are most important to have as a scientist today? First, look, the various skills are important. The obvious one is basically being very good at what you do.

39:27When you're a chemist on a team, you've got to be an important part of it. You don't want to be dragging the team down. You've got to be as skilled a chemist as possible and insightful in the kind of molecules you make and the kind of molecules designed.

39:44And then you should learn as much as you can. You know, don't just be a chemist and keep your eyes focused down there. But try and learn everything else. Because the more you learn about drug metabolism, the more you'll design molecules that will have a longer half-life. The more you understand about potential toxicity of molecules, the more you'll design molecules that have a built-in safety feature along the way. So continue to learn and continue to grow as a scientist in that regard. But then I'll come back to what I've been saying all along, communication, both oral and written, very important.

40:21And if it doesn't naturally come to you, you should work on that. You should maybe take a course in presentations. It's hard to get a PhD and not have some communication skills because of your oral dissertation and your oral exams and things like that. But nevertheless, if it's a weakness, try and expand it by giving talks outside. Lots of schools and lots of scientific meetings exist where you can give talks about your research.

40:53I remember I was petrified doing my first talk at a scientific meeting, and I was very glad it was over. But then I began to do a lot of it, and it became a second issue. So communication skills, both written and oral, are very important to grow. Yeah, it was great talking to you today. We don't get to hear much from people in industry usually or people of such high leadership roles such as you.

41:24So, yeah, it was really great to learn more about your perspectives on drug development and how you go about communicating science to the general public. So thank you for having us. Thank you for inviting me. It's always nice to be invited for me to spout off about all sorts of things. So thank you. I really appreciate that. It's a chance to talk to you both. Yes, we appreciate you, too. Thank you. It's been great to hear from someone who is passionate about chairing the behind-the-scenes that goes into the drug development at a company like Pfizer and funding for new medicines.

41:56I appreciate Dr. LaMatina recognizing the real and current concerns of the citizens and scientists in the United States around the costs of medical care and misinformation about life-saving medicines. Yes, definitely. Drug development is a perfect example of the intersection between science, public policy, and public perception. And it highlights that drug development doesn't happen in a vacuum. I really appreciated the insight Dr. LaMatina shared about the skills chemists need to develop beyond chemistry

42:28to succeed in leadership positions at large pharmaceutical companies like Pfizer. Things like interdisciplinary teamwork and communication are essential, yet they often don't get as much practice as the analytical skills we develop in the lab. Absolutely. And conversations like this are a great reminder that behind every breakthrough medicine is a huge network of scientists, leaders, and innovators working for years to make it possible. To all the listeners of Westalk Chemistry, thank you so much for joining us today with Dr. LaMatina,

43:02and I hope you learned something new about taking a new drug to market or developing the soft skills necessary to lead the next generations of scientists. We'll see you next time. Thank you for listening to Let's Talk Chemistry, a podcast by ChemTalk. We hope you enjoyed it. For more information on today's episode and countless chemistry resources, please visit our website at www.chemistrytalk.org. Thank you for listening to Let's Talk Chemistry, a podcast with Dr. LaMatina and Dr. LaMatina and Dr. LaMatina.