A Myth

PureTech Ventures' John LaMattina this week says "there has never really been 'low-hanging fruit' in pharma R&D." Writing in Forbes, the former president of R&D at Pfizer says "the fact of the matter is that drug discovery has always been hard and that there have been spectacular failures over the years in pursuit of what its retrospectively viewed as 'low-hanging fruit,'" or easily attainable targets. "For decades, the fruit has always been hard to reach. The difference these days is that the trees are even higher due to the expectations of patients, physicians, and payers," LaMattina adds.