Big Pharma

noun

variants or less commonly big pharma

: large pharmaceutical companies considered especially as a politically influential group

The Medicare prescription drug benefit enacted in 2003, and scheduled to go into effect in 2006, promises a windfall for big pharma since it forbids the government from negotiating prices.

—Marcia Angell, New York Review of Books, 15 July 2004

It's no secret that Big Pharma spends megabucks marketing to physicians.

—Anne Underwood, Newsweek, 29 Oct. 2007

Word History

First Known Use

1994, in the meaning defined above

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Rhymes for Big Pharma

• dharma
• karma