Washington, DC – Today, the Tump administration withdrew from consideration Scott Gottlieb for head of the Federal Drug Administration. In his place, the Administration has offered Martin “Pharma Bro” Shkreli. Shkreli is an American businessman, former hedge fund manager and founder and former CEO of Turing Pharmaceuticals.
In September 2015, Shkreli received widespread criticism when Turing obtained the manufacturing license for the antiparasitic drug Daraprim and raised its price by a factor of 56 (from US$13.5 to US$750 per pill), leading him to be referred to as “the most hated man in America” and “pharma bro”. However, prosecution and defense attorneys offered conflicting views at Shkreli’s trial that The Guardian summarized as “Martin Shkreli is either a con man who scammed hedge fund investors out of millions or a nerdy genius who made them even richer.”