Women are at least considered a valuable market for pharmaceutical sales. Children generally are not. Even though it was the plight of children that sparked the two major revisions of drug law in this century—the kids who died from elixir sulfanilamide in 1937 and the thalidomide-deformed babies in the early 1960s—adult drug users have been the major beneficiaries of their suffering. For decades, pediatricians have been banging their heads against the wall trying to draw attention to the medication problems of the young. Their rallying cry has been "children are not just small adults.
Kim, a 38-year-old pharmaceutical sales representee, has suffered with fibromyalgia for over six years. Kim was well until she got the flu six years ago. " I never felt like I recovered from that flu, " Kim said. " I used to feel pretty good, and I used to work out all of the time. I don't understand what has happened to me. My muscles always ache, and I have headaches all of the time. I feel like I have aged forty years since I became ill." Kim was taking NSAIDS and sleeping pills to help her sleep at night. "The medication does help somewhat, but I still feel lousy.
I also knew quite a few pharmaceutical sales reps. Philadelphia, with all its drug companies and medical schools, is crawling with them. My youngest brother, who is single, would sometimes date them: if you talk to women in bars in the Delaware Valley, the law of averages says you're going to make out with at least a few drug reps. Since my brother is diabetic, he was particularly delighted when he once found himself dating a rep from a company that sold insulin.
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