Pet Insurance

I understand that pet insurance is more popular in the UK than in any other country. Why is that, I wonder?

One might have thought that health insurance for pets would be an easier idea for Americans to get their collective heads around than Brits who are, after all, accustomed to getting their own healthcare largely free at the point of care.

Be that as it may, here's an interesting article I came across in one of today's UK papers.

http://money.guardian.co.uk/insurance_/story/0,,1888141,00.html

Animal Health Industry Excellence Awards

One week to go. A week in which we find ourselves wondering why people take so long to RSVP to an invitation and just how late we can leave the table plan without striking fear, alarm and despondency into the heart of the printer.

Still, we have people flying in from the US, India, Australia, Singapore and all over Europe to take part in the event. Three of the 'big four' companies are well represented and so are many of the middle-ranking firms in the industry.

And the lovely Trude Mostue flies in from Norway (where she's taking part in Norwegian television's edition of Strictly Come Dancing) on the Thursday morning to act as our host for the event.

I can confidently say that the silver envelopes containing the winners' names have one or two surprises in store too.

I'd like to tell you that I'm getting very excited about the whole thing.

Actually, I'm lying awake at night imagining strikes by Scandinavian airline workers and security alerts in the Docklands.

Generics: a little something to get you thinking...

Competition on the generic veterinary drug front... It's only going to get more intense, I think we all acknowledge that.

And most of the growth is expected to come from India and China. But might there be somewhere closer to home that you need to be keeping an eye on:

This blogger thinks so:
http://caivs.blogspot.com/2006/06/malta-employs-patent-quirk-to-cash-in.html

Little short of mayhem...

What a week. And, heaven help us, it's only Tuesday.

I used to manage awards programmes in a previous life when I worked for professional engineering and accounting organisations. I confess that I had forgotten just how much work is involved and how resource intensive they can be. In a word, extremely. If I'd had a clearer recollection of just how much sweat and how many tears are involved, I'd have thought twice. Thrice probably. (No actual blood yet, but it can only be a matter of time!)

Still, Richard Daub is installed in the New York office and already reporting for us. (You can read about Richard's day-by-day experiences of learning about the animal health industry at animalpharmusa.blogspot.com)

If your company is based in North America, get in touch with Richard and say hello. I know he'd be delighted to hear from you.

His email address is: richard.daub@informausa.com He's based in our New York office.

Budget permitting, we're hoping to have Richard with us for the first Animal Health Industry Excellence Awards ceremony on October 12th in London. So, those of you coming over for the celebrations may be able to meet him then.