Drug price control 12: Blog posts on page 1 of Google, Yahoo and Bing

Last Friday night, August 12, I wrote this:

Next week, August 15, the drug price control policy of the Philippine government will mark its second year anniversary. Did it achieve its goal of making branded drugs, some still patented drugs, by multinational pharma companies become more affordable to the poor? That will be the subject of my paper next week as I do some review of the literature online.

Another exercise, I typed "drug price control" in google, yahoo, and bing/MSN, and I was happily surprised of the result.

Two of my papers on the subject landed on page 1 of google, #s 9 and 10 -- Part 8 of my discussion series on the subject, "Advertising and government pharma corporation" and Part 1, "IPR and taxes on medicines."

In yahoo, my paper "Drug price control: 1 year of failure" managed to land on page 1, at #10. It's fine.

Finally, in bing.com and msn.com, three of my papers are in the top 10 articles :-) They are on #s 5, 6 and 7. Numbers 5 and 7 are from this blog, while no. 6 is from the MG website, the long paper that I presented in a conference in Singapore in October 2009.

I don't use any modern SEO technique, I just write as much as my time would allow, then post in this blog. That is why I am happy that a number of my blog articles here are able to land on page 1 or the top 10 articles of those top 3 search engines on the issue of "drug price control".

See also the earlier search, Drug price control 10: Blog posts on page 1 of Bing, Google and Yahoo, June 09, 2011.
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Today, I made the search more specific. If you type "drug price control Philippines" on all 3 big search engines, the results are more amazing, at least for me :-)

Two of the top 10 articles there were my papers. #4 is "Access to medicines through politics..." posted in the MG website (it's 32 pages long, that's why), and #7 is "Drug price control 6: Exploring just one price for each drug".

An article by James Hookway posted in WSJ, then reposted in Manila Bulletin, were #s 2 and 5. I was among the persons interviewed and quoted by James in his article.

In bing or msn.com, 3 out of the top 10 articles are my papers. #1 is "Access to medicines through politics". #5 is "Politics of health cost containment: Philippines", also posted in the MG website (21 slides powerpoint). And #7 is "2 Opinions on drug price control."

Finally, google. Five in top 10 or page one of google search were my papers. #1 is "Drug price control 1: IPR and taxes on medicines", #2 is "Drug price control 10: Blog posts on page 1 of google, bing and yahoo." #5 is "Politics of health cost containment: Philippines", #7 is "Philippines: One year after drug price control" posted in Liberty Institute website, Delhi, India. And #8 is "Double drug price control and acronym politics" posted in the online magazine,
thelobbyist.biz.

My article on "Two years of drug price control" will be coming out from this online magazine later today or tomorrow.

Drug price control 10: Blog posts on page 1 of Bing, Google and Yahoo

I have written a number of articles about the drug price control policy in the country since 2009. So last February 15 this year, I curiously tried a simple test: did any of my articles and blog posts about the subject manage to land on page 1, or the Top 10 articles, of the 3 major search engines, Bing, Google and Yahoo? I was surprised of the result, I blogged it here, Drug price control 4: Blog popularity in google, yahoo and bing.

In summary: in both Bing and Google, 2 of the top 10 articles there were from my blog articles; and in yahoo, not one blog post landed in the top 10, but two of my long papers on the subject, posted in the MG website, landed in the top 10.

Today, I checked again if this blog is able to retain its position in the said 3 major search engines when one will search the topic, "drug price control". Here are the results.

In Bing, Microsoft's search engine, #s 6th and 7th were my papers, "Drug price control: 1 year of failure" and "Drug price control 5: Mandatory discounts", respectively.

And #9 is my long paper (35 pages including annexes), "Access to medicines through politics: Preliminary assessment of the drug price control policy in the Philippines", posted in the MG website.

Good result, 3 out of the top 10 articles in Bing were my papers.

In yahoo, only 1 paper from this blog managed to land in the top 10, #6th, "Drug price control: 1 year of failure". Going to page 2, my other paper landed #12th, "Drug price control a year after".

Last test, google -- not one of my papers landed in the top 10 now, too bad. I revised the search to "drug price control Philippines", and a really good result showed up:

#1 is "Drug price control 1: IPR and taxes on medicines", #2 is "Drug price control 6: Exploring just one price for each drug", #5 is my longer paper posted in the MG website, "Politics of health cost containment: Philippines", and #7 is my paper, "One year after drug price control", posted in the Liberty Institute (India) website. Yeah!

The policy will turn two years old within two months, in mid-August 2011. There are no signs that the DOH will remove or recommend to the President to recall the policy.

Well, damage has been done, both short-term and long-term, to the country's investment policy. That if you invented a popular, more disease killer but still patented drug, and if you bring it in the Philippines, expect that the politics of envy will gang up on you, and your drug can be put under price control. Or it can be issued a compulsory licensing (CL).

One implication of this is that some newly invented, more revolutionary but still on patent drugs, may not be brought into the country. Only when the patent is about to expire or has expired, meaning a few years after where generics production can be introduced, that the drug will be brought to the country. I have discussed this subject more elaborately in Drug price control 9: More comments on single pricing per drug.

Drug price control 4: Blog popularity in google, yahoo and bing

As I posted earlier on the "hockey stick" graph, this blog attracts a modest traffic. But there are some topics discussed in this blog that are picked up well by the major search engines. One such topic is "drug price control."

Try the following exercises:
1. Search in google.com "drug price control",
2. Search in yahoo.com "drug price control", and
3. Search in bing.com "drug price control".

As of today, here are the results:

Page 1 of google shows that 2 of the top 10 articles are from this blog. #3 is Part 1 of this series which I wrote last January 14, 2011.

#4 is Uncontrolled emotions in drug price control which I wrote last July 15, 2009. I'm very happy with the google result. Click this and the next 2 pictures to see their larger images.

. Next test, yahoo -- not one article from this blog landed on page 1 or the top 10 articles. But not to dismay, #1 is my paper, Access to medicines through politics: Preliminary assessment of drug price control policy in the Philippines posted in the MG Thinkers website, www.minimalgovernment.net. It's the paper that I presented in a conference in Singapore last October 2009, event jointly sponsored by the Americans for Tax Reforms (ATR), International Policy Network (IPN), Property
Rights Alliance (PRA), Acton Institute, and World Taxpayers Association (WTA). That paper is 33 pages long including tables and annexes.

#3 is my other paper posted in the MG website, Access to Medicines via Competition Not Protectionism and Price Regulation which I wrote last February 2010. It is 11 pages long.

#2 is an article in the Manila Bulletin, Philippine price controls hamper rise of generics, which is a reprint of an article by James Hookways and originally published in the Wall Street Journal last Jun 2010. I was briefly quoted in that articles by James:

Bienvenido Oplas, head of the Manila-based Minimal Government Thinkers Inc. think-tank and a member of the consultative panel advising the Philippines' Department of Health, said this means the price controls policy just isn't working. "It hasn't fulfilled its objective of making more drugs available to more people," he said....

In short, the top 3 articles on "drug price control" on yahoo search engine were either my long papers or an international news report that briefly quoted me. Again, I am happy with this result.

Next test is via bing.com, a search engine developed by Microsoft. On page 1 or the top 10 articles, #6 is my article in this blog, 2 opinions on drug price control which I wrote last September 22, 2009. I posted there portions of opinions written by Ding Generoso of BusinessMirror and Cito Beltran of Philippine Star.

And #9 is my article, Drug price control a year after last August 19, 2010. The article was originally published in The Manila Times that day.

So there. The high presence of some of my articles and long papers in the 3 big search engines is a good achievement by itself.

There's no wine or beer beside me, so I just sip a cup of coffee. :-)