Listen and read

Step into an infinite world of stories

  • Listen and read as much as you want
  • Over 400 000+ titles
  • Bestsellers in 10+ Indian languages
  • Exclusive titles + Storytel Originals
  • Easy to cancel anytime
Subscribe now
Details page - Device banner - 894x1036

Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom

82 Ratings

4.4

Duration
14H 26min
Language
English
Format
Category

Non-Fiction

From an award-winning Fortune reporter, an explosive narrative investigation of the generic drug boom that reveals the life-threatening dangers posed by globalization—The Jungle for pharmaceuticals

The widespread use of generic drugs has been hailed as one of the most important public health developments of the twentieth century. Today, almost 90 percent of our pharmaceutical market is comprised of generics, the majority of which are manufactured overseas. We have been reassured by our pharmacists, our doctors, and our regulators that the generic and brand-name drugs are identical, generics just cheaper. But is this really true?

Katherine Eban’s Bottle of Lies exposes the widespread deceit behind generic drug manufacturing—creating terrifying risks for global health. Drawing on exclusive accounts from whistleblowers, inspectors, and regulators, as well as thousands of pages of confidential internal FDA documents, Eban reveals an industry where fraud is rampant, companies falsify data, and executives circumvent almost every principle of safe manufacturing to minimize cost and maximize profit. Meanwhile, patients unwittingly consume adulterated medicine with unpredictable and even life-threatening effects.

The story of generic drugs is truly global: it connects middle America to sub-Saharan Africa, China, India, and Brazil, and encompasses every market banking on the promise of a low-cost cure. Given that tens of millions of patients take drugs of dubious quality approved with fake data, the generics industry is the ultimate litmus test of globalization: what is the risk of moving drug manufacturing offshore, and is it worth the savings?

An investigation with international sweep, exotic settings, molecular mayhem, and big money at its core, Bottle of Lies reveals how the world’s greatest public-health innovation has become one of its most astonishing swindles.

© 2019 HarperAudio (Audiobook): 9780062917645

Release date

Audiobook: 14 May 2019

Others also enjoyed ...

  1. An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination Sheera Frenkel
  2. Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup John Carreyrou
  3. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty Patrick Radden Keefe
  4. Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World David Epstein
  5. The End of the World is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization Peter Zeihan
  6. The Sixth Extinction Elizabeth Kolbert
  7. Say Nothing: A True Story Of Murder and Memory In Northern Ireland Patrick Radden Keefe
  8. The Heretics: Adventures with the Enemies of Science Will Storr
  9. Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are Seth Stephens-Davidowitz
  10. We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories From Rwanda: Picador Classic Philip Gourevitch
  11. Antisocial: How Online Extremists Broke America Andrew Marantz
  12. Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World Tom Burgis
  13. Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow Yuval Noah Harari
  14. The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion Jonathan Haidt
  15. I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life Ed Yong
  16. Making Sense: Conversations on Consciousness, Morality, and the Future of Humanity Sam Harris
  17. Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment Robert Wright
  18. Astrophysics for People in a Hurry Neil deGrasse Tyson
  19. The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers Ben Horowitz
  20. Noise Daniel Kahneman
  21. How To Win Friends And Influence People Dale Carnegie
  22. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind Yuval Noah Harari
  23. Permanent Record: A Memoir of a Reluctant Whistleblower Edward Snowden
  24. Talk Like TED: The 9 Public Speaking Secrets of the World's Top Minds Carmine Gallo
  25. Good to Great Jim Collins
  26. Debt – Updated and Expanded: The First 5,000 Years David Graeber
  27. Principles: Life and Work Ray Dalio
  28. Conscious: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind Annaka Harris
  29. The Cult of We: WeWork and the Great Start-Up Delusion Eliot Brown
  30. Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness Richard H. Thaler
  31. The Fourth Age: Smart Robots, Conscious Computers, and the Future of Humanity Byron Reese
  32. Radical Candor: How to Get What You Want by Saying What You Mean Kim Scott
  33. The Anatomy of Fascism Robert O. Paxton
  34. Capital and Ideology Thomas Piketty
  35. The Emperor of All Maladies Siddhartha Mukherjee
  36. Pandora’s Lab: Seven Stories of Science Gone Wrong Paul A. Offit
  37. Human Universe Professor Brian Cox
  38. How Not To Die: Discover the foods scientifically proven to prevent and reverse disease Gene Stone
  39. Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets Nassim Nicholas Taleb
  40. Good Habits, Bad Habits: How to Make Positive Changes That Stick Wendy Wood
  41. The Brain Fog Fix: Reclaim Your Focus, Memory, and Joy in Just 3 Weeks Mike Dow
  42. MBS: The Rise to Power of Mohammed Bin Salman Ben Hubbard
  43. What We Cannot Know: Explorations at the Edge of Knowledge Marcus du Sautoy
  44. So You Want to Talk about Race Ijeoma Oluo