WRAL Tech Wire

‘We Work for Health’ – New group seeks to spark medical innovation in N.C.

Sam Taylor

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• We Work for Health
• NCBIO

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Editor’s note: “We Work for Health of North Carolina,” a new partnership formed with the purpose of driving medical innovation in the state, kicked off its efforts Thursday at GlaxoSmithKline’s headquarters in RTP with a series of remarks from high-profile speakers, including U.S. Sen. Richard Burr. Among the group’s organizers and its co-chair is Sam Taylor, head of the NCBIO trade association. The N.C. health organization is one of 10 statewide groups that make up We Work for Health.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. - ”We Work for Health” is a coalition of life science companies, supporting business and other institutions working together to raise awareness of our the life science sector’s contributions to good health and economic progress.

Everybody knows the life science community works to develop treatments and other tools to address disease and improve human quality of life. Heart disease, diabetes, stroke, and hundreds of other health conditions are targets of our research and development efforts.

But the life science community is also an economic engine. And here in North Carolina we have one of the biggest life science engines in the country.

In the biopharmaceuticals sector alone, our companies employ more than 26,000 North Carolinians directly and indirectly support 92,000 more. Biopharmaceutical wages are three times our state’s average. And personal taxes in the biopharmaceutical industry are roughly four times the state per-employee average.

In the broader life science sector, a study recently completed by Battelle Corporation for the North Carolina Biotechnology Center shows that North Carolina’s life science community directly employees 53,000 workers. When you add indirect and induced job creation, that number climbs to 182,000.

In terms of economic impact, total direct output of North Carolina life science companies is more than $28 billion. And if you include indirect and induced output, that number rises to nearly $46 billion. State and local tax income resulting from the life science sector is estimated at $1.4 million.

And the best news is that North Carolina’s life science community continues to grow. In 2008 alone, North Carolina’s life science community announced plans for more than $1.1 billion in new capital expenditures, licensing payments, equity investments and research grants. Even with our world economy in a tail spin, that number was only about 10% off of the $1.3 billion in similar announcements in 2007.

It’s important to remember, however, that the growth and success of North Carolina’s life science community is not an accident. A recent study by the North Carolina Biotechnology Center shows that between 1998 and 2008, North Carolina invested more than $1 billion in growing our life science community.

The vast majority of that money went to research at our great universities. More went into worker training. And a substantial amount went to programs at the Biotechnology Center to create and grow life sciences start-up firms.

Investments like North Carolina’s – and others at the national level – have made America the acknowledged world leader in the life science disciplines.

Now, as our state and nation look to the future, those of us in We Work for Health hope that our country and our leaders will stay focused on the formula for success that has made our life science communities strong.

In part, that formula involves continuing investments in life science research, worker training, and other programs. But it also means assuring that other policy decisions we make – about patents, about follow-on-biologics, about health reform – don’t undermine our life science economic engine.