The Antidote

Werth, author and journalist, offers this sequel to The Billion-Dollar Molecule (1994), on the founding of the pharmaceutical company Vertex. Joshua Boger, founding scientist and president, along with a group of young scientists, set out in a garage to overtake the big drug companies. The author returns to Vertex to learn what it takes to succeed in science and business and sees that 22 years later and at about four times the anticipated cost, Vertex is now set to achieve Boger’s initial goals: “Make better drugs, faster. Create the 21st century biopharmaceutical company. Become Merck, only better.” Werth seeks to discover what Boger’s vision has become and considers if it is a road map toward “a new biological epoch.” We learn that “all progress in the pharmaceutical business is backbreaking, freighted with unknowns, and takes twice as long as you think it will.” Now Vertex has nearly 2,000 employees, and it is about to debut the company’s first drugs discovered and developed internally and commercialized under its own label. --Mary Whaley

巴里·沃思（Barry Werth），美国知名记者以及6本纪实文学的作者。他的第一部作品《十亿美元分子》是里程碑式的作品，记录了福泰制药早期的艰辛创业。他曾为《纽约客》（The New Yorker）、《纽约时报杂志》（The New York Times Magazine）、《GQ》（GQ）、《户外》（Outside）等多种报纸、杂志撰文。他也在史密斯学院、曼荷莲学院以及波士顿大学教授新闻学与纪实文学写作。 钱鹏展，毕业于北京大学药学院，曾在美国学习化学专业，先后从事药物研发、药物行业分析工作。现在英国攻读博士学位，从事经济学研究。发表论文多篇，曾为高阅读量的公众号撰文。译有《十亿美元分子》一书。