Something unfortunate happened to the pharmaceutical industry in the 1990s. The breakthroughs in theoretical science and in the capacity to juggle chemicals failed to translate into new blockbuster treatments. Eventually, that led drugs companies to put less money and effort into research and development and more into their marketing and legal departments.

Among politicians and the electorate, the suspicion has grown that pharmaceutical companies are more about schmoozing influential doctors and regulators and making cunning legal arguments in the patent courts than toiling blamelessly over a test tube.

That has led to harsher treatment in Washington and now in Brussels, which yesterday conducted dawn raids on some of Europe’s biggest companies, including AstraZeneca and GlaxoSmithKline in Britain.

Neelie Kroes, the EU’s Competition Commissioner, is looking for evidence that companies may have acted illegally to stymie the development of cheap generic alternatives, although there was no suggestion of wrongdoing by the companies raided.

Pharmaceutical companies are absolutely right to defend their patents rigorously, although they have at times gone too far in finding ploys to delay patent expiry.

Robust protection of intellectual property rights is the cornerstone of the industry. Brussels needs to be careful that it is not playing into the hands of copycat drugs firms with none of the research and development overheads of the larger companies.

If the end result is more people in the laboratory, Ms Kroes will have achieved a good result. But the investigation will be counterproductive if it merely encourages the hiring of yet more lawyers.

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