It's time for the Federal Trade Commission to launch an antitrust investigation into the pharmaceutical industry.

The current EpiPen controversy is blowing the lid off a simmering pot of suspicious activity that isn't good for health, medicine or the country.It started when Mylan Pharmaceuticals bought the rights to EpiPen in 2007.The EpiPen Auto-Injector is a lifesaving device. Those suffering a dangerous allergic reaction can receive a dose of emergency epinephrine at a critical time.This could be you or your parent or child.When Mylan took ownership of exclusive patents to EpiPen, it gained control of a monopoly for an antidote that millions of people would need to survive if they were to develop an extreme allergic reaction.This means you or your loved one might need EpiPen in an emergency. And sadly, Mylan can charge you whatever it desires to allow you to breathe. You're being held hostage. Pay up or die. Mylan apparently is capitalizing on a monopoly.When they took EpiPen ownership, the price for a two-pack was $100. But Mylan soon jolted its customers by raising the price to $600, an increase of 500 percent.Why was this done? Those answers hopefully will be sought by lawmakers who've taken notice of the crisis and resulting public outrage. Some in the Senate already have sent a letter to Mylan asking for details of their pricing strategies. This issue will continue to play out in the coming months.This much we already know: Mylan's CEO Heather Bresch saw her paycheck jump from $2 million in 2007 to almost $19 million today.After all, EpiPens account for 40 percent of the firm's operating profits, according to a report in Bloomberg Business Week. And the 500 percent price increase undoubtedly is helping to fill the company's coffers. Sounds like CEO reward time in the most extreme fashion, at the expense of allergy sufferers.Lawyers might refer to the CEO's $17 million salary increase as quid pro quo, or "something for something."Mylan lobbied Congress to pass incentives to encourage schools to stock EpiPens. Then, to avoid paying taxes, Mylan changed its legal residence to the Netherlands in 2013 even though the firm is located in Pittsburgh. The Netherlands, of course, is an instant tax haven.Right now, an uproar in negative public reaction is causing Mylan's stock values to drop like a bowling ball tossed over Niagara Falls. How all of this turns out is anyone's guess. In the meantime, drug laws and policies in America are a fiasco.We're giving away naloxone to save addicts' lives but letting poor allergy sufferers who can't afford their EpiPen potentially die at the discretion of a money-grabbing pharmaceutical company.There's an even larger problem at play here in terms of the entire process.Existing patent laws grant profit-seeking drug companies a monopoly control over the drugs you and your family need to survive.You're at the mercy of their power game and pricing whims.Drug companies defend this by saying they need to turn profit to pay for research and development, and to bring in cash before generics or competitors undercut the gains. Certainly that stance makes sense. But what's been happening at Mylan looks to be nothing short of greed.It's long been said Big Pharma doesn't create cures, they create customers. In other words, there's no profit in curing an illness or disease when the real money is in the widespread sale of maintenance drugs.Whether that assessment is true or not is up for debate. Whatever the case, we need to put pressure on lawmakers to correct the problem. For once, Congress needs to stand up to the all-powerful pharmaceutical lobby.Under the current scenario, drugs aren't the cure.They're the disease.By Donald R. Serfass |

dserfass@tnonline.com