One of my favorite Spring Break memories is traveling with my family to Cozumel Mexico at age 15. Who would have thought I would still be going on Spring Break well into my late 20s! When you go through a rigorous pharmacy school curriculum, you really appreciate your precious time off. Our Class Officers organized a Class Trip to Puerto Rico. Around 70 third year pharmacy students flew out of a snow covered Baltimore to sunny San Juan.
In addition to soaking up the sun and hiking to waterfalls, we visited Eli Lilly. Puerto Rico is the 5th largest area in the world for pharmaceutical manufacturing (after the US, UK, Japan and France) with over 80 plants! The pharmaceutical companies originally came to Puerto Rico in the late 1960s and '70s to take advantage of a federal tax incentive. The tax incentive, Section 936, is now expired. Puerto Rico produces 16 of the top 20-selling drugs in mainland US. We visited a building a Eli Lilly that solely produced insulin lispro. Each day they make kilograms of insulin crystals that they send all over the world. It was an eye opening experience to see the extensive process that goes into producing one drug.
My class trip made me think back to my last few months of undergrad. I was rushing to finish up my undergraduate research project, when my research advisor told me that the most important thing I needed to do during my last month of school was to say goodbye to all the friends I had made over the years. In just over a month, third year pharmacy students will be off on rotations. I am glad my class had a chance to spend some quality time together to build lasting connections before rotations and graduation.
Sources:
http://www.caribbeanbusinesspr.com/cbdirectory/cb_manufacturing.php?cat_id=11
http://www.pharmaceuticalonline.com/doc/puerto-ricos-pharmaceutical-industry-40-years-0003
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