Dew,
My though was too single channeled when I mentioned about the weak dollar. My thought train was in regards to their Solvay and Piramal purchases which is the avenue Abbott is using into the emerging markets.
I also think that Abbott is able to exploit the usage of GAAP by the way it structured the above purchases. In both transactions, Abbott will have to pay hundreds of millions of euro's for the next couple of years to these two companies, which of course will keep the non-gaap entries continuing.
With Niaspan and Triclor sales starting to diminish, all the pressure be put on Humira's future. In many ways Abbott looks similar to what BMS looked like in the early 2000's.
Lastly, America's finances are so bad they will have to look at extracting something back from the health care industry, and I'll guess big pharma will be the first place they look.