Indiana drugmaker Eli Lilly announced today that it plans to lay off “a significant number” of their U.S. sales force before the end of summer, making it one of their largest downsizing efforts in years.

According to reports, the drug manufacture will terminate just under 1,000 full-time employees as well as many of the company’s contract workers by late July. In Indiana, these cuts will affect nearly 100 employees, all of which were informed of their pending demise on Wednesday.

However, there is some speculation that the number of lay offs could reach in upwards of 1,200, but representatives of Eli Lilly refuse to comment on the specifics of the cutback.

Most of the workers being impacted by this lay off are those that represent the U.S. bio-medicines division, selling drugs like the controversial antidepressant Cymbalta and a number of other cardiovascular and male driven medications. Interestingly, many of these products are scheduled to lose their patent protection in the near future, which definitely means big losses for the company.

Eli Lilly’s announcement of this lay off represents the biggest cutback to their workforce since 2009, when nearly 5,500 jobs were eliminated worldwide.

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