Pfizer fined for bribing foreign doctors and health care professionals

The US Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Pfizer with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act after finding various subsidiaries bribed doctors and other health care professionals employed by foreign governments in order to win business.
Read article at pharmalot.com

Do you really think that GSK, the drug company, is interested in helping people to be healthy?

Do you really think that drug companies are interested in helping you to be healthy? - Surely not? - Are you not aware that they repeatedly appear in both the civil and the criminal courts as defendants in cases of fraud, bribery, corruption and the like? - That their only real interest is in profits and their only motivation is greed? - Check it out:

 

See last Monday's article on the BBC News Website, in which we read that "GlaxoSmithKline is to pay $3bn (£1.9bn) in the largest healthcare fraud settlement in US history. The drug giant is to plead guilty to promoting two drugs for unapproved uses and failing to report safety data about a diabetes drug to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
The settlement will cover criminal fines as well as civil settlements with the federal and state governments.
The case concerns 10 drugs, including Paxil, Wellbutrin, Avandia and Advair."

Did you know that the many well-honed skills of GSK include bribing doctors to prescribe antidepressant drugs off-label for children, knowing that these drugs can and do result in grave harm to children, including death? And did you know that Andrew Witty, CEO of GlaxoSmithKline, was knighted in the 2012 New Year Honours List? - Beggars belief, doesn't it? - It's not as if the fraudulent practices of this firm have only come to light recently. They have been reported and in the public domain for years. Why was the head of this huge criminal business recommended for a knighthood?

I've mentioned Andrew Witty previously in one of my blogposts. - See HERE. Would you feel safe taking drugs made and marketed by this company? -  Well I wouldn't.

Bribery of doctors and other NHS healthcare staff by pharmaceutical companies may be reduced by the Serious Fraud Office

An Independent on Sunday investigation has revealed that the bribery of doctors and other NHS healthcare staff with lavish hospitality and freebies by pharmaceutical companies may be reduced by the Serious Fraud Office.

"Big drug firms have spent millions of pounds on bankrolling events and trips for NHS staff, an Independent on Sunday investigation of trust records has revealed. The catalogue of freebies includes Pfizer providing hospitality to dozens of doctors attending a meeting at the five-star Gleneagles hotel resort in Scotland, and a dinner meeting between three Eli Lilly staff and two nurses at which 22 alcoholic drinks were consumed.

Healthcare staff, who influence how the £12bn annual NHS drugs budget is spent, insist they are not swayed by hospitality. However, it has emerged that big firms such as Sanofi-Aventis, Napp and Cephalon all feature in reports by the industry's watchdog, the Prescription Medicines Code of Practice Authority (PMCPA), into alleged breaches in the rules on hospitality."

I recommend reading the whole of this damning report, including the Comments beneath the report.

ProPublica is investigating how drug company money reaches physicians

ProPublica is investigating how Pharmaceuticals Industry money reaches physicians, and the credentials and calibre of the physicians it uses. See this article.

Extract: "In 2001, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ordered Pennsylvania doctor James I. McMillen to stop “false or misleading” promotions of the painkiller Celebrex, saying he minimized risks and touted it for unapproved uses. Still, three other leading drug makers paid the rheumatologist $224,163 over 18 months to deliver talks to other physicians about their drugs."

There are many interesting Comments beneath the article.

More bribery by Johnson and Johnson, the drug company

"Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), the world’s second-biggest seller of medical products, will pay $70 million after admitting that the company bribed doctors in Europe and paid kickbacks in Iraq to win contracts and sell drugs and artificial joints. Subsidiaries of J&J paid bribes to doctors and hospital administrators in Greece, Poland and Romania, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice said today in filings at U.S. District Court in Washington. The company also made illegal payments to Iraqi officials to win contracts under the U.N. oil-for-food program, the filings said. J&J, based in New Brunswick, New Jersey, used slush funds, sham contracts and off-shore companies in the Isle of Man to carry out the bribery, the SEC said."
Read article at Bloomberg.com

Bribery allegations in China against drug firm, Johnson and Johnson.

Johnson & Johnson involved in bribery case in China
The US drug giant Johnson & Johnson has been exposed in the involvement of an alleged bribery case in China, according to local media reports.
Read article in the Global Times (China)

Swedish Officials Investigating Nobel Prize Board

Swedish Officials Investigating Nobel Prize Board - news published
Friday, December 12, 2008 7:18 PM:

The Nobel Prize Committee is facing criminal investigation of bribery and corruption after allegedly taking huge payments from a pharmaceutical company that directly benefits from the work of this year's Nobel Prize winner in medicine. The astonishing scandal, being reported in the European trade press and conspicuously absent from Sweden's major daily newspapers, surfaced just days before the internationally renowned awards were presented in Stockholm on Wednesday. According to Swedish trade journal Dagens Medicin, two Nobel-affiliated corporations – Nobel Media and Nobel Webb – are accused of taking "many millions" of dollars from Swedish-American pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca.
Read article here.