PHARMA CROOKS ???
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There are so many things wrong with that article. From the FDA being stupid to regulations not being enforced to Lilly being unethical etc! The only thing different from Lilly and the rest of the pharma companies is that their dirty laundry got published.
Just read on a stock message board where Fizzer screwed over Unigene on a deal and Unigene took that as lesson to be more aware for their next deal (rumoured to be with Novartis). Now, who would ever think that Fizzer would screw over someone???
Pharma should hold itself to a higher standard than other businesses. Sadly, it is worse. This has to be the most unethical, corrupt, disgusting industry on the planet. There is not enough regulation in the world that could force liars and cheaters to tell the truth. We are completely over-regulated and it makes absolutely no difference. Six or seven billion in fines is probably not enough. I have to wonder - where do all these big fines go? Not to the millions of people ripped off or dead, so where? I will tell you: to line the pockets of the people sent to protect us.
Wish I had been listening better but Fizzer was mentioned in some news story about corruption a couple of nights ago.
Speaking of corruption, how about Obummer in bed with big pharma after blasting them in the election? Would you say he is just another lying politician???
Internal Memo Confirms Big Giveaways In White House Deal With Big Pharma
First Posted: 08-13-09 11:10 AM | Updated: 08-13-09 05:49 PM
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/13/internal-memo-confirms-bi_n_258285.html
A memo obtained by the Huffington Post confirms that the White House and the pharmaceutical lobby secretly agreed to precisely the sort of wide-ranging deal that both parties have been denying over the past week.
The memo, which according to a knowledgeable health care lobbyist was prepared by a person directly involved in the negotiations, lists exactly what the White House gave up, and what it got in return.
It says the White House agreed to oppose any congressional efforts to use the government's leverage to bargain for lower drug prices or import drugs from Canada -- and also agreed not to pursue Medicare rebates or shift some drugs from Medicare Part B to Medicare Part D, which would cost Big Pharma billions in reduced reimbursements.
In exchange, the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers Association (PhRMA) agreed to cut $80 billion in projected costs to taxpayers and senior citizens over ten years. Or, as the memo says: "Commitment of up to $80 billion, but not more than $80 billion."
Representatives from both the White House and PhRMA, shown the outline, adamantly denied that it reflected reality. PhRMA senior vice president Ken Johnson said that the outline "is simply not accurate." "This memo isn't accurate and does not reflect the agreement with the drug companies," said White House spokesman Reid Cherlin.
Stories in the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times last week indicated that the administration was confirming that such a deal had been made.
Critics on Capitol Hill and online responded with outrage at the reports that Obama had gone behind their backs and sold the reform movement short. Furthermore, the deal seemed to be a betrayal of several promises made by then-Sen. Obama during the presidential campaign, among them that he would use the power of government to drive down the costs of drugs to Medicare and that negotiations would be conducted in the open.
Story continues below
And over the past several days, both the White House and PhRMA have offered a series of sometimes conflicting accounts of what happened in an attempt to walk back the story.
The White House meeting took place on July 7th, as first reported that evening in the Wall Street Journal. Also on the same day, a health care lobbyist following the talks was provided the outline of the deal by a person inside the negotiations. That outline had been floating around K Street before being obtained by the Huffington Post. In order to learn more about its origin, HuffPost agreed not to reveal the name of the lobbyist who originally received it.
"That is the PhRMA deal," said the lobbyist of the outline. He then clarified, "It was the PhRMA deal."
The deal, as outlined in the memo:
Commitment of up to $80 billion, but not more than $80 billion.
1. Agree to increase of Medicaid rebate from 15.1 - 23.1% ($34 billion)
2. Agree to get FOBs done (but no agreement on details -- express disagreement on data exclusivity which both sides say does not affect the score of the legislation.) ($9 billion)
3. Sell drugs to patients in the donut hole at 50% discount ($25 billion)
This totals $68 billion
4. Companies will be assessed a tax or fee that will score at $12 billion. There was no agreement as to how or on what this tax/fee will be based.
Total: $80 billion
In exchange for these items, the White House agreed to:
1. Oppose importation
2. Oppose rebates in Medicare Part D
3. Oppose repeal of non-interference
4. Oppose opening Medicare Part B
"Non-interference" is the industry term for the status quo, in which government-driven price negotiations are barred. In other words, the government is "interfering" in the market if it negotiates lower prices. The ban on negotiating was led through Congress in 2003 by then-Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-La.), who is now the head of PhRMA.
The rebates reference is to Medicare overpayments Big Pharma managed to wrangle from the Republican Congress that Democrats are trying to recoup. The House bill would require Big Pharma to return some of that money. The rebate proposal would save $63 billion over ten years, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The White House, given the chance, declined to tell the Wall Street Journal for a July 17th article that it supported the effort to pursue the rebates.
The Medicare Part B item refers to "infusion drugs," which can be administered at home. If they fall under Part B, Big Pharma gets paid more than under Part D. The agreement would leave infusion drugs in Part B.
In the section on Big Pharma's concessions, "FOBs" refers to follow-on biological drugs. Democrats have pushed to make it easier to allow generic drug makers to produce cheaper versions of such drugs, an effort Big Pharma has resisted. The Senate health committee bill gives drug makers 12 years of market exclusivity, five more than the White House proposed.
PhRMA's Johnson cast doubts on the provenance of the outline. "The memo, as described, is simply not accurate," he said in a statement. "Anyone could have written it. Unless it comes from our board of directors, it's not worth the paper it's written on. Clearly, someone is trying to short circuit our efforts to try and make health care reform a reality this year. That's not going to happen. Too much is at stake for both patients and the U.S. economy. Our new ads supporting health care reform are starting this week, and we are redoubling our efforts to drive awareness of why this issue is so important to America's future."
Johnson added that "no outside lobbyists -- not a single one -- were ever involved in our discussions with the Senate Finance Committee or the White House so someone is blowing smoke."
But the lobbyist who was given the outline defended its authenticity. And although the White House now says that drug price negotiations and reimportation were not actually discussed in the talks with PhRMA, the lobbyist said: "Well, that's bull -- that's baloney. That was part of the deal, for them not to push that."
The new uncertainty surrounding the deal comes after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has repeatedly said that her chamber is not bound by any agreement it is not a party to. On July 8th, the day after the Journal reported some elements of the deal, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said in a public speech that his committee would not be tied down by the agreement.
Before recess, he followed through. His committee passed a bill that allowed for re-importation and drug-price negotiations.
In the Senate, Democrats Sherrod Brown (Ohio) and Byron Dorgan (N.D.) pressed White House officials at a closed-door meeting last week, asking whether the White House had tied the Senate's hands.
The health care lobbyist said that what deal still exists is uncertain, as a result of House pressure. "Now the White House is backing away from it, as you know, because of pressure from the House, because the House was not a party to the deal," he said. "The Speaker put enormous pressure on the White House, [saying], 'We weren't a party to it and we reserve the right to do whatever we want.' And which they did in the House Energy and Commerce Committee bill, which led the White House to say, 'Well, maybe it's not cast in concrete.'"
Obama is walking a tightrope here. He wants to keep PhRMA from opposing the bill, and benefits by having its support, which now includes a $150 million advertising campaign. That's a fortune in politics -- more than Republican presidential candidate John McCain spent on advertising during his entire campaign -- but it's loose change in the pharmaceutical business.
Opponents of the deal with PhRMA hope that Obama is playing a multilayered game, making a deal in order to keep the drug makers in his camp for now, but planning to double-cross them in the end if he needs to in order to pass his signature initiative.
Big Pharma, however, is still comfortable. "As far as the pharmaceutical industry, PhRMA and its member companies, yes, they say a deal is a deal. We'll see what happens," said the health care lobbyist.
Drug Rep in $3B Procrit Case: "80% of My Sales Were Medicare Fraud"; Carried $400K in "Cash"
By Jim Edwards | Aug 17, 2009
ShareEmailDiggFacebookTwitterGoogleDeliciousStumbleUponNewsvineLinkedInMy YahooTechnoratiRedditPrintRecommend1The whistleblower pharmaceutical sales reps in the Procrit case reinstated in a Massachussetts federal court claim that their careers at Johnson & Johnson’s Ortho Biotech unit were based mostly on lies. Mark Duxbury and Dean McClennan, both former sales reps at J&J, claim that the bulk of their business selling Procrit to hospitals and clinics was conducting Medicare fraud.
Duxbury claims he sold $13 million of Procrit between 1992 through 1998, and that approximately 80 percent of those sales were “false or fraudulent claims for Medicare reimbursement.”
McClennan sold more than $65 million of Procrit, and about 50 percent of his sales were fraudulent Medicare claims, he alleges.
The case — which J&J denies — was revived by a Massachussetts federal appeals court last week. It contains the usual complaints: marketing the spread between the price reimbursed by Medicare and the lower price the company sold it at, and off-label marketing.
But it also names names. Dozens of them: Doctors, hospitals, and clinics. In each case it describes how the doctor or institution took advantage of J&J’s schemes to lower the price it sold Procrit to doctors at, while asking the government to reimburse at the higher “average wholesale price.”
The whistleblowers’ lawyer says Medicare was defrauded of $3 billion.
Broadly, the complaint states (download here), J&J is accused of:
… giving providers unreported unlawful front end and back end payments in the form of “off-invoice” discounts, rebates, account credits, and other cash or cash equivalent payments such as phony “grants”, “advisory board honoraria”, and “donations” directly tied to the providers’ purchase of Procrit.
J&J did this by making presentations to hospitals demonstrating the savings they could make by overbilling Medicare, the suit claims. Here’s one example:
Seattle District Manager Robert Nelson instructed Relator Duxbury to analyze profits gained by the spread at St. Peter’s [in Olympia, Wash.,] and St. Joseph’s [in Tacoma, Wash.,] hospitals and present them in writing as a “financial analysis” of the benefits of purchasing Procrit.
J&J had a software program, called MVP, designed to generate rebates and discounts that would make Procrit sales profitable for such institutions.
The pair also carried $400,000 in Procrit discount cards that they could hand out to customers. The cards were referred to within the company as “cash” because, to doctors, that’s exactly what they were worth:
There were thousands of “Patient Trial Cards” provided to sales representatives, each of which was worth well over one thousand dollars ($1,000) in free Procrit. For example, Relator McClellan had over 400 Patient Trial Cards in his possession at one time. Medicare was billed for free Procrit and the free Procrit was not accounted or in calculating AWPs.
And, of course, there were the bogus grants:
One example of this type of “kickback” given to Providers to purchase Procrit is Relator Duxbury possesses documentation of a ten thousand dollar ($10,000) and twenty thousand dollar ($20,000) unrestricted grants that Defendant gave St. Joseph’s Hospital in Tacoma, Washington in 1992 and 1993 conditioned upon the purchase of Procrit.
J&J argues (download here) the case should be dismissed because the allegations were previously disclosed and the pair are merely jumping on the bandwagon.
the pharma crooks are just as bad as the banking crooks- greedy - all in it for the bottom line to fatten the paychecks of the upper mgt elite, nothing else-- they could care less about patients or employees.
Who wudda ever thought that shining light in pharma, Fizzer, would be placed in the CROOK category???
Pfizer to pay record $2.3B penalty for drug promos
Repeat offender Pfizer paying record $2.3B settlement for illegal drug promotions
By Devlin Barrett, Associated Press Writer
On Wednesday September 2, 2009, 6:43 pm EDT
Buzz up! 190 Print
Companies
fizer Inc.Wyeth WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal prosecutors hit Pfizer Inc. with a record-breaking $2.3 billion in fines Wednesday and called the world's largest drugmaker a repeating corporate cheat for illegal drug promotions that plied doctors with free golf, massages, and resort junkets.
Who wudda ever thought that shining light in pharma, Fizzer, would be placed in the CROOK category???
Pfizer to pay record $2.3B penalty for drug promos
Repeat offender Pfizer paying record $2.3B settlement for illegal drug promotions
By Devlin Barrett, Associated Press Writer
On Wednesday September 2, 2009, 6:43 pm EDT
Buzz up! 190 Print
Companies
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal prosecutors hit Pfizer Inc. with a record-breaking $2.3 billion in fines Wednesday and called the world's largest drugmaker a repeating corporate cheat for illegal drug promotions that plied doctors with free golf, massages, and resort junkets.
Whistleblower gets windfall from Pfizer
John Kopchinski, who exposed problems with Pfizer's painkiller Bextra, will get $51.5 million from the settlement -- after losing his job.
Posted by Charley Blaine on Thursday, September 3, 2009 1:30 PM
Taking on corporate giants can feel like tilting at windmills, but John Kopchinski's six-year legal battle against Pfizer (PFE) just made him a rich man.
The Gulf War veteran and former Pfizer sales representative will earn more than $51.5 million as a result of his whistleblower lawsuit against the world's biggest drug maker and the record penalty the company must pay the U.S. government for its massive marketing transgressions.
The unassuming Texas resident celebrated his windfall by having a family portrait photograph taken Wednesday morning.
Check Bing for more on Bextra's problems
"We're going to be staying right here in San Antonio in the same house, and my wife tells me when we go to the movies we're still getting one tub of popcorn -- the large tub," Kopchinski told Reuters in a telephone interview.
Kopchinski, appalled by Pfizer's tactics in selling the pain drug Bextra, filed a "qui tam" lawsuit in 2003.
That set off federal and state probes that led to Wednesday's agreement by the company to pay $2.3 billion in civil and criminal penalties and plead guilty to a felony charge for promoting Bextra and 12 other drugs for unapproved uses and doses.
Pfizer shares were off 1.6% to $16.02 this afternoon after falling 0.6% on Wednesday. The Dow component's shares are off 9.7% this year.
"In the Army I was expected to protect people at all costs," Kopchinski said in a statement. "At Pfizer I was expected to increase profits at all costs, even when sales meant endangering lives. I couldn't do that."
Kopchinski, 45, was fired by Pfizer in March 2003, two years before the company pulled Bextra from the market over concerns it raised the risk of heart attacks and strokes.
At the time of his dismissal after raising his concerns with the company, Kopchinski had a baby son, and his wife was pregnant with twins. He went from earning about $125,000 a year to living off his retirement fund before landing a job with an insurance company for $40,000 a year.
"It was a lot of stress on the family. I pretty much depleted my entire 401k," he told Reuters.
"The last six years have been pretty hard, so going forward it's going to be pretty much easier," said Kopchinski, noting that college for his young children "is taken care of."
Erika Kelton, Kopchinski's lead attorney from the firm of Phillips & Cohen, said large rewards are justified because of what whistleblowers must endure, often for many years, after complaints within the company go unheeded.
"Particularly in pharma, it's no secret that it's an industry that can blackball former employees," Kelton said. "So the reward is important both to encourage people to step forward and to recognize that their contributions are huge."
Kopchinski and five other whistleblowers will earn more than $102 million in payments from the U.S. government under the False Claims Act through which individuals can reap rewards for exposing corporate wrongdoing.
Check out all the dirty shit Pfizer has been doing. Of course most of us knew this all along. The screaming "4 hour erection" ads on family TV also shows how low lifed these bastards are!!!
Who would ever think Fizzer would do something against the law
Pfizer Paid for Doc's Helicopter in Off-Label Geodon Push, Suit Claims
By Jim Edwards | Sep 17, 2009
ShareEmailDiggFacebookTwitterGoogleDeliciousStumbleUponNewsvineLinkedInMy YahooTechnoratiRedditPrintRecommend0Pfizer paid a doctor $4,000 a day to promote the antipsychotic Geodon and expensed his use of a private helicopter to get to off-label speaking events, according a whistleblower lawsuit that was part of the $2.3 billion Bextra settlement.
Pfizer said in a statement:
Pfizer denies all federal, state and qui tam allegations, with two exceptions. We acknowledge certain improper actions related to the past promotion of Bextra and Zyvox. Beyond those two exceptions we deny all federal and state and qui tam claims.
The suit was brought by Mark R. Westlock of Fenton, Mo., was a rep for Pfizer from 1991 to 2007, when he claims he was forced to resign. (Download Westlock v. Pfizer here.) He alleges that Dr. Neil S. Kaye of Wilmington, Del., an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Jefferson Medical College, received $4,000 a day in speaker fees to talk to other doctors about “the off label use of Geodon® in adolescents,” among other issues. He was used so frequently by Pfizer that he was flown by ‘copter to some of his gigs, Westlock claims:
(Click to enlarge.)
The top image is from Kaye’s own website. He details his interest in helicopters here and here and here.
Some of Kaye’s material was sent to Pfizer pharmaceutical sales representatives under the heading “take home selling points.” The material within that package was also labelled “do not detail,” ostensibly because it covered off-label material. But Westlock claims that everyone knew they were to use it in their sales pitches because the email would not have been titled “take home selling points” if they were not in fact selling points.
Speaking of higher standards, Astra evidently did not vet this turkey before hiring him:
http://industry.bnet.com/pharma/100...arassment-reps-share-memories-of-bonkers-ceo/
All lies.
Pharma is the most honest and ethical industry on the planet.
Proof ... the industry has removed those terrible ethical affronts that forces innocent physicians and other health professionals to write new prescriptions for me-too-drugs hand-over-fist.
Remember those ... they were called pens and notepads.
Pharma is the most honest and ethical industry on the planet.
Proof ... the industry has removed those terrible ethical affronts that forces innocent physicians and other health professionals to write new prescriptions for me-too-drugs hand-over-fist.
Remember those ... they were called pens and notepads.
Pfizer Pays Record $1.3 Billion Penalty for Drug Misbranding
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By Cary O’Reilly
Oct. 17 (Bloomberg) -- A unit of Pfizer Inc., the world’s largest drugmaker, was sentenced to pay $1.3 billion in penalties for misbranding medicines, including the largest criminal fine ever imposed in the U.S.
U.S. District Judge Douglas Woodlock in Boston ordered Pfizer’s Pharmacia & Upjohn unit to pay a $1.2 billion criminal fine and forfeit $105 million, Acting U.S. Attorney Michael Loucks said in a statement.
The fine, over sales practices for a painkiller since pulled from the market, is the biggest piece of a record $2.3 billion settlement announced last month between the U.S. Justice Department and New York-based Pfizer. The deal includes $1 billion in civil penalties, the largest non-criminal fraud case against a drugmaker, the Justice Department said.
The criminal case revolved around allegations that the painkiller Bextra and three other medicines were promoted for uses other than those approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The government, which pays for medicines through several health programs, started a criminal probe after private whistleblowers filed lawsuits in three states.
The four-year investigation uncovered a range of practices, including kickback payments to doctors in the sale of nine other drugs, among them the impotence drug Viagra and cholesterol pill Lipitor, officials said.
Pfizer, which had $48.3 billion in revenue last year, reported in January that it took a fourth-quarter charge of $2.3 billion to cover the preliminary agreement. The company has said it would have no additional charges from the case.
“Today’s hearing is the last step in a process to bring final closure to the settlement agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice that was announced on Sept. 2, 2009,” the New York-based company said yesterday in a statement.
Pfizer gained 11 cents to $17.77 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have risen 5.1 percent over the past year.
The lead civil case is Collins v. Pfizer Inc., 04-11780, U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts (Boston).
To contact the reporters responsible for this story: Cary O’Reilly in Washington at caryoreilly@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: October 17, 2009 00:01 EDT
It just keeps getting better! Now there is overtime lawsuits that are being settled also. This industry should be ashamed, it is laughable how they want to hold reps accountable for all of their screw ups.
Merck starts revealing payments to doctor-speakers
Yahoo/APMon, 10/19/2009 - 6:37 pmComment