British drug manufacturer pleads guilty to misdemeanor charges

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
7/3/2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

GlaxoSmithKline Plc accused of breaking U.S. laws in marketing drugs

British drug maker GlaxoSmithKline Plc has agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanor criminal charges. The drug maker has agreed to pay $3 billion to settle what is being called the largest case of healthcare fraud in U.S. history.

The drug maker pushed the drug Wellbutrin for uses it was not approved for, such as weight loss and treatment of sexual dysfunction.

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LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Pending court approval, the agreement would resolve allegations that GlaxoSmithKline broke U.S. laws in marketing two popular drugs for unapproved uses and failing to disclose important safety information on a third.

The substantial cash penalty and civil fine will be the largest penalty ever paid by a drug company Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole said.

"Let me be clear, we will not tolerate health care fraud," Cole said at the Justice Department. Cole declined to say whether any company executives were under investigation.

Guilty pleas in cases of alleged corporate misconduct are exceedingly rare. The company's guilty plea and sentence will now need to be approved by a federal court in Massachusetts.

"For far too long, we have heard that the pharmaceutical industry views these settlements merely as the cost of doing business," Stuart F. Delery, head of Justice's civil division, said at the news conference.

"That is why this administration is committed to using every available tool to defeat health care fraud."

Among other charges, GSK targeted the antidepressant Paxil to patients under age 18 when it was approved for adults only.

The drug maker also pushed the drug Wellbutrin for uses it was not approved for, such as weight loss and treatment of sexual dysfunction.

As part of the campaign, the company distributed a misleading medical journal article, providing doctors with expensive resort vacations, European hunting trips, high-paid speaking tours and even tickets to a Madonna concert.

In addition, GSK failed to give the U.S. Food and Drug Administration safety data about its diabetes drug Avandia, in violation of U.S. law, prosecutors said.

Officials say the misconduct continued for years beginning in the late 1990s and continued, in the case of Avandia's safety data, through 2007.

The charges are "unprecedented in both size and scope," Cole says, the number two official at the U.S. Justice Department.

The settlement includes one billion dollars in criminal fines and two billion dollars civil fines.

Among the largest settlements made by leading drug makers was Pfizer Inc. paying $2.3 billion to settle allegations it improperly marketed 13 drugs in 2009, and when Eli Lilly and Co. said it would pay $1.42 billion to settle probes into selling the Zyprexa schizophrenia drug for unapproved uses the same year.

� 2012, Catholic Online. Distributed by NEWS CONSORTIUM.

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Keywords: GlaxoSmithKline, Avandia, fines, Wellbutrin

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1 - 2 of 2 Comments

Zookeeper
10 months ago
Do you actually think that this is hurting them? Don't make me laugh...Do you know how much GSK has made just by selling a drug that says that it can fix sexual dysfunction? The tryth of the matter is that the only reason thatthey got caught is because they didn't pay the FDA what they wanted to release the drug on their approval. The whole system is corrypt and they know it.
Dr David Hill - World Innovation Foundation
10 months ago
Glaxo and drug companies in general are another face of what is wrong with modern society. Like the bankers they put greed and profit above human suffering. Both these days have no empathy with society. Indeed most big corporations place the bottom-line above long-term sustainability of the human experience for short-term gain. When natural resources get to a state where there is not enough to go around, possibly only then will they see the madness in their quest for greater wealth year in, year out. For this mentality will be the eventual death of us and most probably with the greed dictate, during this present century at the unprecedented rate that the world is consuming its finite resources. The only thing that is going up is global debt and where global society is heading for a head on collision with up to 10 billion humans by mid-century (only 38 years away now) and where there will not be enough to go around. Are we really that mad to let these global institutions and the powerful few destroy our very existence it has got to be asked? Bad things I am afraid are around the corner but industrialists, politicians and bankers do not give a damn for human civilization. If they did they would see the sheer madness that they sow in the land of gathering unplenty. For those who are interested an interesting web-link concerning our huge pharmaceutical companies is – http://foolscrow.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/return-to-nuremberg-big-pharma-must-answer-for-crimes-against-humanity/

And another where they killed off the only strategy to stop bird flu through Nature magazine doing their dirty work is - http://avian-influenza.cirad.fr/content/download/1931/11789/file/Kennedy-F-Shortridge.pdf

The drugs involved in the GlaxoSmithKline fraud scandal according to an authoritive source sold around $28 billion. As these colossuses according to much published research have a profit mark-up of at least 50%. Glaxo made at least $14 billion on their transactions. You take £3 billion away and you are still left with a $11 billion profit, putting the fine into the perspective of near irrelevance. Indeed, this $3 billion payment will soon be recouped from customers (you and me) and the drug companies will continue in their merry way. When does morality, integrity and the interest for others come into the equation is the big question?

Dr David Hill
Chief Executive
World Innovation Foundation

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