Re: So much for drug savings for the elderly....

From: leslie (LESLIE_at_JRLVAX.HOUSTON.RR.COM)
Date: 07/03/04 

Date: Sat, 03 Jul 2004 05:30:16 GMT

14tonks (mail.2.14tonks@recursor.net) wrote:
: The lunches are chicken feed. They don't amount to more than petty cash as
: far as the pharmaceutical industry is concerned. The real graft is in
: "consulting fees" and "research grants" which give kickbacks of $10,000 to
: $100,000 (and up) to doctors and groups who prescribe brand X instead of
: brand Y.
: --
:
: Sheila
: To reply to me, add the prefix real. to my address.
:

Here's an article about "prescription payola"...

   http://makeashorterlink.com/?S1EB229A8
   As Doctors Write Prescriptions, Drug Company Writes a Check

The original link, wrapped to 2 lines:

   http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/27/business/27DRUG.final.html?
   pagewanted=print&position=
   As Doctors Write Prescriptions, Drug Company Writes a Check

  "June 27, 2004

   As Doctors Write Prescriptions, Drug Company Writes a Check
   By GARDINER HARRIS

   The check for $10,000 arrived in the mail unsolicited. The doctor who
   received it from the drug maker Schering-Plough said it was made out
   to him personally in exchange for an attached "consulting" agreement
   that required nothing other than his commitment to prescribe the
   company's medicines. Two other physicians said in separate interviews
   that they, too, received checks unbidden from Schering-Plough, one of
   the world's biggest drug companies.

   "I threw mine away," said the first doctor, who spoke on the condition
   of anonymity because of concern about being drawn into a federal
   inquiry into the matter.

   Those checks and others, some of them said to be for six-figure sums,
   are under investigation by federal prosecutors in Boston as part of a
   broad government crackdown on the drug industry's marketing tactics.
   Just about every big global drug company including Johnson & Johnson,
   Wyeth and Bristol-Myers Squibb has disclosed in securities filings
   that it has received a federal subpoena, and most are juggling
   subpoenas stemming from several investigations.

   The details of the Schering-Plough tactics, gleaned from interviews
   with 20 doctors, as well as industry executives and people close to
   the investigation, shed light on the shadowy system of financial lures
   that pharmaceutical companies have used to persuade physicians to
   favor their drugs.

   Schering-Plough's tactics, these people said, included paying doctors
   large sums to prescribe its drug for hepatitis C and to take part in
   company-sponsored clinical trials that were little more than thinly
   disguised marketing efforts that required little effort on the
   doctors' part. Doctors who demonstrated disloyalty by testing other
   company's drugs, or even talking favorably about them, risked being
   barred from the Schering-Plough money stream.

   Schering-Plough says that the activities under investigation occurred
   before its new chief executive, Fred Hassan, arrived in April 2003,
   and that it has overhauled its marketing to eliminate inducements.

   At the heart of the various investigations into drug industry
   marketing is the question of whether drug companies are persuading
   doctors often through payoffs to prescribe drugs that patients do not
   need or should not use or for which there may be cheaper alternatives.
   Investigators are also seeking to determine whether the companies are
   manipulating prices to cheat the federal Medicaid and Medicare health
   programs. Most of the big drug companies, meanwhile, are also
   grappling with a welter of suits filed by state attorneys general,
   industry whistle-blowers and patient-rights groups over similar
   accusations.

   In many ways, the investigations are a response to the evolution of
   the pharmaceutical business, which has grown in the last
   quarter-century from a small group of companies peddling a few
   antibiotics and antianxiety remedies to a $400 billion bemoth that is
   among the most profitable industries on earth.

   [snip]

   Last month, Pfizer agreed to pay $430 million and pleaded guilty to
   criminal charges involving the marketing of the pain drug Nuerontin by
   the company's Warner-Lambert unit. AstraZeneca paid $355 million last
   year and TAP Pharmaceuticals paid $875 million in 2001; each pleaded
   guilty to criminal charges of fraud for inducing physicians to bill
   the government for some drugs that the company gave the doctors free.

   Over the last two years, Schering-Plough, which had sales of $8.33
   billion last year, has set aside a total of $500 million to cover its
   legal problems - mainly for expected fines from the Boston
   investigation and from a separate inquiry by federal prosecutors in
   Philadelphia who are investigating whether Schering-Plough overcharged
   Medicaid.

   Besides looking into whether Schering-Plough paid doctors large sums
   to prescribe the company's drug for hepatitis C, prosecutors are
   investigating whether many company-sponsored clinical trials for the
   drug were simply another way to funnel money to doctors..."

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