Kathleen Sharp - Patients May Die When Doctors Moonlight as Big Pharma's "Key Opinion Leaders"

As the crimson sun slipped into the gray Pacific Ocean, a multibillion-dollar drug deal took shape. A group of board-certified doctors greeted each other in a private room at a luxury hotel in California. The oncologists were big buyers of an anti-anemia drug called Procrit, sold by Ortho Biotech [5], a Johnson & Johnson (J&J)  division. That Friday evening, the company toasted its top clients and their wives with bottles of Beaujolais, porterhouse steaks and free weekend accommodations.

The event could have been just another "grin and grip" affair, but there was a catch: J&J wanted to pump the sales of its biotech drug to beat its rival Amgen and its anti-anemia drugs. "The idea," as J&J drug rep Dean McClellan later explained, "was to get the docs to increase their Procrit dosage to 40,000 units [6]."

There was just one problem. Regulators had approved a weekly drug dose of 30,000 units, and J&J was prohibited by the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDAC) from marketing its drugs in unapproved ways [7]. But the doctors could prescribe in any "off-label" manner they wanted. So, McClellan, a star rep and medical consigliere, led a "discussion" about high-dose experiments. Taking his cue, one physician explained how he routinely injected patients with 40,000 units of Procrit. Another oncologist pumped his people with 10,000 units for ten consecutive days - triple the approved amount. "That seems a little extreme," said McClellan, frowning.

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http://www.truth-out.org/patients-may-die-when-doctors-moonlight-big-pharmas-key-opinion-leaders/1327091467

Gary Null, Ph.D., and Nancy Ashley, VMD - GARDASIL: CHILD ABUSE BY BIG PHARMA

By Gary Null, PhD and Nancy Ashley, VMD

January 9, 2012

In 1987, I was asked to debate a group of 6 scientists about the very promising AIDS drug, AZT.  Signs around NYU Medical School exhorted everyone to “Put Time on Your Side”, and the vast majority of activists, including ACT UP, were pushing the government to allocate all available funds to get this drug into as many people as possible who had been diagnosed with AIDS.  I was the only one who was dissenting and there was a simple reason:  I had spoken with John Lauritsen.

Lauritsen, an investigative journalist who wrote for the New York Native in the 1980s and 1990s, knew that AZT was a fraud.  Originally a chemotherapy drug that was rejected due to excessive toxicity, AZT was resurrected for use as an AIDS treatment and fast tracked by the FDA for approval in just six months.  Lauritsen looked closely at the one single study used as a basis for this approval, and found:  “the description of methodology was incomplete and incoherent.  Not a single table was acceptable according to statistical standards – indeed, not a single table made sense.  In particular, the first report, on “efficacy” was marred by contradictions, ill-logic, and special pleading.”  Lauritsen discovered that this poor-quality study was unblinded early, allowing both doctors and patients to know whether AZT or the placebo was being taken, thus completely invalidating the study.  Then the study itself was terminated early, ostensibly so that all participants would be able to take AZT, which appeared so effective at preventing death from AIDS.  The real-life follow up, however, at no time repeated the stunning results of this mangled study.  Instead, according to Lauritsen, “More than 96% of all “AIDS” deaths in the U.S. occurred after AZT was approved for marketing in 1987. Those deaths were not caused by a virus, but by AZT. “

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Ed Silverman - Pharma Fraud Continues To Fill The US Treasury

PHARMALOT

By Ed Silverman // December 19th, 2011 

http://www.pharmalot.com/2011/12/pharma-fraud-continues-to-fill-the-us-treasury/

Boasting about recovering lots of money from prosecuting health care fraud has become an annual pasttime at the US Department of Justice. In general, fraud is a hot topic. Why? For the second consecutive fiscal year, the feds recovered more than $3 billion under the False Claims Act, and the total since January 2009 was $8.7 billion.

Of the $3 billion recovered this past fiscal year, which ended September 30, $2.4 billion in recoveries involving fraud committed against federal health care programs, nearly matching the $2.5 billion recovered in the previous fiscal year (see here). And of the $3 billion, whistleblower cases filed under the False Claims Act accounted for $2.8 billion.

As for drugmakers, the feds say that enforcement actions involving the pharmaceutical industry were, once again, the source of the largest recoveries this year. In all, the Justice Department recovered nearly $2.2 billion in civil claims against drugmakers last fiscal year, including $1.76 billion in federal recoveries and $421 million in state Medicaid recoveries (here is the Justice Department statement).

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Martha Rosenberg - In Shocking "Pharmalateralism," FDA Strips Critic of Voting Rights

http://www.opednews.com/articles/In-Shocking-Pharmalateral-by-Martha-Rosenberg-111213-278.html

December 13, 2011 By Martha Rosenberg It's said that it takes 22 FDA safety officers to change a light bulb: 12 to defend the decision to install it, 8 to call it another "lighting option," 6 to quote Big Pharma studies and one to say it doesn't need changing, it just needs a better label. This week's hearings into birth control pills Yaz, Yasmin, Beyaz and Safyral confirm the FDA's dedication to pharmalateralism. It's said that it takes 22 FDA safety officers to change a light bulb: 12 to defend the decision to install it, 8 to call it another "lighting option," 6 to quote Big Pharma studies and one to say it doesn't need changing, it just needs a better label. This week's hearings into birth control pills Yaz, Yasmin, Beyaz and Safyral confirm the FDA's dedication to pharmalateralism. Bayer launched Yaz in 2006 as a pill that goes "beyond birth control" to treat acne and severe PMS, all the while avoiding the water retention of traditional birth control pills. But soon, previously healthy teenagers experienced "beyond birth control" effects they hadn't expected. Fifteen-year-old Katie Ketner had her gallbladder removed after taking Yaz, Susan Gallenos had a stroke and part of her skull removed and Michelle Pfleger, 18, collapsed and died of a pulmonary thromboemboli, according to published reports.

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[Video] Suzanne Humphries on Vaccines

Dr Suzanne Humphries, a practicing nephrologist (kidney physician) says the vaccine industry isn't giving people both sides of the story, and parents need to get informed before subjecting their children to vaccines that can potentially cause serious harm or even death.

Medicine For Sale: Tracing the Shadowy Money Trail that Exploits your Health (Part 1)

By Gary Null, PhD and Jeremy Stillman

Each day, millions of Americans visit a physician. Whether they go to the office of a primary care physician, consult with a specialist or seek medical assistance at an outpatient clinic or hospital emergency room, in all cases, there is an underlying assumption that the quality of care they are given must be the best in the world because we spend nearly twice as much as any other country in the world on individual healthcare.   Also, we are led to believe by our physicians and nurses, the media and the many federal agencies that oversee the medical-industrial complex, including the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Cancer Institute (NCI) that everything offered to patients is based upon scientifically proven therapies for safety and efficacy or science-based medicine.  

At the same time, we are told that any approaches to health involving non-science-based medicine is to be rejected; these include homeopathy, ayurvedic medicine, acupuncture, acupressure, massage, aromatherapy, magnet therapy, chiropractic medicine and supplementation with vitamins.  We are told that such modalities have no foundation in science and that they have an almost cult-like following.  Our health authorities make it clear that patients pursuing these alternative therapies have never made any improvements, in any circumstances, simply because they aren’t dealing with science-based medicine.  The medical establishment tells us that anyone who sees improvement in their health using a non-science-based therapy was either misdiagnosed in the first place or improved only because they were treated by some form of science-based medicine that they must have received before.  Hence, all practitioners of alternative medicine must be at best delusional, and at worse, out-and-out frauds and quacks who should be disgraced and imprisoned.  

This has been the existing medical paradigm for nearly a century.  Confronted with this situation, we ask a few basic questions: Is science-based medicine safe and effective?  If so, where is the proof? And if it is not safe and effective, where is the proof?  We also ask are alternative therapies are safe and effective? If they are, where is the proof? If they are not, where is the proof?  These are reasonable questions to ask.

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Ethan A. Huff - GlaxoSmithKline pays US government record $3 billion for illegally marketing drugs (but CEO and executives not held criminally responsible)

Ethan A. Huff, NaturalNews.com  December 6, 2011 

http://www.naturalnews.com/034329_GSK_illegal_marketing_drugs.html

(NaturalNews) The pharmaceutical industry is notorious for getting away with murder, both figuratively and literally, without so much as a slap on the wrist from the justice system. And a recent settlement involving drug giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) only further exposes the fact that Big Pharma is free to break the law as long as it pays off Big Government, its partner in crime.

The latest dog and pony show involves the US government addressing GSK's illegal activity over the years in peddling its deadly chemical cocktails. After being exposed for illegally marketing drugs, paying off doctors to promote dangerous drugs, and manipulating scientific data to get dangerous drugs approved, GSK has essentially been pardoned by the US government in exchange for $3 billion.

Sure, $3 billion might sound like a lot of money to most people. But GSK raked in roughly $43 billion in revenue just last year. So this settlement is a mere drop in the bucket for GSK, and it really does nothing to satisfy the demands of justice. It does, however, conveniently transfer $3 billion in payoff money to the federal government, which has allowed GSK to get away with its crimes for years.

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Martha Rosenberg - Seven Diseases Big Pharma Hopes You Get in 2012

By Martha Rosenberg, AlterNet

Posted on December 6, 2011, Printed on December 7, 2011
http://www.alternet.org/story/153332/seven_diseases_big_pharma_hopes_you_get_in_2012

It used to be joked that a consultant is someone who borrows your watch to tell you what time it is. These days, the opportunist is Big Pharma, which raises your insurance premiums and taxes while providing you "low-priced" drugs that you paid for.

How did Pharma get a good third of the United States taking antidepressants, statins, and Purple Pills, albeit at low prices? By selling the diseases of depression, high cholesterol, and gastroesophageal reflux disease, or GERD. Supply-driven marketing, also known as "Have Drug — Need Disease and Patients," not only turns the nation into pill-popping hypochondriacs, it distracts from Pharma's drought of real drugs for real medical problems. 

Of course, not all diseases are Wall Street pleasers. To be a true blockbuster disease, a condition must (1) really exist but have huge diagnostic "wiggle room" and no clear-cut test, (2) be potentially serious with "silent symptoms" said to "only get worse" if untreated, (3) be "underrecognized," "underreported" with "barriers" to treatment, (4) explain hitherto vague health problems a patient has had, (5) have a catchy name — ED, ADHD, RLS, Low T or IBS — and instant medical identity, and (6) need an expensive new drug that has no generic equivalent.

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Alliance for Natural Health - Merck—Too Big to Prosecute?

Alliance for Natural Health On December 6, 2011

http://www.anh-usa.org/merck-too-big-to-prosecute/

There is a surprising reason why the government won’t go after drug companies for serious crimes.

It is because government programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and the Veterans Administration would then be barred from doing business with them!

In 1999 the FDA approved Vioxx, a drug created by Merck and Co. to treat arthritis. Vioxx was pulled off the market in 2004 because evidence showed it greatly increased the risk of heart attack in the 25 million Americans who had taken the drug. Some 50,000 patients sued [1], and 27,000 of the plaintiffs received $4.85 billion in settlement of their claims.

Last week the Department of Justice announced that Merck has agreed to pay a $321 million criminal fine [2] and plead guilty to one misdemeanor count of illegally introducing a drug into interstate commerce. Merck also is paying $426 million to the federal government and $202 million to state Medicaid agencies. Those payments will settle civil claims that its marketing caused doctors to prescribe and bill the government for Vioxx they otherwise would not have prescribed.

Please note that these settlements are for rather minor infractions—not for deliberately concealing the danger of a killing drug from patients, the medical community, and their investors. Despite the serious consequences of Merck’s actions, the government won’t prosecute them for any serious charges—because, if they did and won, it would mean they would have to stop doing business with Merck in the future! Federal law makes it illegal for Medicare and Medicaid to do business [3] with “an excluded or debarred entity resulting from serious criminal charges.”

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