United States Archives - Page 2 of 7

Big Pharma Execs bribed doctors to prescribe more opioids amid national crisis, Feds say

October 26, 2017

The CEO of drug giant Insys Therapeutics bribed doctors to prescribe more opioids to patients who didn’t even need them, according to federal authorities who arrested the executive after a raid on Thursday—a major offensive in the battle against America’s opioid epidemic.

John Kapoor, the billionaire founder and CEO, led “a nationwide conspiracy to profit by using bribes and fraud to cause the illegal distribution of a fentanyl spray intended for cancer patients experiencing breakthrough pain,” the Department of Justice said in a statement.

Lawsuit: Big Pharma funded terrorism in Iraq with payments to corrupt health ministry

October 19, 2017

In the first years following the defeat of Saddam Hussein, there were few dark corners of battle-scarred Iraq less hospitable to Americans than the country’s ministry of health.

The walls of the ministry, headquartered in a dilapidated high-rise in eastern Baghdad, were covered with hundreds of photos of scowling Shiite clerics. Banners proclaimed “Death to America and Israel” and “we must destroy the occupiers.” Death squads commandeered the ministry’s ambulances for missions to hunt Sunnis. Assault rifles were stacked in offices. The morgues were used for torture. Everywhere flapped the flag of the Jaysh al-Mahdim, also known as the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia controlled by the radical anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

Stop Big Pharma from ‘getting away with murder’

October 16, 2017

Few things are more infuriating to consumers than the constant, surging increases in drug prices. Americans under 65 are projected to pay an additional 11.6% this year, while seniors are expected to see increases of 9.9%. These increases follow similar ones in recent years.

Price hikes like these, which run well above inflation and wage growth year after year, are a keen indication of how the drug industry lacks market fundamentals. Or, as President Trump put it Monday, prescription drug prices “are out of control” and the big pharmaceutical companies “are getting away with murder.”

Here’s how the VA helped Big Pharma get veterans hooked on opioids — then made the problem worse

October 12, 2017

he Veterans Administration overprescribed opiates and psychiatric medication for more than a decade, and then swung back dangerously in the other direction about five years ago.

Oxycontin manufacturer Purdue Pharma played a key role in spreading opiate use among veterans by giving $200,000 to essentially turn the VA into its propaganda arm, according to an investigative report by Newsweek.

Secret corporate documents obtained by the magazine show how the pharmaceutical company helped develop VA-Department of Defense guidelines that claimed opiates rarely cause addiction, and promoted the phony campaign, “Pain: The 5th Vital Sign.”

Now dentists are being blamed for the antibiotic crisis, says new study

October 9, 2017

DENTISTS prescribing unnecessary antibiotics could be spreading an antibiotic-resistant superbug infection, researchers have claimed.

Taking antibiotics can put patients at risk for developing C. diff and illustrates the importance of using the medications only when needed. The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) tracked community-associated C. diff infections — meaning those in patients who did not have an overnight stay in a hospital or nursing home — in five counties in the state. During the six-year period, researchers determined 15 percent of those with the infection who had taken antibiotics had them prescribed for dental procedures.

Pfizer loses battle to keep Medicaid rebate data hidden from Texas lawmakers

October 5, 2017

Pfizer (PFE) lost a round in the larger fight over pharmaceutical pricing when a federal judge ruled that Texas lawmakers should be able to obtain state Medicaid rebate data about its medicines.

The drug maker last year filed a lawsuit against the Texas Health and Human Services Commission for releasing the data to a pair of state lawmakers, who sought the information in order to assess drug costs for the state Medicaid program. But Pfizer argued that releasing the data would violate federal and state laws that protect its confidential information.

Revival of Gilead Whistleblower’s Lawsuit Should Stoke Fear In Big Pharma

September 26, 2017

The pharmaceutical industry often operates like the rules don’t apply to it. Over the years, prescription drug manufacturers have been slapped with billions in fines after they are caught overstepping regulatory limits meant to protect patients and taxpayers. The most significant cases were initiated by whistleblowers, and thanks to them, greater transparency has been forced on the industry.

In the most recent blow, a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision has revived a whistleblower lawsuit against Gilead Sciences. The ruling has put Big Pharma on edge. A federal district court had dismissed the case in 2015, saying the complaint had failed to state a claim that violated the False Clams Act.

Report: Drug company faked cancer patients to sell drug

September 6, 2017

Washington (CNN)When Insys Therapeutics got approval to sell an ultra-powerful opioid for cancer patients with acute pain in 2012, it soon discovered a problem: finding enough cancer patients to use the drug.

To boost sales, the company allegedly took patients who didn’t have cancer and made it look like they did.

The drug maker used a combination of tactics, such as falsifying medical records, misleading insurance companies and providing kickbacks to doctors in league with the company, according to a federal indictment and ongoing congressional investigation by Sen. Claire McCaskill, a Democrat from Missouri.

Trump ends ‘Dreamers’ program, leaving fate of 800,000 uncertain

September 5, 2017

Donald Trump thrust the fate of nearly 800,000 young, undocumented migrants into uncertainty on Tuesday by terminating the Obama-era program that protects the so-called Dreamers from deportation.

In response, Barack Obama said the decision was “self-defeating” and contrary to “basic decency”.

A “shadow has been cast over some of our best and brightest young people once again”, the former president said.

The 2012 policy known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) will be phased out by 5 March 2018, leaving Congress with six months to enact new protections for Dreamers through legislation. On Tuesday night, Trump suggested that if Congress failed to “legalize Daca” he would “revisit” the program.

Some treatment centers accused of keeping addicts hooked for insurance dollars

August 25, 2017

DELRAY BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The Reflections treatment center looked like just the place for Michelle Holley’s youngest daughter to kick heroin. Instead, as with dozens of other Florida substance abuse treatment facilities, the owner was more interested in defrauding insurance companies by keeping addicts hooked, her family says.

“It looked fine. They were saying all the right things to me. I could not help my child so I trusted them to help my child,” Holley said.

Instead, the center refused to give 19-year-old Jaime Holley her prescription medicine when she left, forcing her to use illegal drugs to avoid acute withdrawal symptoms, her mother said. She died of a heroin overdose last November. “Right to my face they lied to me, and I believed them.”