AstraZeneca - Dave Brennan confesses to what?

Pharmalot by way of the "Wall Street Journal" has posted a great article about AstraZeneca and their CEO Dave Brennan out on the damage control trail stumping their tainted "we will do better after we finish counting the money; and we promise with the double dare fingers crossed" message. Once again I have interjected my honest personal commentary and opinion in purple colored font within the article.

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By Ed Silverman December 22nd, 2009 // 8:51 am

AstraZeneca Is More Sensitive about illegal marketing

All those big fines are prompting some drug makers to say they’ve found religion.

Of course that religion really hasn't changed much, since in the "church of corporation" Money is the God, and other lesser God's like ethical behavior, moral responsibility, caring for your fellow man, not coveting your brothers wife, etc.... are not quite part of the corporate ten commandments shall we say.

For instance, Pfizer ceo Jeff Kindler recently gave a speech about corporate trust (watch it here).

Now, AstraZeneca’s Dave Brennan confesses that his company is “more sensitive than we’ve ever been” about preventing illegal promotion of their drugs ever since it paid a $520 million to settle a US probe marketing of its Seroquel schizophrenia med.

More sensitive to what exactly Mr. Brennan? Using children as Ginny pigs, targeting the poor and foster children, more sensitive to the drugging assault upon the elderly, paying corrupt and evil doctor's to promote your dangerous chemicals at the tune of $500,000 a pop.

So what do you mean by "more sensitive"? That AZ is going to continue to market their dangerous drugs aggressively spending $$billions$$ on slick marketing ads, that AZ will continue to pay the government hand slap criminal penalties as just part of doing business, That AZ will continue to spend a billion dollars plus attempting to deny those they have injured by their unsafe drugs any reasonable compensation, that AZ will continue to get the corrupt FDA to rubber stamp your profitable anti-psychotic drug for everything under the sun and great blue sky; so there is no reason left to do the under the table off label marketing crimes. That AZ will continue to spend like a drunken sailor lobbying government elected representatives to green light their business as usual criminal practices.

Off-label marketing has become “a much bigger issue in the last few years as a result of the government’s position on this,” he tells The Wall Street Journal. “If you go back ten years in this industry, this was not an issue. I mean, we trained our people not to promote off-label…so it’s always been sensitive. But now, it’s even more sensitive because we’re paying fines.” The fine, by the way, was $520 million. Last year, Seroquel generated $4.5 billion in revenue.

"I mean, we trained our people not to promote off-label" Oh really, that's why we see exactly the opposite in the many buried and leaked internal documents within your Lilly white and purified corporation.

I must ask if you are just in a completely psychotic delusional state, or just one huge blatant liar? I actually thought you paid "Tony Jewell" the huge dollars to be your cover up spin doctor.

What was the latest sweetheart deal you made with the DOJ (department of justice) "The fine, by the way, was estimated @ $520 million". Though the final details of this sweetheart deal are still unknown to the public.

The drugmaker faces numerous lawsuits over its Seroquel marketing and documents released by plaintiffs attorneys allegedly showed AstraZeneca execs discussed broadening the market to include adolescents and patients with Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, and at medical meetings, in sales calls and with patient-advocacy groups, the Journal writes.

The goal of an AstraZeneca public-relations plan from 2001 was to “encourage and support…use outside schizophrenia into a broad range of other patient populations including bipolar disorder and the elderly.” It also said there needed to be “aggressive market penetration” among adolescents, the elderly and patients with bipolar disorder for Seroquel to outsell rival meds. The FDA didn’t approve the pill for bipolar disorder until 2006, the Journal reminds us.

Jeez, this certainly sounds like you are living in a state of denial Mr. Brennan. I gather a 2.5 million $$dollar$$ a year salary with added perks and a golden parachute attached can do that to even the most ardent executive moralist after all.

In response, Brennan tells the Journal: “There were a wide variety of documents. Stuff that said we don’t promote off-label. Others that said different things. You know, that’s just the nature of how business runs over ten or twenty years. There’s millions of documents floating around. I don’t have any particular comment” on individual documents.

I would have to say there are probably millions of other damning documents and evidence that were floating around that AZ was able to shred, suppress, bury, or make disappear like magic. Come on now, AZ has no moral or ethical obligation to their fellow human beings; it's just the nature of this nasty profitable business.