Schering Sales Corp. and its parent company were sentenced to pay $435 million as part of a settlement with the Justice Department over accusations it improperly marketed drugs for unapproved uses and lied to the government about drug prices.
Under a settlement announced in August, Schering Sales pleaded guilty to conspiracy and agreed to pay a criminal fine of $180 million. Its parent company, Schering-Plough Corp., agreed to pay another $255 million to resolve civil aspects of the case.
The sentencing closes the loop on an investigation by the Justice Department and the U.S. attorney's office in Boston that began in 2001.
Investigators said Schering-Plough marketed drugs for uses that had not been approved by the Food & Drug Administration.
One example was Temodar, a drug the FDA had approved to treat a type of brain tumor called anaplastic astrocytoma. Prosecutors said Schering promoted Temodar to treat several other types of brain cancer, which the FDA had not approved.
The company also promoted the unapproved use of Intron A for the treatment of cancer on the surface of the bladder, prosecutors said.
Although doctors are allowed to prescribe drugs for unapproved uses, drug companies are prohibited from marketing drugs for these so-called "off-label" uses.
As part of the settlement, the company pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FDA and the Health Care Financing Administration.
Prosecutors said Schering-Plough, based in Kenilworth, N.J., reported a false best price to the Health Care Financing Administration on Claritin RediTabs to avoid paying millions of dollars in rebates to Medicaid.
Under Medicaid rules, pharmaceutical companies must provide their products at the best price made available to commercial buyers, including HMOs.
Yahoo Biz
Insider's view: do you still believe Big Pharma and the Medicare argument? If you do there's a nice bridge I'd like to sell you.
2 comments:
It never ends with the big pharma. So far many have been caught and fined but not criminally done in. That will come with updating of US laws. We hope. Unlike USA in Canada there are no laws to bring these culprits to the same expensive justice and expose them as lier, cheater, corrupters ets. for what they are. The government ostensibely is working on this, but we doubt anything will heppen for now. Our group has taken up this task and will do anything within the legal and democratic system to speed up the process.
The Canadian big pharma is exactly same as USA's but 10% of it. No company has been fined or exposed in any way so far while in US only few have not been yet.
To anyone in Canadian goverment authority: are you watching this or have it watched for you and do something about it. There are lot of insiders who would just love to give you what you need to do it. So get off your ...and DO IT as our friends south of the border do.You will recover tax dollars in billions that have bees strip mined from your public health system
I do not happen to agree with this position re big pharma. Think most people would not either so lets see:
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