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Door Open to Sue Pfizer in BC Says Researcher

$142 million ruling in US shows province is too cozy with drug giant: Cassels.

By Andrew MacLeod, 2 Apr 2010, TheTyee.ca

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Pfizer advises BC on restructuring drug approval.

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If there are any plans for British Columbia to follow the lead from other jurisdictions and try to recover money from Pfizer Inc. for a drug the company's been found to have marketed fraudulently, Health Minister Kevin Falcon said he's unaware of them.

"That's a decision at the staff level," he said yesterday [March 31]. "I'm not aware of anything that staff is doing in terms of going after them for the dollars that were spent."

Last week Pfizer lost a $142.1-million U.S. court decision for illegally promoting the epilepsy drug Neurontin for unapproved uses.

Kaiser Foundation Health Plan Inc. and Kaiser Foundation Hospitals argued in a federal court in Boston that it "was misled into believing migraines and bipolar disorder were among the conditions that could be treated effectively with Neurontin," Business Week reported.

The story quoted Kaiser's lawyer, Tom Sobol: "The jury found Pfizer engaged in a racketeering conspiracy over a ten-year period... That bodes well for future cases.”

Pfizer, which lost a similar case in 2004, has said it will appeal the ruling. Spokespeople for the company did not respond to The Tyee by publication time.

BC should sue too: researcher

In B.C., Minister Falcon confirmed today [April 1] that the health ministry has not yet done anything about pursuing a case against Pfizer, but said it always reserves the right to pursue such a case in the future.

Health policy researcher Alan Cassels said that in B.C. the government is much too cozy with the pharmaceutical industry in general, and Pfizer in particular.

"Drug safety is not a political issue, it's a public health issue," he said. "If drug companies in B.C. are marketing their drugs illegally to B.C. physicians, deceiving patients, and wasting millions of taxpayer dollars in the process then we B.C. citizens expect them to be punished."

Thanks to earlier court cases Pfizer's "criminal behaviour" has been known for at least five years, but B.C. has done nothing about it, he said.

Instead it has involved representatives from Pfizer and other companies in recent years in the restructuring of the province's drug approval process. "This government rewards criminal recidivists, inviting criminally-prosecuted drug company members to 'advise' them on running B.C.'s public drug plan," he said.

B.C. should "get tough on crime" and at least "stop the profiteers from raping our drug plan in the name of public health," he said.

Scrapped watchdog issued warning

As it happens, the threatened Therapeutics Initiative (TI) at the University of British Columbia, which got sidelined from the province's drug approval process after the Pharmaceutical Task Force's report, wrote about Neurontin, sold in Canada as gabapentin, in its most recent bulletin.

In B.C., consumption of the drug is still rising, and $30 million was spent on the drug in the province in 2009, they write. About $19 million of that came from public funds.

The TI had written about the drug in 2000, but at that time concluded there was little evidence available. Ironically, studies that have come out through Pfizer's court cases have given them more to work with and allowed another look at the drug.

"Misleading promotion pushed gabapentin to blockbuster status," the new bulletin said. "Scientific evidence suggests gabapentin has a minor role in pain control."

The New Democratic Party's health critic, Adrian Dix, said gabapentin is another example where the TI protected patients and likely saved the provincial government money.

In this case the TI's 2000 advice may also have been good for the company, he said. "It may be, given the conduct of Pfizer, that the Therapeutics Initiative's correct analysis of the value of their drug, saved them from some liability."

The bigger question, he said, is the amount of influence drug companies have on provincial policy.

"The industry has always done this, they spend more on marketing than they do on research," said Dix, noting that pharmaceuticals are the fastest growing part of the health care budget. "The government's undermining programs and initiatives that would protect the public and save money while focussing its cuts on hospitals."

It makes no sense for the government to ignore the TI's work and advice, he said. "We need some people on our side and the patients' side to protect patients and the Therapeutics Initiative is part of that."

The Therapeutics Initiative provided advice to the province on drug decisions, but it never made the final decisions, he said. "For them to deliberately choose ignorance in the making of health policy is not a good sign for the future." [Tyee]

Andrew MacLeod is The Tyee's Legislative Bureau Chief in Victoria. Reach him here.

23 Comments:

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  • zalm

    2 years ago

    Knowledge and practice before drugs

    Having become a lot more acquainted with the 2009 CPS (Compendium of Pharmaceuticals and Specialities, for those not in the business) than I ever wanted to be in recent weeks, I'm acutely aware of how much information already exists out there about how dangerous, iffy, ineffective or even harmful many drugs are. Even so-called blockbusters often have long lists of contraindications, side effects, and known records of interference with other drugs. Yet physicians, with no more information to go on than this, routinely supply these as remedies for inadequately-diagnosed illnesses that our society persists in dragging into doctor's offices without doing a modicum of research on their own issues for themselves.

    Which is inexcusable in this day and age of internet-research. There is never any reason for going in to see your doctor and saying "I'm here because I don't feel right, but I can't describe why to you." That puts the whole onus on the doctor to engage in an exploration of your health and wellness that you're not sufficiently motivated to engage in yourself. You don't have to show up with answers - in fact that's not recommended - but you can certainly find lists of questions to ask yourself about your health and what you feel is wrong. And then if someone sends you away with a pill, ask some questions. In fact, ask lots of questions.

    And that one step, taken together by all of us, would reduce the power the drug companies have over others, our government, our health system, and ultimately over us, by an order of magnitude.

    And probably rescue Gordo's dismal budget in the process, although he probably wouldn't end up with any directorships at Smith-Nephew-Glaxo-Kline-Beyer-Astra-MegaDrugCorp after his career in politics was ended....

    I'm definitely in favour of using drugs - sometimes there's nothing else that will do. But as we aid my father in battling back from a massive overdose of antipsychotics used in a "routine" treatment, we find now that TI will have work for thousands of years to come. The minimum standard for federal licencing is just that - a minimum standard. For each one of us, there must be more, and we must be party to it.

  • RossK

    2 years ago

    It Is Also Very, Very Important To Note That...

    ....The Chair of the Campbell government-generated taskforce that tried to kill the Therapeutics Initiative was later hired by ...wait for it...

    Pfizer.

    _______

    Details, based on a previous story also written by The Tyee's Mr. MacLeod, can be found here

    .

  • Jeffrey J.

    2 years ago

    Former BC Advisor hired by Pfizer

    Former BC advisor about pharmaceutical sales was later hired by Pfizer. Good lord!

    http://thetyee.ca/Blogs/TheHook/BC-Politics/2009/11/17/AvisonPfizer/

  • RickW

    2 years ago

    Health Minister Kevin Falcon said he's unaware

    That about explains everything........

  • alive

    2 years ago

    lesson

    Business is about money!
    In business nobody cares if the product is of any use, as long as the rubes buy it.

  • DJT

    2 years ago

    Not surprising

    I wouldn't be at all surprised if Pfizer were a financial donor to the Libs. If that's the case, you can bet your bottom dollar that Falcon and his cronies will remain "unaware".

  • Realist

    2 years ago

    I was perscribed gabapentin

    The government of BC paid for my perscription for gabapentin to help deal with arthritic pain and I found that the drug did absolutely nothing for me. My doctor and I quickly switched to another anti-inflamatory. i wonder how much other money this(or any other) government paid Pfizer for this hoax. Perhaps going after Pfizer migh recoup enough money so the BC Government can overturn their recent decicion to stop paying for disabled orthopedic devices.

  • mary jane

    2 years ago

    any scum bag is welcome in bc

    it sseems to me that our infamous political leaders are only interested in keeping BC'ers from having healthy lives, drugged with legal drugs to keep them shut up, working at low paid jobs so they hardly have energy to complain.

    Falcon like his cohorts don't bother keep BCers safe, which is their job. they are more interested in partying, showing off scamming the public, raising taxes. It would not suprise me either to find the big drug componies donate to gordo and gang.

  • barney

    2 years ago

    Further to RossK's observant point...

    This story would get all the more intriguing if we knew how much Pfizer (and other members of the multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical cartel) have donated, directly or via the backdoor, to the BC Liberal Party in the past.

  • zalm

    2 years ago

    Realist

    Gabapentin was one of the blockbusters I was thinking of as I wrote. I have a relative with chronic pain for whom this particular drug has actually eased her crippling degeneracy and allowed her to work again, though she cannot yet cycle ten kilometers to work every day (in Edmonton !) as she used to do.

    But there are no other stories of success out there that I'm aware of. And yet I'm sure gabapentin is prescribed all out of proportion to its efficacy, which, by one account is only a 7% improvement in some chronic conditions. And you will be as different from my relative as chalk and cheese, so there should be no claims out there to absolute knowledge or absolute efficacy when it comes to drug dispensing.

    Your experience is exactly what should happen - see if it works for you, and get off it if it doesn't.

  • Intention Pure

    2 years ago

    Health Canada's "client" is the mega pharmaceutical corporation

    Unaware alright.

    Bill C-51 (now renamed as Bill C-6) is further known to be a Big Pharma bill (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, June 2008 Vol 15 No.2 p 22). Big Pharma, along with the food industry, are Health Canada's effective employer since our government put them in charge as of January 1996 when parliamentary debate and public input were bypassed using an Order in Council, passed by the then Minister of Health. This fundamentally changed the purpose of the Food and Drug Act by redefining the "client" it serves as the manufacturer as opposed to members of Canadian society (CCPA, p 22).

    The Canadian public is totally at risk because of this, and the Canadian Health Care Budget is being hi-jacked by big pharma while we close beds, hospitals, cut critical nursing positions, and all for corporate profit and at the cost of the health and lives of Canadians.

    A quick review of current information on our conventional medical orthodoxy reveals massive failures of this ideology, and further, areas needing to be totally exposed as fraudulent and driven by the corporations legal mandate for profit (Swine Flop Campaign).

    Medications, research from John Hopkins Medical School has revealed, are the leading cause of death. Again, ". . . properly prescribed drugs, not diseases, have become the leading cause of death" (CCPA, p 22).

  • Andrew MacLeod

    2 years ago

    Donations, since you asked . . .

    A quick search of Elections B.C.'s donation database shows Pfizer Canada Inc. gave $21,257 to the B.C. Liberal Party between 2005 and 2009. Industry groups such as Canada's Research Based Pharmaceutical Companies, which counts Pfizer as a member, also gave.

  • RossK

    2 years ago

    Thanks Andrew...

    And just to be absolutely clear - my point was based entirely on a previous report by Mr. MacLeod as was noted by Jeffrey J above....

    I can add something though - which is that there have been 'institutional deals' in British Columbia involving Pfizer since the blue ribbon panel took a run at the Therapeutics Initiative.

    .

  • happy

    2 years ago

    What about this donation MacLeod

    "VANCOUVER, November 20, 2009 - Renowned B.C. kinesiologist and heart disease researcher Dr. Scott Lear is the inaugural recipient of the Pfizer/Heart and Stroke Foundation Chair in Cardiovascular Disease Prevention Research at St. Paul’s Hospital, established in partnership with Simon Fraser University (SFU)".

    "Funding from this $4.6-million endowed chair will allow Dr. Lear to move his internationally renowned research program into a patient care setting, where he will have daily interaction with clinicians and patients. Working at the Providence Heart + Lung Institute based at St. Paul’s Hospital, he will investigate why people get heart disease and what they can do to prevent or manage it."

    "The chair was established in 2007 with $1.25 million from Pfizer Canada, $1.128 million from St. Paul’s Hospital Foundation, including $1 million from an anonymous donor, $750,000 from Heart and Stroke Foundation of BC & Yukon and $1.5 million from SFU."

    http://www.helpstpauls.com/media_room.php

  • Rocker Rich

    2 years ago

    Neurontin

    Few will defend the hyper-aggressive sales practices of major pharmaceutical corporations. Well into the 1990s, as women pulled even with men for medical-school enrollments, Big Pharma continued to use sexist ads to promote their wares. (A common image: a willowy, buxom female smiling contentedly on a cloud.)

    Still, governments should think twice before sueing Pfizer over Neorontin. Although it may have been overhyped for migraines, it does help many patients suffering otherwise chronic neurological pain. For every litigant saying it didn't work, Pfizer could doubtless find many more to aver that Neurontin restored them to productive lives.

    There are countless drugs like Neurontin that are FDA approved for one malady but are then prescribed for "off-label use" to control another. Avastin, expensively effective at prolonging lives of cancer sufferers was so often used to block or even reverse macular degeneration that it's manufacturer went so far as to tweak the formula and put a renamed compound called Lucentis into successful FDA trials.

    Bottom line: taking Big Pharma to court is not a slam dunk. Right now, the province has its hands full with the vastly more winnable action against Big Tobacco. And even that case has been meandering through the courts since the NDP launched it around 2000.

  • RossK

    2 years ago

    Excellent Point Rocker Rich....

    ....Which is precisely why the work of the Therapeutics Initiative is so important....Because it also makes such descriminations and thus can help us make decisions about what is effective and what is not (both medical and cost effectiveness).

    Thanks.

    .

  • RossK

    2 years ago

    I hate to go all off topic and everything, but....

    ....There is potentially very big story brewing that is being squashed by a (suspiciously?) well-timed four day weekend that is keeping even The Tyee off the scent....

    Some have dubbed it 'Casino Royale' and it involves big money, a retractable roof, a coveted land swap, a Cabinet Minister, a big Vegas operator, and a Campbell government insider......

    Sean Holman has the entire story here.

    _____
    My take, for anyone interested, is here.

    .

  • morechatter

    2 years ago

    It Just Makes Me Sick

    All this talk of Health Care or the lack of it as Canada goes from a Healthy Nation to one of take two twinkes before going to bed. As there are no quick remedies and the side effects are usually killers.
    BC Government steps up to the plate as DERA is being sued by BC Housing. Why just DERA as it is no secret manu of the agencies aren't up any standards as funding slips away. So long over due and now Pfzier?

  • morechatter

    2 years ago

    What is the difference between DERA and Plzier?

    Millions and Millions of tax payers dollars and the public's safety as BC Government turns an eye on smaller fish to fry as poorly run non-profit agencies go under the gun for mismanagement. One sure thing about Pfzier it knows exactly what it is doing and so do the BC Liberals. Although that can't be said about BC Liberals handling of the economy. Could it be possible that the Premier will change course as the sobering reality is if Liberals stay the course BC will crash?

    The BC Liberals are the only government in decades fortunate enough to inherit a balanced budget. Squandering this advantage by going from a balanced budget to the largest deficit in history for a party and achieving the worst economic growth in Canada is hardly an accomplishment.

  • Machiatto

    2 years ago

    Gabapentin class action in Canada

    Justice Paul Perell of the Ontario Superior Court ordered that a lawsuit relating to Neurontin be certified as a national class action except for residents of Quebec.

    The London, Ont., law firm Siskinds LLP and the law firms of Dunn and Company and Hanson Wirsig Matheos in Vancouver, are representing the plaintiffs

    Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2010/02/22/gabapentin-neurotonin-lawsuit.html#ixzz0kGXEK8oU

  • aardvark

    2 years ago

    Research Chair Donations

    How independent is the research...hmmm....

  • Isabella2

    2 years ago

    Pfizer

    "That's a decision at the staff level," he (Falcon) said yesterday [March 31]. "I'm not aware of anything that staff is doing in terms of going after them for the dollars that were spent."
    STAFF!!!!!!!???
    What the H--- are we paying Falcon for if staff does it all?
    Every time this man opens his mouth !!!

  • jhudgina

    2 years ago

    The government sues. . .

    successfully, do we, the consumers of Gabapentin, get reimbursed for the outrageous price we paid for it? If successful, will the government put a stop to the money hungry pharmaceutical industry funding its gifts to wealthy facilitators through we who can barely afford the cost of very necessary medication? Will Campbell do that?

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