NEWS: International Drug Company Caught in a Lie

HAY STOP TRYING TO MINDCONTROL US, YOU BIG PHARMA-NAZI!!!1!

Man, that's one helluva thread!

For me, this question still lingers... why the dramatic increase in cancers, heart disease, depression, diabetes, asthma, and other diseases over the past 50 years? There's plenty of evidence for links to diet & lifestyle, and to environmental triggers. Shouldn't we be looking at THAT as much as we do at high-tech "cures?" When's "The March for Prevention" going to be held?

I think if individuals go back to the old adage that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," big pharma will start to lose some of its clout.

When I was in law school I had a professor who claimed that fines like this were routine in the U.S. He said the FDA fines drug & food companies all the time over purposegful mislabeling and that they didn't care because the fines were nothing compared to their profits. When pressed he didn't come up with any specific examples/cases so a lot of people thought he was full of shit. I never got around to checking into it further, but it certainly wouldn't surprise me if it were true.

Well, before we give Big Pharma a huge pat on the back, let's not forget that much of the research they go on to patent is subsidized by American taxpayers. Capitalism at its finest, indeed.

No way it's better than my semen. No. Way.

Wouldn't be too viable. You'd end up getting a stiff neck.

*rimshot*

-TM

I can't decide if I should take this as an April Fool's prank and laugh at it, or take it as an April Fool's prank and laugh at everyone who took it seriously.

Or if I'm just being overly cynical of the media and this is fo rlz.

I think people should remember that this story only affected the New Zealand production of Ribena. GSK have confirmed that the levels of Vitamin C in the UK are as stated on the label (although I'm sure there are now dozens of high schools out checking this right now). I'd be inclined to believe this may have been a gross oversight and/or mistake, rather than an outright attempt to deceive. Vitamin C isn't an expensive substance to add to drinks (least of all fruit drinks), so what could possibly be gained by it's omission? According to GSK, the problem was due to the assay used to measure Vitamin C in the New Zealand product not being sensitive enough to cope with the natural breakdown associated with the product's shelf life.

Just my ten pence worth, I feel the representation of this story may have been a bit biased ("Caught in a lie", tagged as "fraud"). I do agree this issue should never have happened, but people do seem to be taking what could have been a genuine mistake as evidence of corruptness direct to the core of a mulitnational pharma.

*points up*

what they said.. the findings were only with Ribena from NZ.. which is what i find a little more bothersome than the no vitiam C in the first place. hat makes it so different if it's still supposed to follow the same recipe?

The diluting syrup in both the UK and NZ is apparently fine and contains all the Vit C it should do, but it was the pre-diluted packaged drinks in NZ that were found to be deficient.

I originally thought it could be due to differences in preservatives, but none are used in the UK ready-mixed packages. Don't know if this is the same in NZ. Any NZ subscribers fancy playing Top Trumps with the ingredients lists?

Further info. The phrase used that caused the dispute was: "the blackcurrants in Ribena contain four times the Vitamin C of oranges". Which, as fruit and on a weight-by-weight basis, appears to be factually correct. Except we're discussing a drink, not the fruit itself. I can understand how it could be misleading but I do still think it's been blown out of proportion as evidence of mass corruption.

Actually, Pfizer has been ordered to recall Viagra and stop production after it was revealed that the active ingredient is unfit for human consumption and is only suitable for automobile maintenance:

SPOILERS! (Click to view)

Less than US $200,000??????

any word on how the 2 14 year olds tested the Ribena?

Bill Nye would be proud.

I'm tired of all these pro-science stories! Where are all the stories about people using religion to expose lies?

I think you're putting the cart a couple leagues ahead of the horse there. Taxpayers subsidize all sorts of medicinal and chemical research, only a fraction of which ever gets licensed to BigPharma, and even then the patents are for significant work done by BigPharma's people, without which it would be impossible to manufacture most of these compounds into anything useful in broad applications.

Besides, is there some other economic system producing extremely useful medicinal compounds besides heavily regulated mixed economies? Either way, the significant financial penalties usually come in the form of penalties in civil suits, not fines from regulatory agencies.

*golf clap*

On the contrary. The worldwide press reports will do serious damage to worldwide sales of the product and will almost certainly hit their share price where it hurts. Even if the figure had been a million or 10 million it would have been only a tiny drop in the ocean for a company that size.

Which is why I'm all for restricting public advertising for such offenses. An "advertising time out" would get the message across much better than some meaningless fine.

Bummer! There goes the excuse to drink candy sweet cordial and claim it's good for you. They still advertise it as high in Vitamin C- wonder if they put it in now or no injunction was put agains them?

No it is, and it has. It was just line of one poduct that didn't in one country. As far as we know anyway.

Did you read Jonathan Lethem's essay "The Ecstasy of Influence" in the February Harpers?

Elsewhere in the same article he refers to blood banks, and how blood banks operating on the gift economy (blood donors) offer much safer, purer and potent (his words) blood than commercial blood banks. I think that people do indeed do better work when they are motivated by passion or an idea of "the common good" or even--gasp--love, rather than those motivated by profit potential.

Here is a book on the subject of taxpayer subsidized medical research that gets sold to Big Pharma for a song and then sold back to taxpayers at inflated costs.