Associated PressBy CHUCK BARTELSMar 20, 2014
The Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday overturned a $1.2 billion judgment against Johnson & Johnson in a lawsuit challenging the drugmaker’s marketing of the antipsychotic drug Risperdal. The court ruled that the state improperly sued under a law that applies to health care facilities, not pharmaceutical companies. The ruling comes in an appeal of lawsuit filed by Arkansas against the drugmaker and subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals. The state says the companies didn’t properly communicate the drug’s risks and marketed it for off-label use, calling the practices fraudulent. Johnson & Johnson said there was no fraud and Arkansas’ Medicaid program wasn’t harmed…In a separate action brought by the U.S. Department of Justice, Johnson & Johnson agreed in November to pay more than $2.2 billion to federal and state governments and in penalties to resolve criminal and civil allegations that the company promoted powerful psychiatric drugs, including Risperdal, for unapproved uses in children, seniors and disabled patients. The agreement was the third-largest settlement with a drug maker in U.S. history.Johnson & Johnson and Janssen are also awaiting a ruling by the South Carolina Supreme Court, where the companies have an appeal pending of a $327 million judgment in a similar case. A $330 million verdict against both companies in Louisiana was overturned in January.hat tip to pharmagossip…
It will be champagne around in New Jersey at headquarters. Another bullet dodged by the hard [well paid] work by their lawyers. I reckon there have been many other champagne celebrations about Risperdal® in the past – pulling off TMAP, buying Omnicare’s business, Excerpta Medica’s flooding the medical literature, turning Biederman by funding a Harvard Center and cashing in on his Bipolar Child epidemic. The $ 2.2 B settlement with the feds was a set-back, but well within their cost of doing business budget. The Risperdal® roll-out was a big success for its leader Alex Gorsky, who is now CEO of the whole company. He turned a schizophrenia drug into an all-purpose blockbuster many times over. And he couldn’t have done it without the help of skillful lawyers and marketers. Well, that’s not the whole story.
Law suits are just the cost of doing business:
http://pharmagossip.blogspot.com/2014/03/plavix-and-five-o.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FDlJuM+%28PharmaGossip%29
Expanding market is the goal, even on the thinnest of indications such as 60 and male:
http://cardiobrief.org/2014/03/19/12-8-million-more-adults-now-eligible-for-statin-therapy/
All the while doctors can talk to doctors, even during your office visit, about the new wonder drug of the day:
http://pharmagossip.blogspot.com/2014/03/doctor-glaxo-is-here-to-teach-you.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FDlJuM+%28PharmaGossip%29
Because the drug companies only publish what is right and true about drug trials:
http://brodyhooked.blogspot.com/2014/03/over-enthusiasm-in-research-results-how.html
Steve Lucas
How dumb of the Arkansas attorney general to file under the wrong statute.
Arkansas, like North Carolina, Virginia, and Texas are so “business friendly” that they’d let anyone who spends enough on campaign contributions ruin their environments, the health of their citizens, and the lot for common workers. This is a direct result of deregulation and the profit uber alles mentality of political “leaders” in states.
Risperadol being just one of many ways to score on the dart board of options to treat a person who a professional won’t spend a significant amount of time with is one more pack of lies about what “mental illness” and mental illness is or is not, and the lie of drugs “fixing” a brain with an endogenous defect. Denying all the negative effects is kaching-ing in and avoiding damages and as long as these companies are able to get away with it and KOLs endorse this carelessness, they’re going to get away with it.
Psychiatry’s relationships with out justice systems are all out of whack.
our justice system, and to Hades with any other typos and grammatical errors.