Healthy Skepticism Library item: 101

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: news

Clarke , T .
U.S. Probe Into Antidepressant Drug Makers Widens
Reuters 2004 Feb 2

Full text:

The U.S. government has subpoenaed Wyeth in connection with its marketing to doctors of the antidepressant drug Effexor, making it the third drug company in a week to receive a subpoena in a widening federal investigation.

James Sheehan, Assistant U.S. Attorney in Philadelphia, said Wyeth, Johnson & Johnson and Forest Laboratories Inc., have been subpoenaed in a probe relating to potentially over-aggressive marketing of psychiatric drugs.

“The office of the inspector general gets involved when there’s fraud, when you cross over to misleading, deceptive or false statements or when there are kickbacks involved in connection with the marketing,” he said.

Sheehan, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation, said such drugs can easily be misprescribed “because of the difficulty of determining effectiveness of treatment.”

The subpoenas came from the Inspector General for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, which investigates potential fraud involving the health benefits of about 10 million federal employees and retirees.

Wyeth said the agency asked for documents related to the marketing of Effexor from Jan. 1, 1997, to Sept. 30, 2003. Johnson & Johnson and Forest acknowledged receiving subpoenas but declined to say what was sought.

Johnson & Johnson makes the schizophrenia drug Risperdal, and Forest sells the depression drug Celexa.

In 2003, Effexor, which is Wyeth’s biggest-selling product, had global sales of $2.7 billion; Risperdal sales were $2.5 billion, making it Johnson & Johnson’s second-biggest drug. Sales of Celexa for the first nine months of 2003 were $1.2 billion.

Drugs for depression, schizophrenia and other psychological disorders are also made by Pfizer Inc., Eli Lilly and Co., Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and AstraZeneca Plc and are among the most profitable on the market.

Sheehan declined to say whether other companies would be subpoenaed.

Several drug companies, including AstraZeneca and a joint venture between Abbott Laboratories Inc. and Takeda Chemical Industries Ltd. have had to pay substantial fines to the federal government for fraudulent marketing practices.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration often sends out letters of reprimand if claims made for drugs are not quite accurate; cases are only prosecuted when the deception is intentional and carried out on a large scale, Sheehan said.

As the main watchdog for federal health programs, the Office of Personnel Management’s role is to ensure the beneficiaries of its program get the drugs they pay for and are treated with the right drugs for their condition.