Healthy Skepticism Library item: 15206

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Publication type: news

Ahmed S.
Nigeria: Pfizer to compensate with $75m
AfricaNews 2009 Mar 4
http://www.africanews.com/site/Nigeria_Pfizer_to_compensate_with_75m/list_messages/23525

Full text:

United States pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer, has agreed to pay the sum of $75 million (N11.250 billion) as compensation over the 1996 Trovan drug test in Kano State, north-west of Nigeria. The drug experiment test left over 200 children with deformities and some died as a result of the third test.

According to report from the US pharmaceutical company, the amount is going to be shared among the victims, Kano State government and other forms of litigation. $35 million of the amount is going to be shared among the victims as compensation; $30 million will be paid to Kano State Government for the construction of modern hospitals; and the remaining $10 million will be paid to cover litigation expenses by government on behalf of the victims, The Sunday Trust newspaper reported.

However, the chairman of the Trovan Test Victims Association Alhaji Mustapha Maisikeli told AfricaNews that members are yet to be briefed by their lawyers of the latest development.

This development, it was gathered, was the drug company’s response to a proposal submitted to it in a meeting held last month in Abuja by the stakeholders’ delegation that included the Kano State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Aliyu Umar, a representative of the victims’ parents, Mustapha Maisikeli, Barrister Maryam Uwais, and the state Commissioner for Health, Hajiya Aisha Isiyaku Kiru, the former Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon (rtd) and former American President Jimmy Carter.

The two former presidents have been brokering an out-of-court resolution of the issue. It was gathered also that General Gowon has intimated Governor Ibrahim Shekarau about the giant company’s acceptance of the proposal. The deal will be sealed in Rome in March this year.