The Hallelujah Health Tip
Issue #519: Big Pharma - Corruption & Fraud
October 30, 2007
(5) BIG PHARMA – CORRUPTION AND FRAUD
In Health Tips, #510 – #514, I shared excerpts from Chapter 3 of Mike Adams book NATURAL HEALTH SOLUTIONS. Mike Adams is a champion of consumer protection and health freedom. His book, Natural Health Solutions, is an explosive review of pharmaceutical companies, the FDA and conventional medicine. In the book he exposes the junk science, corruption and crime that characterize medicine today. (This book is not easy to obtain, but is available from Hallelujah Acres by calling 1-800-915-9355.)
Chapter 3 of Natural Health Solutions is titled “BIG PHARMA,” and in this Health Tip #519 we are going to continue sharing excerpts from this chapter:
BIG PHARMA CORRUPTION AND FRAUD
(Pages 122-138) “Corruption and fraud are mainstays of the pharmaceutical business. Drug companies routinely defraud state Medical programs, bilking taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars. On the rare occasions when they are caught and charged with fraud, they conveniently settle out of court, avoiding prosecution that would bar them from further sales to states and even the federal government.
“The U.S. Department of Justice found that some states paid more than 50,000 percent of the honest street price for certain drugs. The most common con uses ‘price fixing,’ and here’s how it works:
1. Drug companies sell drugs at deeply discounted prices to buyers like Costco, Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, and other retailers.
2. When the same drugs are sold to state Medicaid programs, drug companies use the Average Wholesale Price (AWP) sheet - an industry-wide sheet with almost no correlation to the wholesale prices charged to public companies. The AWP billing states astronomical fees for common drugs. A $2.25 bottle of dextrose, for example, which is basically sugar, magically becomes a $928.51 bottle of dextrose when sold to the state of Alabama.
3. Markups of 500 percent, 1000 percent and even higher are common. Some drugs were found to be marked up as much as 54,199 percent.
4. States that catch drug companies in the con have to sue the companies to recover the lost funds. Faced with years of costly litigation, most states choose to settle lawsuits out of court. Such settlements are structured to allow the companies to pay a fine without admitting guilt—allowing the corporations to remain on the ‘approved’ list for selling products to state and federal governments.
5. Who foots the final bill while drug company executives and shareholders line their pockets with stolen money? THE TAXPAYERS, OF COURSE. . .
BIG PHARMA’S DARK TACTICS
“In stark contrast to its best efforts to project a noble public image, the drug industry remains mired in corruption, scientific fraud, price-fixing scams, disease mongering propaganda, human experimentation and other unscrupulous tactics designed to boost profits no matter what the real cost to society. . . .
“Americans pay the highest prices for prescription drugs anywhere in the world. This is accomplished through the Big Pharma / FDA conspiracy that:
*Violates free-market economics by attempting to ban cost-effective online pharmacies, prescription drug sales from Canada, drug tourism to Mexico, etc.
*Creates obstacles for the introduction of generic drugs that would compete with brand-name drug sales. . . .
*Distorts science to create any outcome desired through fraudulent clinical trials and cherry-picking trial results. . . .
“Drug companies justify these monopolistic and anti-competitive practices by dangling the ‘cure carrot’ in front of consumers, claiming they need these profiteering prices in order to fund research to find so-called cures for devastating diseases. It’s all a con, of course. . . .
“There is absolutely no sensible justification for the idea that Americans alone should subsidize the profits of pharmaceutical companies. The ‘cure carrot’ dangled in front of U.S. lawmakers and consumers is little more than a clever marketing gimmick—a trick designed to distract people from the very real fact that they are getting ripped off by drug company profiteering.
“I find it amazing that when a local gas station raises gas prices by 20 percent following some national disaster, people go crazy with accusations of profiteering. Yet when drug companies mark up their drugs 30,000 percent or more over the cost of ingredients, the public seems more than happy to go along with it, repeating the propaganda line, ‘They need that money to fund tomorrow’s cures!’ Or, maybe they just need it to pay massive CEO salaries and keep investors happy. The drug companies spend more on advertising and marketing than research, . . .
“Thus if we, the American consumers, ever want to have the cure for these diseases, we must be willing to pony up 30,000 percent markups (or even higher) on prescription drugs so that the drug companies can afford to do their all-important research.
PROFITEERING AT ITS WORST
“’But we have to charge enough money to pay for all the R&D!’ That’s what drug companies proclaim while they’re price gouging consumers and taxpayers with the world’s highest prices for prescription drugs. . . .
“Most people don’t know that prescription drugs cost mere pennies to manufacture. But they’re sold for dollars—sometimes hundreds of dollars. Here’s a closer look at the markups found on many popular prescription drugs, as reported by the Life Extension Foundation:
Norvasc - Consumer Price: $188.29 per 100 tabs - Cost of Ingredients $0.14
Prevacid - Consumer Price: $344.77 per 100 tabs - Cost of Ingredients $0.11
Prozac - Consumer Price: $247.47 per 100 tabs - Cost of Ingredients $0.11
Zanax - Consumer Price: $136.79 per 100 tabs - Cost of Ingredients $0.02
“So drug companies put together ingredients that cost a few pennies, they find a disease or symptom that can be altered by the chemicals, then they acquire FDA approval and start marketing the chemicals as ‘medicine’ with markups that may exceed 100,000 percent.
“And then, to add insult to injury, . . . (the government) ‘negotiates’ a Medicare Benefit Program that claims to be saving health consumers millions of dollars by offering them 15 percent discounts on brand-name drugs.
“Clever. Only in America can people be convinced to believe they’re getting a bargain while they’re paying 100,000 percent over cost for chemicals that will actually harm them. . . .
WHERE DOES ALL THE MONEY GO?
“With the FDA/Big Pharma conspiracy enforcing a monopoly drug market in the United States, and with drug companies further bilking state Medicaid programs out of countless millions through fraudulent billing practices, billions of dollars are disappearing from the pockets of consumers and taxpayers.
“The drug companies claim the money is going to find cures for disease. If that’s the case, then why are drug company CEOs raking in the dough with multimillion dollar salaries while our nation’s elderly are starving because they spent their food money on prescription drugs demanded by their doctor? . . . .
“A look at where the money is going . . . . Pfizer (NYSE symbol PFE)
CEO: Henry A. McKinnell (announced retirement July 2006) He received:
$78 million total from 2001-2005 ($15.5 million/year average)
$83 million pension package
SEC 10-Q Filings, August 2006, for 6 months ending June 30, 2006
Marketing and Administration: $7,276,000,000 (that’s billion)
Research and Development: $3,285.000.000
3.9 billion more on marketing than research in 6 months! . . . .
THE REAL COST OF PRESCRIPTION DRUGS
“If you think that paying sky-high prices for prescription drugs is bad enough, prepare to be shocked: Americans actually pay for drugs three times.
“After buying the drug at the pharmacy and taking it, you get to ‘pay’ yet again thanks to the side effects caused by these drugs. Almost all pharmaceuticals, when used long-term, create toxic side effects that harm internal organs: heart, liver, kidneys, brain—these organs are all inevitably harmed by prescription drugs and even many over-the counter drugs. . . .”
EDITOR’S COMMENT:
The Bible has this to say regarding drugs in Revelation 18:23: “…FOR THY MERCHANTS WERE THE GREAT MEN OF THE EARTH; FOR BY THY SORCERIES [DRUGS] WERE ALL NATIONS DECEIVED.” A good concordance will reveal that the word ‘sorceries’, comes from the Greek word ‘PHARMA-KEIA,’ which in today’s English is translated ‘DRUGS.’
Some words taken from this root Greek word would include:
*PHARMA-CY – “The art and science of preparing and dispensing drugs . . .
*PHARMA-CIST – “A person licensed to prepare and dispense drugs . . .
*PHARMA-COLOGY – “The science dealing with the preparation, uses, and esp. the effects of drugs.”
I find it so interesting (and so very sad) that when it comes to the DRUGS called marijuana, cocaine, heroin, alcohol, nicotine, etc., we teach our young people to JUST SAY “NO.” Yet when it comes to a prescription DRUG or an over-the-counter DRUG, we have been programmed to JUST SAY “YES!” Friends, there is not a SAFE DRUG on planet earth! EVERY DRUG is a foreign and toxic substance within the body, that has an adverse effect upon it, and yet, not only are the “nations” being “deceived” with these drugs, but the Christian Community as well. HOW SAD!
Here at Hallelujah Acres, we teach that the body is almost always capable of healing itself without drugs when we bring conditions conducive to health about within, so that the body can do what God designed it to do – HEAL ITSELF! How the body does just that can be found in Health Tip #517. Health Tip #517 is available in the archives at http://www.hacres.com/publications/health_tip.asp?tipid=552&year=2007 . From the home page, in the upper right hand corner, click on the “Hallelujah Health Tip” box, then at the top left, click “Go to Archives”, then “2007”, then Health Tip #517.
If you are not already on The Hallelujah Diet, may I encourage you to give it a try! Hallelujah Acres is a Christian Ministry that teaches health from a Biblical perspective! Hallelujah Acres is trying to help the Christian community (as well as anyone else who will listen) realize that God's ORIGINAL diet, as given by God in the Bible, in Genesis 1:29, was God's perfect plan for the proper nourishment of His human creation. Multitudes have made this diet change that we teach here at Hallelujah Acres, and experienced normalization of weight, as well as the elimination of almost all their physical problems. For more information, visit our website at www.hacres.com or call (704) 481-1700.
