The American unit of Belgian pharmaceutical company UCB SA (UCB.BR) pleaded guilty on Thursday and will pay $34.4 million to settle criminal and civil charges that it illegally promoted a drug for migraines.
The company pleaded guilty to one count of promoting the epilepsy treatment drug, Keppra, in the United States in 2004 for migraine treatment without the necessary approval from the Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
One atypical element here is that the company actually pleaded guilty to a crime.
Another slightly off-key note came from the description of the activities constituting the illegal marketing, per Reuters:
The company was accused of promoting Keppra with posters that claimed it was safe and effective for migraines and cited studies that it also claimed were independent -- but in fact were sponsored by UCB, according to the Justice Department.
In those posters, UCB failed to disclose that its own trials had failed to demonstrate the drug was effective for migraines or that it had backed the studies, the agency said.
Furthermore, per Bloomberg,
UCB’s marketing included sponsorship of doctor-paid 'studies,' posters, publications and oral presentations about the supposed benefits of using Keppra to treat migraines. Prosecutors said UCB failed to disclose that a 2000 study showed that Keppra was not effective in preventing migraine.
So the company did not deny accusations of deceptive marketing, and the suppression of a clinical study that failed to conform to marketing objectives.
But most of the rest followed the usual routine.
The settlement involved some sort of promises of better corporate behavior in the future, per Reuters:
As part of the settlement, the company agreed to implement procedures and reviews to avoid and detect any future similar conduct. As a result, UCB will not face probation, according to the plea agreement filed in court.
The penalty for the company was a fine that appeared to be big:
UCB will pay about $8.6 million in criminal fines and forfeiture and another $25.8 million to settle parallel civil allegations involving false claims submitted to U.S. federal healthcare programs, according to the plea agreement.
However, it was a pittance compared to the revenues generate by the product whose marketing was illegal, per Bloomberg:
Keppra, with 942 million euros ($1.37 billion) in sales last year, is the company’s top-selling drug, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The spokesperson for the government basically said, "that ought to teach them," again per Bloomberg,
'UCB put its pursuit of profits ahead of its obligations to patients,' Ronald C. Machen Jr., U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said in an e-mailed statement. 'Today’s guilty plea and UCB’s $34 million payout should remind drug companies that try to cleverly design off-label marketing schemes that we will not allow them to compromise patient safety.'
However, the company's leaders did not seem the least bit fazed, or contrite for that matter, per Reuters,
'We are pleased to have resolved this matter and look forward to continuing to work with the many organizations with whom we partner to advance our mission of transforming the lives of people living with severe diseases,' said Greg Duncan, UCB's president for North American Operations.
The contrast between the crime his company admitted, involving deceptive marketing and the suppression and a study that failed to fit marketing objectives, and the high minded mission seemed to cause Mr Duncan no cognitive dissonance. Or perhaps "transforming the lives of people" was meant more ironically?
Left unsaid in the brief news reports was whether any individual who authorized, directed, or implemented the bad behavior, including, in this case, the deceptive marketing and suppression of clinical research, would pay any sort of penalty. It seems safe to assume that no one will go to jail, pay a fine, lose a job, or even be demoted. Why the US Department of Justice thought that a small fine and no individual penalties would change corporate behavior, when the profits to be made are so large, in the absence of even a little bit of contrition by corporate leaders, was not exactly clear.
So on and on the march goes. The parade of settlements, sometimes even involving guilty pleas of criminal convictions, now indicates how low the ethical standards of health care organizations have fallen. However, the lack of any consequences to individuals suggests that they have no incentive to rise.
Again, despite promises of tougher treatment of individuals involved in health care corporate misbehavior from the government (see posts here and here), the same old script plays out again and again.
So I get to say twice in two days,,,, pervasive bad behavior by large health care organizations has got to be a major cause of our ongoing health care dysfunction.
So, to really deter bad behavior, those who authorized, directed or implemented bad behavior must be held accountable. As long as they are not, expect the bad behavior to continue.
