Merck Takes Their Deceptive Products To A Whole New Level

Pharmaceutical companies have used dubious means to get their products to market for decades. Whether it be an onslaught of advertisements showing happy people in a park or a guy smiling at his wife, paying off members of Congress, having their top-level employees work at the FDA or throwing gobs of money at universities to do biased research, there are many means for Big Pharma to make astronomical profits. Even with all that, Merck has redefined deception with their latest tactic to convince people their products are safe and effective.

From Attorney at Law:

Merck & Co., the pharmaceutical Goliath behind Vioxx, Gardasil, and other big-name drugs, allegedly paid the medical publishing firm Elsevier to crank out a make-believe medical journal that was nothing more than a marketing tool designed to promote the company’s products under the guise of legitimate medical research.

The journal, called Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, was used to publish favorable research and data on Merck drugs. Merck then quoted the fictitious research in promoting its drugs as being safe. But the purported journal cannot be found on the Internet and it’s not registered with Medline, the medical journal database, leading some to call the publication a scam.

Despite the good things companies like Merck develops, every drug manufactured is tainted by methods such as creating fictitious medical journals...and all other means of deception. It is a real shame that there are pharmacists out there that want to help people, but the people that control the budget (along with some of the doctors) ruin the industry with their greed and avarice. Putting profits ahead of people, especially in the context of health care is extremely dangerous to say the least.

Now that Congress is gearing up to tackle health care reform, legislators might want to pay attention to stories like this, and ignore Merck's (and Pfizer, Amgen, etc etc) lobbyists. When we look at the facts of what goes on, both in the pharmaceutical and insurance industries, only then can something be done about the problems we face.

Merck, Gov. Rick Perry and $45,000=?

There has been a lot of talk as to why Gov. Rick Perry came out in support of a mandatory vaccination of Guardasil for teenage girls ages 12 and up in Texas schools. Well forget the rank hypocrisy of those that pander to the religious right and forget about advocating for the safety of teenagers. You can also forget about the debate over teen promiscuity and if this action encourages it.

What it all boils down to is the money. It really is that simple with this Republican governor.

From Rawstory:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) says that it's just a coincidence that he and eight other lawmakers received donations of $5,000 each from Merck lobbyists just a few days before mandating the drug giant's HPV cervical cancer vaccine for all females in Texas ages 12 and up.

"There's been a lot of pressure about the implications of vaccinating young girls against sexually-transmitted diseases," says CNN's Ali Velshi in the video below, "some people thinking that that encourages promiscuity at that age."

He reports though that "this thing is coming undone by word, rumor and report of connection between Rick Perry's office and Merck."

Governor Perry says that is just a coincidence that he received $5,000 from Merck along with eight other lawmakers days before his decision came down. It is also just another coincidence that his former chief of staff is now a lobbyist for Merck.

How many coincidences does it take for people to get what is going on here. All we need to do is follow the money and the connections. Merck now realizes the folly of their actions and is pulling back from lobbying the drug. The question is if they are backing down quick enough to avoid the consequences of being seen as the dirty drug dealers that they are.