Connecticut files racketeering suit against Eli Lilly

How out of control are the makers of psychiatric drugs?

Eli Lilly & Company - whose top personnel have included prominent Republican politicians ranging from Mad Dog Bush to embattled Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels - is now the target of a RICO lawsuit filed by Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal. Connecticut contends the company illegally marketed its antipsychotic drug Zyprexa for unapproved uses and hid the drug's side effects for over 10 years. The risks from Zyprexa that Lilly covered up include heart problems, diabetes, and even unnatural weight gain - yet the drug was being marketed even to children.

As part of this pattern of racketeering, the company bribed public officials and marketed Zyprexa for childhood depression, ADHD, and sleep disorders even though the drug was never approved for these conditions or for children. Many consumers are still suffering serious side effects. Blumenthal called it a "sick marketing mindset" and "fierce greed." In some states, public officials who received Lilly bribes promoted Zyprexa for unapproved uses in juvenile detention centers, psychiatric facilities, and nursing homes. Lilly also bribed doctors and pharmacies to promote Zyprexa.

An incriminating e-mail by current Lilly president John Lechleiter was unearthed in a lawsuit against the company filed by the state of Alaska on behalf of patients who developed diabetes while using Zyprexa. Lechleiter - who was then Lilly's executive vice-president for pharmaceutical products - encouraged promoting Zyprexa for unapproved uses. He told the Indianapolis-based drug giant to conjure up data on using the drug to treat "disruptive kids" just to boost its sales (despite the fact that Zyprexa wasn't approved for children). Promoting a drug for such off-label uses is a federal crime.

After the New York Times reported this smoking gun, Eli Lilly & Company then had the unmitigated nerve to deny the whole thing.

Are the programmies going to keep pretending psychiatric drugs aren't overprescribed and that the drug makers are perfect angels? Think of all the unethical activity drug companies commit but just aren't caught for. Anyone who'd still trust the pushers of psychiatric toxins after reading all this is a lost cause.

(Source: http://ahrp.blogspot.com/2008/03/state-of-connecticut-files-rico-lawsuit.html;
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/14/business/14cnd-drug.html;
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/14/AR2008031404466_pf.html)