Thought I would share the story in case you would like to post it anonymously. A pharmacist in Hebron Ct was supposed to dispense a prescription for liquid propranolol. The mom who is a family friend called me hysterical because the medication looked different. I told her to promptly return to CVS and demand to see the stock bottle and its contents color. It turns out it was the wrong medication she does not know the name of med that was given to her 3 year old daughter, but she was angry & frightened & burst into tears after realizing how serious a situation this was. She asked me what do people do if they don’t know if pharmacist personally to ask these questions. She is supposed to get a call from the DM. I told her to emphasize that Cvs needs to increase staffing levels pronto! I also told her to go public with this but she is afraid to do so as she is a business owner in town. When I told her how many mistakes actually do happen and are covered up she changed her mind and said after speaking to the DM she will decide whether not to go public with her issue!

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Who thought he was off the air called #CPPS #IPPS,
“BORDERLINE DRUGGIES”
How Dr. Drew Sold His Cred to Big Pharma
The health journalist for HLN comes under scrutiny after admitting he helped a major drug company promote antidepressants to consumers.

Drew Pinsky, with fellow CNN host Piers Morgan, during the Turner Broadcasting Television Critics Association winter press tour in Pasadena, California (Mario Anzuoni/Reuters)

On Monday night, Dr. Drew Pinsky’s program on HLN — the network formerly known as CNN Headline News — explored the everyman’s dilemma of “how to tell if your doctor is hooked on drugs.” Informative as the segment proved to be, one surefire signal your doc’s hooked didn’t come up. Any time federal prosecutors release a cache of documents proving that a pharmaceutical company paid your doctor $275,000 as part of a criminal plan to market its antidepressant for unapproved uses, your doctor has a drug problem. Dr. Pinsky is one of many physicians GlaxoSmithKline (formerly Glaxo Wellcome) sent around to trump up Wellbutrin’s potential uses outside of FDA ground rules. His activities, elaborately decorated as a public educational campaign, amounted to a convenient contraption GSK used to launder illegal marketing messages.

“Dr. Drew” is a board-certified addiction specialist who rose to national prominence through his long-running radio show, Loveline, which delivers sexual health and relationship advice to its confused, vulnerable, and curious callers. MTV picked up the show, catapulting the telegenic Dr. Drew into true media stardom. He’s built a wide-ranging career including shows like “Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew,” and since last year he’s hosted a nightly program for HLN. Dr. Drew’s minor empire is built on audiences who’ve grown to trust his medical opinion.

Though GSK pled criminally guilty and will fork out $3 billion in penalties for violations ranging from illegal marketing to misreporting drug prices, Pinsky’s role as GSK’s enabler doesn’t constitute a crime. But the extent to which he deceived his audiences as part of the GSK-prescribed program, which involved town halls, writings, and media appearances, ought to end his career with CNN. Aware that Wellbutrin’s main competition, the class of drugs known as SSRIs, came with the unfortunate risk of lowering libido, GSK’s sales department developed an ingenious plan to use Dr. Pinsky as the face of a public education campaign getting the word out about these side effects and “other effective antidepressants that do not disrupt sexual desire and function,” as GSK’s website said. Other antidepressants then available that didn’t seem to depress sex drive included Serzone, which is now off the market, and Remeron. But both had other complicating factors that made Wellbutrin the better choice in such situations.

Dr. Drew hasn’t apologized and has instead issued a statement saying his comments about Wellbutrin were based on his own clinical experience. That’s the claim most doctors make when pressed about giving remarkably on-message pharma-sponsored talks. Whether or not you buy his claim that GSK’s money made no difference to him, Dr. Drew’s role was suspect in speaking to an audience that was both unwitting of his paid status and medically unsophisticated. Similar to the audience tuning in to him on HLN every night, he was speaking to people who were relying on his medical authority. Clinical audiences have a base of knowledge they can use to evaluate claims that Dr. Drew aired, such as his assertion on one radio program that Wellbutrin can make women multiorgasmic. The general public does not.

The other CNN host facing charges of public trust violation, Piers Morgan, has so far survived calls for his resignation over his alleged but unproven link to Britain’s phone hacking scandal. Now CNN, mired in its lowest ratings in decades, faces a similar decision accompanied by fewer options. When I brought up the Piers Morgan affair in an interview, Turner Broadcasting spokesperson Carolyn Disbrow tried to distance HLN from CNN at large. “You know we’re separate, right?,” she said.

According to documents available on the Justice Department’s website, Dr. Drew broadcast GSK’s intended message while keeping audiences in the dark about being a paid spokesman. Pinsky has also admitted as much in a statement. Although Turner told me that Dr. Drew’s GSK payments “occurred well before the time he became affiliated with [HLN],” Dr. Drew’s habit of taking money from pharma doesn’t appear to end there. ProPublica’s “Dollars for Docs” database reports that Johnson & Johnson paid Dr. Drew $74,500 just two years ago. Was that more undercover messaging? Dr. Drew’s brief statement doesn’t address J&J or the most important questions: what else are we missing, and what’s going on now?

While pondering Dr. Drew’s next move in this scandal, I reached out to Dr. Daniel Carlat, a psychiatrist who once made big bucks giving talks for Wyeth about its antidepressant Effexor. Dr. Carlat went on to redeem himself by founding a pharma-free continuing medical education company, writing about his experience, and is now serving as director of the Pew Prescription Project, which aims at getting the Physician Payments Sunshine law implemented as quickly as possible. Calling Dr. Drew’s actions improper, Carlat says “doctors would think twice about accepting such payments if a strong disclosure law were in effect.” Recently, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services delayed its estimated Sunshine implementation date until January 2013. Though all physicians must make plans for 2013, back in 1999 Dr. Drew could never have predicted the confluence of events that brought his $275,000 deal into public view today.

Dr. Drew happens to sell ad spots on his Twitter account. He dutifully identifies his sponsored messages on Twitter, unlike the messages he delivered for GSK. He tries not to overdo it. “It’s treacherous. I don’t want people to think I’m exploiting my followers,” Dr. Drew once told a CNN reporter. That’s exactly what I’m thinking.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

FORD VOX, MD, is a physician, based in Atlanta, who specializes in caring for people with complex brain injuries. He has written for Newsweek, Slate, and the Los Angeles Times.

How Dr. Drew Sold His Cred to Big Pharma

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/07/how-dr-drew-sold-his-cred-to-big-pharma/259473/

The health journalist for HLN comes under scrutiny after admitting he helped a major drug company promote antidepressants to consumers.

Drew Pinsky, with fellow CNN host Piers Morgan, during the Turner Broadcasting Television Critics Association winter press tour in Pasadena, California (Mario Anzuoni/Reuters)

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U.S. Attorney for Oregon Indicts Three Chinese Nationals for Laundering Drug Money

https://canbynowpod.com/crime/u-s-attorney-for-oregon-indicts-three-chinese-nationals-for-laundering-drug-money/

Three Chinese nationals were indicted by the U.S. attorney’s office in Oregon this week for their roles in a complex scheme to launder proceeds from the sale of illegal narcotics by facilitating the transfer of bulk cash from Mexican drug trafficking organizations.

Shefeng Su, Xinhua Li Yan and Xiancong Su, are each charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering. Shefeng Su and Li Yan were residents of Portland during the time frame alleged in the indictment.

According to the indictment, the defendants’ money laundering scheme was designed to remedy two separate problems: drug trafficking organizations’ inability to repatriate drug proceeds into the Mexican banking system and the restrictions by China’s capital flight laws from transferring large sums of money held in Chinese bank accounts for use abroad.

Drug traffickers are challenged by their inability to transport U.S. currency acquired from the sale of illegal narcotics to Mexico while avoiding detection by law enforcement and Mexican banking regulators. Mexico’s anti-money laundering regulations limit the amount of cash deposits of U.S. dollars that Mexican financial institutions can receive.

As a result, drug trafficking organizations work with professional money launderers to bundle and sell bulk U.S. dollars in order to convert them to pesos, a more readily depositable currency in Mexico.

Meanwhile, Chinese nationals living outside China are challenged by China’s limit on the amount of personal funds that can be transferred out of Chinese bank accounts for use in a foreign country. Currently, China limits these transfers to $50,000 per year. As a result, some Chinese nationals have a need to acquire large quantities of U.S. dollars via other means.

The defendants’ scheme facilitated the transfer of cash between these two groups. Their money laundering organization would facilitate the transfer of funds from the buyer’s Chinese bank account to another Chinese bank account held by the money laundering organization.

Once the Chinese renminbi (RMB) were transferred between these bank accounts, the funds were repatriated back to Mexico and converted to pesos to complete the money laundering cycle. This scheme has been described by some as the “Chinese Underground Banking System.”

All three defendants are at-large and believed to be outside the U.S. This case was investigated by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and is being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Oregon.

An indictment is only an accusation of a crime, and defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

The DEA/judicial system will always try to go after the money… even if they are only getting about 10% of all the illegal substances are getting seized and destroyed…   Nothing like indicting people who are not in the country and unlikely the people will ever get served, jailed and go to trial.  I guess that it is important for those within our judicial system to do something to demonstrate that they are focused on the job at hand.. No matter how futile their actions are.

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This is the first year that I have compared Part D programs for us.  Below is the “short version” of that comparison. Barb has had a part D prgm policy since its inception in 2006 with Silver Script (a CVS Health company) . She went on Medicare disability in 1996 and between 1996 and 2006 all of her medications were paid for “OUT OF POCKET”  It was not unusual during that time frame that for a 90 days supply of all of her medication would cost between $2000- $3000.  One of Barb’s medications required a PRIOR AUTHORIZATION and copay was $600 and change for a 90 day supply.  It wasn’t until last year that one of Pharmacists at the Winn-DIxie that we use while in Florida suggested that I use the “house drug card” that Winn Dixie uses that would bring the cost down to $190 and change for a 90 days supply… CASH AND NO PA… 🙂

Upon returning to our Indiana home, I discovered that at one of the BIG BOX STORES… I could purchase – FOR CASH – the same 90 days supply for < $90.

For 2020 Silver Scripts using the  https://www.medicare.gov/plan-compare/#/?lang=en to compare out of pocket costs of the various Part D prgms… if you are currently on a Part D prgm, all you have to do is create or login to Medicare and they will pull up all your meds to help you compare the costs of the various prgms available in your zip code.

Silver scripts has a stated cost of this particular med of $3520.09 for a 90 days supply and the new policy we are probably going to sign up for lists the cost as $97.42 after the deductible has been met.  With CVS health being the largest pharmacy chain in the country… and Silver Script being one of the TOP THREE PART D PRGMS …one would think that they would be able to purchase this med at or near the same cost as other pharmacies or PBM’s.

They also – sort of – play a trick with the $$ numbers… unless the pt is paying attention… they may not notice that the pt’s cost is the same before the deductible as it is after the deductible has been met… which means … IT IS NOT A COVERED MEDICATION…  pt MAY BE ABLE TO GET IT COVERED VIA A PRIOR AUTHORIZATION…. but still have to PAY HUNDREDS more than the medication can be purchased for CASH at many pharmacies.

Me on the other hand…  I take SIX GENERIC RXS and estimated annual cost via Silver Scripts is $1596.88 and thru the plan we are probably going to sign up for would be $294.24… I would not even meet the $450 annual deductible !!!

Caremark – the PBM that CVS Health owns – has been caught overcharging the Arkansas state employee prescription prgm https://www.kark.com/news/lawmakers-pharmacists-meet-with-cvs-over-regulation-of-pharmacy-benefit-managers/ as well as the Ohio’s state Medicaid HMO prgm. https://insurancenewsnet.com/oarticle/pharmacy-middlemen-reap-millions-from-medicaid

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Dr Mark Ibsen at the Don’t Punish Pain Rally in MT

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Don’t Punish Pain Rally 10-16-2019 from Susie Scott on Vimeo.

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Please pass along advise I was given by a lawyer to contact law schools as it could mean free media attention for the schools!!! Offer them the chance to be in history books. A lawyer suggested I contact my state`s law school, (bedridden twice 5 months after healing from a triple bypass, it took a year for me to find a doctor “after mine retired” that would prescribe both pain med. and zanax thatI have been on for 16 years) I called them but was told I was too far in distance from the school for them to consider my request.

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