PA Bill Number: HB2311
Title: Establishing the School Mental Health Screening Grant and Development Program.
Description: Establishing the School Mental Health Screening Grant and Development Program. ...
Last Action: Laid on the table
Last Action Date: Sep 23, 2024
Police department points to Big Pharma as major dealer in drug war :: 01/19/2016
Police officers in one American city are pointing to Big Pharma, rather than addicts on the street, as the true criminals in the nation’s failed war on drugs.
The Gloucester Police Department in Massachusetts received public praise over the summer for an initiative to treat addicts who pose a low risk to residents rather than throwing them into the overburdened prison system.
Now, the department is again in the headlines after it asked followers of its Facebook page to call out the CEOs of major drug manufacturers, and the doctors who sometimes recklessly prescribe their narcotics, as major contributors to drug addiction.
“Prescribers, Pharma … we are waiting. And our patience grows thin. Do you want to be a real conduit to treatment and care, or do you want to be a dealer? Guess which one law enforcement wants you to be? … but we’ll deal effectively with either. Your choice,” the department said in a recent post.
In a separate post, the department listed the names of Big Pharma’s top CEOs along with their respective salaries and contact information. Gloucester police then asked followers to contact the drug industry heads to ask what they are doing to keep doctors’ offices from being the first stop on the road to addiction for so many Americans.
From the post:
Gotta go make some calls…..
Top 5 Pharmaceutical CEO Salaries:
- Eli Lilly — John Lechleiter $14.48 million
jlechleiter@lilly.com 317-276-2000
- Abbott Labs — Miles D. White $17.7 million
miles.d.white@abbott.com 847-937-6100
- Merck — Kenneth C. Frazier
$25 million + cool private jet.
ken.frazier@merck.com 908-423-1000
- Johnson & Johnson — Alex Gorsky $20.38 million
ceo@jnj.com 732-524-0400
- Pfizer — Ian Read $23.3 million
ian.read@pfizer.com 212-573-2323
They’re all on Forbes Top 100 CEO salaries as well.
In 2013 The Huffington Post reported that the 11 largest pharmaceutical companies made $711 BILLION in profits in the last decade while their CEO’s made a combined $1.57 BILLION in the same period.
Now…don’t get mad. Just politely ask them what they are doing to address the opioid epidemic in the United States and if they realize that the latest data shows almost 80% of addicted persons start with a legally prescribed drug that they make. They can definitely be part of the solution here and I believe they will be….might need a little push.
According to the department, a Pfizer representative contacted them less than 48 hours later to discuss ways the company could help.
Gloucester Police Chief Leonard Campanello, a former narcotics officer, says his department is taking this approach because it’s obvious that federal, state and local law enforcement agencies’ previous drug war tactics have miserably failed.
“It’s the next logical step in the so-called war on drugs,” he said in an interview. “We need to change the conversation.”
Currently, medical experts estimate that more than 4.7 million Americans are addicted to prescription painkillers. And a huge portion of those addicted became hooked on the drugs while taking them as prescribed by a doctor.
And the problem could soon grow much worse.
In the fall, major pharmaceutical manufacturers celebrated the federal government’s approval of Oxycontin as an acceptable drug for children as young as 11 years old.
The controversial pain medication got the all-clear from the Federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in August, opening a potential new floodgate of young customers. And those customers are at the leading edge of the pre-adolescent demographic curve when, for many, the lifelong struggle with narcotics abuse begins.
http://personalliberty.com/police-department-points-to-big-pharma-as-major-dealer-in-drug-war/
