Sanofi-Aventis fined for $500k drugs deal linked to prescription sales
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25515016-23289,00.html
Adam Cresswell, Health editor | May 21, 2009
Article from: The Australian
DRUG giant Sanofi-Aventis has been slapped with a $25,000 fine for striking a groundbreaking but controversial sponsorship deal that was expected to funnel $500,000 a year into one of Australia’s top medical research institutes to help fund its work.
The ruling, by the watchdog committee that polices the pharmaceutical industry’s code of conduct, found the deal with Melbourne’s Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute had the potential to interfere with a doctor’s independence.
The decision — which has yet to be finalised, and may yet be subject to an appeal by Sanofi-Aventis — may cause a funding headache for the Baker.
The institute had previously warned that traditional corporate donations had significantly reduced in the current economic climate, and justified its involvement with Sanofi-Aventis by saying it was exploring innovative funding streams that did not compromise its independence.
Under the sponsorship deal, revealed in The Australian late last month, Sanofi-Aventis had agreed to pay the Baker 25 cents for every packet sold of its top-selling clot-busting drug Plavix — one of two brands of a drug that were together the third-biggest drain on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme in 2006-07.
The arrangement was promoted in an advertisement carrying the logos of both organisations in the GP newspaper Australian Doctor this month.
The advertisement said $100,681 had been donated to the Baker so far, and the institute said on its website it expected $500,000 annually from the deal.
The Baker has since defended the arrangement, saying it had been developed in line with the code of conduct and the institute did not believe it would lead to inappropriate prescribing of Plavix, one of a tightly regulated group of medicines that requires doctors to get permission over the phone from a PBS official before they can prescribe it.
But the code of conduct committee, run by the industry body Medicines Australia, found the deal breached a provision of the code that banned anything that would “interfere with the independence of a healthcare professional’s prescribing or dispensing practices”. It imposed the fine and found Sanofi-Aventis had to “cease … linking a donation or sponsorship via script sales”.
Sanofi-Aventis declined yesterday to comment on the findings or any possible appeal, saying it had yet to see the minutes detailing the reasons for the ruling.
Baker IDI director Garry Jennings said he was disappointed by the decision and would wait to see if the arrangement could survive in a modified form. But he said the Baker was a “robust organisation and financially sound”, and its future would not be in doubt if the funding stream were to evaporate.