Schering-Plough's bad luck couple?

Sean McNicholas was Vice President Marketing, Endocrine Care, Pharmacia, responsible for Genotropin marketing until the year 2001. His boss' boss was Carrie Cox, President, Pharmacia.

Pharmacia, a subsidiary of Pfizer, Inc., was later charged in federal court with offering a kickback in the year 2000 in connection with its outsourcing contract for its human growth hormone product, Genotropin. The company agreed to plead guilty to the charge and pay a criminal fine.

Additionally, Pharmacia entered into a Deferred Prosecution Agreement with the Government for its illegal promotion of Genotropin for such "off-label" uses as anti-aging, cosmetic use and athletic performance enhancement:

"From in and about January 1, 2000 . . . the defendant did, with intent to defraud and mislead, introduce . . .  Genotropin . . . intended for use for anti-aging treatment and other Unapproved Uses, without the FDA approval required."

As a result of the criminal plea and Deferred Prosecution Agreement, the company paid a total of $34.7 million.

Sean McNicholas is now Schering-Plough's Senior Vice President, responsible for ZETIA and VYTORIN, reporting directly to Carrie Cox, who dumped $28 million SGP stock last year.

After an unexplained two-year delay in releasing results of the Vytorin study; a brief change in the primary endpoint orchestrated by unknown executives without the involvement of their lead investigator, and the naming of an independent review panel boasting members with financial conflicts, Schering-Plough was forced to release the data.

The SGP stock promptly dropped 20%.

Oh, and did we mention, prior to her job as President Pharmacia and President Schering-Plough, Carrie Cox was Vice President, Women's Health Care at Wyeth, responsible for marketing of Prempro and for Pondimin and Redux, two slimming products?

In September 1997, the FDA requested the withdrawal of Pondimin and Redux and Wyeth ended up paying well over $20 billion in class action settlements to women who alleged heart valve damage.

In 2002, millions of women quit taking Prempro, after an 8-year study was halted by the NIH after five years. The study by the Women's Health Initiative included 16,000 women and found that women who received HRT had significant increases in breast cancer, heart attacks, strokes, and blood clots.

Within 3 months after the study was released, Wyeth's stock had fallen more than 55%, eroding its $48 billion in market value, according to TradingMarkets.com on February 28, 2007.

BrandweekNRX suggests Congress asks the following questions:

1. As Senior Vice President for Vytorin, did Sean McNicholas have any role in the two-year delay, brief change in the primary endpoint, and naming of the review panel?

2. Did Sean McNicholas dump his SGP stock options last year, just like Carrie Cox?

3. As Vice President for Genotropin, did Sean McNicholas have any role in offering kickbacks and illegal promotion of Genotropin?

Comments

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