Pharmaceutical fraud costs more than taxpayer dollars, it often costs lives. In July, 2012, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) agreed to pay a record-breaking $3 billion in criminal and civil fines, the largest settlement to date against a pharmaceutical company. Allegations against GSK included off-label marketing, kick-back in the form of expensive gifts to persuade doctors to prescribe its products, and failure to report important safety information.

Types of Pharmaceutical Fraud

Pharmaceutical fraud puts patients at risk of injury or death. Examples of pharmaceutical fraud include:

• Providing false or misleading data to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) during the approval process
• Marketing drugs for uses other than those they are approved for (off-label marketing)
• Kickbacks to doctors, hospitals, pharmacies, and other healthcare establishments to induce them to sell specific drugs
• Charging higher prices to government programs such as Medicare and Medicaid then are legally allowed

Dangerous drugs receive FDA approval and go to market when drug makers provide false safety information to the FDA, and are then prescribed and sold to the public without the proper safety warnings.

Kickbacks encourage the prescription of drugs that are not in patients’ best interests.

Off-label marketing gives doctors and patients the impression that the drugs are appropriate for conditions or patients in which their safety is unproven or where they are known to be dangerous.

If you are considering a whistleblower lawsuit involving fraud by a pharmaceutical company, please contact the whistleblower attorneys of Hastings, Cohan, and Walsh, LLP, right away. We can help you receive the maximum award for your efforts and exercise your rights under whistleblower protection laws.