TeenScreen - Another Gross Distortion

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By Evelyn Pringle (about the author) Page 3 of 6 page(s)

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"The most shady aspects of the program emerged quickly," he said, the recommended drugs were exclusively new, patented and expensive and were selected by persons with financial ties to Pharma; and the claims of increased efficacy and safety made by the drug companies and State employees, were contradicted by the available science," Jones discovered.

"The pharmaceutical industry purchased the "opinions" of a few key doctors and the endorsement of a few key state administrators, and in exchange they illicitly opened the market for billions of tax dollars spent on dubious and dangerous drugs," Jones said.

Pharma giant, Janssen, took the lead in exerting influence over state officials by creating Advisory Boards made up of State Mental Health Directors who were regularly treated to all expense paid trips and conferences. By influencing 50 key officials, the company knew that it would have a good shot at getting a TMAP list adopted in every state.

For example, Ohio Mental Health Director, Michael Hogan, and California Director, Stephen Mayberg, are New Freedom Commission members who control mental health services in their respective states, and both are members of a Janssen advisory board.

Hogan has proven to be so useful that Eli Lilly has given him a Lifetime Achievement Award. In granting the award it was noted that Hogan had given over 75 presentations at conferences since he accepted the position on Bush's New Freedom Commission.

According to my ace records researcher, Sue Weibert, every conference that she was able to track down that featured Hogan, was sponsored by drug companies, and the group that organized the conference solicited money from pharma to pay the key note speaker.

Hogan is also on TeenScreen's Advisory Board.

In Florida, Flynn has Jim McDonough, the Director of the Florida Office of Drug Control, in her back pocket.

In a March 22, 2004 email to McDonough she griped about paying the Florida gang $120,000 a year and not getting enough in return. We've been working with David Shern and USF for 18 months or so and still haven't got a program going, she said, At this point I'm inclined to re-think the use of our resources. We're sending about $120k to USF annually. ... but ultimately we're not achieving our goals in the community, she wrote.

Flynn went on to tell McDonough that she had to find kids to screen and said, I'm looking for a horse to ride here!

At this point, the NFC, TMAP, and TeenScreen, working together, have managed to weave together a web of key government officials who control funding for the nation's mental health services in states all across the country.

By using TeenScreen, pharma has hopes of roping in 7-12 million new customers, according to Flynn's March 2002 testimony:

The need for increased ... screening is evidenced by the fact that close to 750,000 teens are depressed at any one time, and an estimated 7-12 million youth suffer from mental illness. While treatments are available for these severely disabling disorders, sadly, most children do not receive the treatment they need. Among teens that are depressed, 60-80 percent go untreated.

State Officials Starting To Get Busted

As it turns out, bribing state officials is really not uncommon. In Pennsylvania, Allen Jones discovered that Janssen and Pfizer had both been courting the same guy, Steve Fiorello, the State Pharmacist. Each company had paid Fiorello as a consultant, treated him to travel accommodations, and provided him with educational grants to promote PennMap.

Fiorello was in a unique position. He was paid about $82,000 to oversee pharmacy operations at Pennsylvania's mental health hospitals, and he was also a member of the committee that determined which drugs would be on the PennMap list for doctors to prescribe at those hospitals.

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