Whoops !  Billion Dollar Best Selling Cancer Drug Found to Cause Cancer and to Speed Up and Hasten Death !

 by James Boyne

OpEdNews.Com

If you are a regular viewer of the Nightly News (any channel) you may have noticed that nearly every commercial is for a prescription drug----to cure everything from heartburn, headaches, stomach distress, arthritis, diarrhea, constipation, depression, anxiety, itchiness, erectile dysfunction, female sexual listlessness, high blood pressure, sleeplessness, restlessness, diabetes, asthma, allergies, and all the other normal maladies that we all leave the house with and go to work with every day.

You may have noticed one particular commercial for anemia which can be caused by cancer and the consequences of the necessary chemotherapy. I have seen this ad over 300 times. It features a kindly, elderly, gray haired gentleman who appears weak and tired. He is talking to his concerned wife about his tiredness, weakness and lethargy. Beautiful, soothing music plays in the background; his dog is by his side; the man is standing in front of his “bed  and breakfast” house; the grass is green; the sky is blue; but he looks discouraged. Then, Procrit, the chemotherapy drug comes to the rescue.

The commercial advises people who are taking chemotherapy for cancer to “ask their doctor if Procrit is right for them”. Naturally, the ad says that this drug may cause the normal assortment of side affects: stomach distress, bleeding, headaches, liver problems, stomach ailments, strokes, heart palpitations, or whatever the laundry list of side affects that all the other drugs come with.

In the final scene, the kind gentleman is seen after his Procrit therapy, and he is vibrant, energized, happy and healthy. “Ask your doctor about Procrit” is the final statement.

Well, Oooops!  The New York Times reported in a half page article on 10/17/03 that this multi billion dollar, blockbuster, best selling drug not only has been found to be ineffective; it actually may cause a cancer victim to get worse, have their cancer spread, and it may actually hasten a person's death. Yes, this is the top selling product of our exalted pharmaceutical industry that spends millions on research but billions on advertising, marketing, sales rep salaries, gifts (calendars, pads, pencils, pens, seminar trips, catered dinners, etc), $50 million CEO salaries, and free samples forced on the doctors. And they have taken over the airwaves with all the TV commercials.

The New York Times said, “A drug widely prescribed for anemia in cancer patients and believed to help radiation work better did not prolong life and might have even impaired cancer treatment in some patients, a study in Europe has found.”

Procrit is made by Amgen and sold by Johnson and Johnson for $500 to $1000 a shot. And one would think that a cancer patient with anemia would need many shots.

According to the New York Times, the European study, which was much more comprehensive than the American clinical trials was conducted at 23 medical centers in Germany, Austria, France and Switzerland.

In the test of 351 mouth and throat cancer patients that took erythropoietin, which is the Hoffmann-La Roche version of Procrit, 180 were given the real drug and 171 were given placebos. How would you like to be one of the guinea pigs given a placebo when your life was on the line. Well, in this case you would have been better off because slightly more patients taking the real drug (61%) died, while only (52%) taking the placebo died. The 351 cancer victims would have been better off all getting the placebo.

You are probably scratching your head now wondering how this could happen. This type of commercialization of prescription drugs is now rampant in the pharmaceutical companies. Many drugs are not only worthless or at the very least, of dubious value, but are stratospherically priced to drive everyone into the poor house or cause insurance premiums to skyrocket.

The New York Times stated “The results prompted the researchers to speculate that the drug might contribute to worse outcomes, possibly by helping cancer cells grow or helping tumors develop their own blood supplies. But what actually happens is still not known”

Can you imagine a drug being approved that costs $500 to $1000 a shot and that touts itself as something that will save your life, being worse than a placebo. I would be damn mad. The pharmaceutical industry is plundering and pillaging the American public. To get the real flavor of how and why the health insurance industry and pharmaceutical industry will be the catalyst that will destroy the American economy and our way of life (and death) read my article Living Sickly, Dying Quickly.

This latest New York Times article is a perfect example of the lust and greed for profits at the expense of sick and dying people who are desperate and will pay any price to save their life.

Naturally, in the Times article, drug company spokesmen and executives attempted to explain away and play down the significance of this new finding.

Several weeks ago another New York Times editorial revealed that drug companies never do what is called “comparative testing”. They always test their new products against a placebo, never against another rival product, and never against one of their own similar existing products that is being phased out because it is going off patent. I was shocked when I learned this. I always thought that all drugs were tested and tested and tested and tested against all their competitors and against existing in-company drugs. Nope. They are only tested against the infamous “placebo”.

The end result is you never really know which drug may be better than any other drug, except for the drug company’s outrageous claims that it is the best and the most effective and that more doctors recommend their drug than any other drug.

The Times stated that the Amgen spokesman (for Procrit) said it “needed more study”. They are making billions on a bogus drug that can’t compete with a placebo and they say it “needs more study”.

Another independent clinical cancer researcher from Boston said “I actually was amazed to read this. It’s very provocative and it’s going to stir a lot of controversy”.

The New York Times article quoted a medical oncologist at the Mayo Clinic who said, “he and his colleagues had also studied about 320 patients with advanced cancer who took either Procrit or a placebo, and found Procrit did not help survival.

I say lets call a spade a spade. It sounds like old fashioned snake oil to me. The quinine water of the 1860’s that cured every ailment known to mankind marketed by the horse and buggy traveling con artist as he traveled from prairie town to prairie town.

According to the Times article, another Mayo clinic oncologist said, “Its is a very important study, and it  points out the importance of well-executed and designed controlled trials. Our theories aren’t always substantiated. Patients should beware, and doctors shouldn’t prescribe medications on the basis of small studies. We’ve been fooled before”

I wonder if the drug companies are going to refund the money spent by the patients who died, thinking they had hope and that they would recover.

Pharmaceutical companies, with their fraudulent clinical trials, deceitful and deceptive TV commercials and print ads, and the total commercialization of the marketing of prescription drugs need to be controlled by tight Federal regulation. The so-called R&D is going into the hiring of hundreds of thousands of pharmaceutical sales reps, gigantic advertising and promotional campaigns, and into the pockets of CEO’s and top executives making up to $50 million a year.

I am a former staunch, diehard, conservative Republican who voted for Goldwater, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush I and Bush II. I blame the Republicans in particular for the protection of the pharmaceutical industries flagrant deceit, deception, dishonesty, extortionist pricing system, monopolistic practices, and their legal interference with and the perversion of the patent laws. They are supposed to be the protectors of our health; a trust that the American public has granted to them. Instead they are interested only in control, power, money, greed and profits. And not just in America. They are scouring the world for new markets to plunder. Your sickness, injury and illness is in their best interest. They are the arch special interest group donating tens of millions of dollars to Bush and the Republicans (for future favors no doubt).

In 2004 I will support the one candidate that has honesty, integrity, compassion, empathy, straightforwardness, common sense, energy, drive, ambition, and “fire in the belly” to be one the greatest Presidents we may ever have, Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio). He is one of the only candidates that has a well thought out position on all the issues and can verbally and intelligently articulate them in an enthusiastic manner. He is little known. He is at the end of the pack. He has the SeaBiscuit passion though, and he can come from behind and win the day for all Americans. He is a progressive, populist, liberal Democrat but don’t stick him with a label. He is a man for everyone----seniors, small businessmen, blue collar workers, white collar workers, executives who are fed up paying half their profits for workers comp and health insurance premiums, and young college students struggling to find a job and pay off their debt.. He is a man for women’s rights, equal rights, minority rights, majority rights, and American rights. He is patriotic but doesn’t want to attack Iraq, Iran, Syria, North Korea, Cuba and Lebanon all in the same weekend. He doesn’t want to give $600 billion to hire teachers, build schools, roads, infrastructure, electrical grids, water systems and pay bribes to Iraqi’s so they will stop shouting “Death to America” after we have liberated them. He is a man of logic.

Dennis Kucinich knows that a Big Private Corporation like the pharmaceutical industry and the health insurance industry can be just as counter productive as a big Federal Program, if it is not run well and not run for the benefit of the nation. He is for universal health care for all and he has a well thought out plan on how to pay for it. Tens of thousands of doctors and health care workers support universal health care. It can be done. It can be run more efficiently and effectively and honestly than the system we have now which is out of control. For more information on Dennis Kucinich you can visit his web site at  www.kucinich.us. You will be impressed, as I was. You’ve heard that expression that we have to “think out of the box”. Well for 2004 that is surely what America has to do, “think out of the box”, and elect a man who has a vision and the drive and will to carry it out.

Read  Living Sickly, Dying Quickly for a sobering look at what is happening to America and its health care system.

And “Ask your doctor if Procrit is right for you”

James Boyne

dboyne@aol.com