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Suddenly Panexa doesn't sound so bad

It apparently isn't enough for the pharmaceutical industry to price drugs so high that people in impoverished countries can't afford them. The high prices inevitably result in the production and sale of dangerous fakes, so the drug companies actively suppress the information.

Drug companies collect information about fakes but hide their dirty laundry behind trade secrets claims and PR. The American Prospect's chilling account of Glaxo SmithKline's malfeasance in connection with the trade in counterfeit Halfan (an anti-malarial) in Africa includes more corporate double-speak, denial of responsibility, "misplacement" of records and manufactured excuses than you would think could fit in a single article. The death toll from BigPharma's refusal to publicize and prevent the sale of diluted or fake drugs may never be known but is clearly quite high.

As is often the case, I'm horrified but not surprised that this is going on in the Third World because it is going on right here. In 2002, Kansas City pharmacist Robert Courtney was sentenced to 30 years in prison for diluting the cancer drugs Taxol and Gemzar, killing 17 and injuring many more. Bristol-Myers Squibb and Eli Lilly both settled civil cases arising out of Courtney's prosecution because BMS and Lilly both had records that showed that Courtney sold three times as much of those drugs as he purchased. Both companies denied any responsibility, of course.