AstraZeneca Pays $520 Million in False Claims

This is a wonderful example of Medicaid fraud at its finest. The makers of Seroquel were promoting the anti-psychotic drug for "off-label" usage. Allow me to provide a working definition for "off-label".

CHILDREN

That's right, Seroquel is the darling of the child welfare industry. Seroquel is used as a chemical restraint in foster care. The drug is instantly prescribed to children who show any desire to return home or who speak out on the abuses in foster care.

Seroquel, is the favorite of residential institutions for children as it immediately qualifies a child for the higher level of placement care.

Seroquel, in all its glory, has extreme side effects ranging from tardic dyskenisia to horrifying conditions of endopresis. Seroquel will allow a child to meet the criteria for Individualized Education Programs, or as we all know as special needs.

Seroquel will cause heart attacks in 8 year old children. Seroquel will take a child lab rat to the brink of suicide.

But the miraculous beauty of Seroquel is that not one penny of the false claims was recouped in child welfare.

After all the arduous work of the Health Care Fraud Enforcement Task Force, children will continue to be pumped with anti-psychotic drugs and dumped in the money making world of foster care fraud by burying this story.

Department of Justice
Office of Public Affairs
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Pharmaceutical Giant AstraZeneca to Pay $520 Million for Off-label Drug Marketing

AstraZeneca LP and AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals LP will pay $520 million to resolve allegations that AstraZeneca illegally marketed the anti-psychotic drug Seroquel for uses not approved as safe and effective by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services’ Health Care Fraud Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) announced today. Such unapproved uses are also known as "off-label" uses because they are not included in the drug’s FDA approved product label.

The Wilmington, Del.-based company signed a civil settlement to resolve allegations that by marketing Seroquel for unapproved uses, the company caused false claims for payment to be submitted to federal insurance programs including Medicaid, Medicare and TRICARE programs, and to the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program and the Bureau of Prisons.

Under the terms of the settlement, the federal government will receive $301,907,007 from the civil settlement, and the state Medicaid programs and the District of Columbia will share up to $218,092,993 of the civil settlement, depending on the number of states that participate in the settlement. The allegations were originally brought in a lawsuit under the qui tam or whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act and various state False Claims Act statutes...more

CORPORATE INTEGRITY AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE OFFICE OF INSPECTOR GENERAL OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN...

I can only hope that the federal portion of the settlement goes towards ending Medicaid fraud in child welfare. May is National Foster Care Propaganda Month.

Happy Child Abuse Propaganda Month!