[WaterBoard]

You forgot the part about overt fraud in new drugs coming to market where AE's are suppressed and former FDA officials are hired by the drug companies to speed the product to market.

And yes, from my own personal observations in a teaching hospital setting, I think I know a little about the subject.

For your information, the firearm industry is more heavily regulated that the pharma business.

The reason why regulation on the pharma business exists today is because of sins of the past where pharma could not regulate itself.

Example of recent pharma fraud which stripped insurance companies of billions and patients of health:

OxyContin Fine One Of Largest Issued

A federal judge last month ordered Purdue Pharma LP to pay a fine of $634.5 million, stating that the drug maker had misled the public regarding the risk of addiction of the painkiller OxyContin, a trade name for oxycodone. The fine is one of the largest ever levied against a drug company.

The ruling comes after the company and three current and former Purdue executives pleaded guilty in May of this year to felony charges of misbranding with intent to defraud and mislead. Michael Friedman, who stepped down in June of this year as the company's president, current chief counsel Howard Udell and former chief medical officer Dr. Paul Goldenheim also pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of misbranding.

[WaterBoard]

Suppression of adverse reactions by big Pharma?

Glaxo got more bad news on the Avandia front when a Congressional Committee Report found that company executives made a concerted effort to intimidate Dr. John Buse, a diabetes expert, into keeping quiet about some of the Avandia’s safety problems. The report alleged that Glaxo Chief Executive Jean-Pierre Garnier and former research chief Tachi Yamada were involved in the intimidation.

Avandia was once Glaxo’s second biggest selling drug, but sales in the US dropped 48% after the Cleveland Clinic published its heart attack study.