Pharmaceutical Giant Gilead Spent $259 Million Bribing Doctors and Hospitals to Push Deadly Drugs on Patients
Between 2013 and 2019, American pharmaceutical corporation Gilead spent at least $259 million bribing doctors and hospitals to promote the company’s drugs, many of which cause serious side effects and death.
According to reports, $178 million went directly into doctors’ pockets while another $81 million was funneled into hospitals across the United States that were encouraged to push Gilead products on patients.
In 2019 alone, the data shows, Gilead paid off as many as 21,833 physicians to prescribe the company’s drugs to their patients.
Gilead also launched a $3.3 billion hepatitis C elimination project in the state of Georgia that has reportedly killed at least 249 enrolled patients, according to leaked documents obtained by Arms Watch.
The cause of death of some of the patients was reported as “unknown” in confidential Gilead reports. Other patients became so seriously ill taking whatever Gilead was giving them as “treatment” that they had to withdraw – and some of the folks who withdrew later died.
Gilead has been pushing its hepatitis C drug “Harvoni” not just in the U.S. but also in Canada and Portugal. In all of these countries, patients are dying from the drug, according to data obtained from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
“Despite the severe side effects from these Gilead hepatitis C antivirals the pharmaceutical company has listed none of them so that patients can make their informed decision,” Arms Watch reports.
“Instead, Gilead has paid kickbacks to doctors to prescribe these drugs without patients being informed about the possible risks.”
