When Health Care Gets Ugly - Pfizer to Pay $2.3 Billion for Fraudulent Marketing of Bextra-

Health care should be a field that gains the trust of the public for better quality of life. However, when comes to the line between ethics and profits, people tend to become greedy... money is the thing they choose in the end and people lives being put in danger...

Here's the excerpt of the news...

"WASHINGTON – American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer have agreed to pay $2.3 billion, the largest health care fraud settlement in the history of the Department of Justice, to resolve criminal and civil liability arising from the illegal promotion of certain pharmaceutical products..."

"...a felony violation of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act for misbranding Bextra with the intent to defraud or mislead. Bextra is an anti-inflammatory drug that Pfizer pulled from the market in 2005..."

"In addition, Pfizer has agreed to pay $1 billion to resolve allegations under the civil False Claims Act that the company illegally promoted four drugs – Bextra; Geodon, an anti-psychotic drug; Zyvox, an antibiotic; and Lyrica, an anti-epileptic drug – and caused false claims to be submitted to government health care programs for uses that were not medically accepted indication..."

"Illegal conduct and fraud by pharmaceutical companies puts the public health at risk, corrupts medical decisions by health care providers, and costs the government billions of dollars," said Tony West, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division."
(Full text of news here)

From another website, here's the excerpt...

"The FDA rejected a company application to market the drug for uses like that because the benefits didn't outweigh the risks, mainly cardiovascular problems. Bextra was approved to relieve arthritis pain (10 milligrams once a day) and menstrual pain (20 milligrams twice a day). But Pfizer touted Bextra heavily for other conditions and at higher doses anyway..."

"...encouraging doctors to start patients at high doses of Bextra--eight times the approved starting dose in the case of migraine patients..."
(Full text here)

Utada Hikaru 宇多田 ヒカル

I believe the name "Utada" is known by the public even for those who do not listen to Japanese songs much. Apparently, she was popularly known by her famous love song "First Love" in 1999, as the theme song for the popular Japanese drama "majo no jouken" (魔女の条件). Apart from "First Love", there are other 4 songs which were the theme songs of popular Japanese dramas: "Can you keep a secret?" for "Hero", "Flavor of Life" for "hana yori dango" (日本流星花园), "Prisoner of Love" for the big hit and full of controversial drama "Last Friends", and the latest "Eternally -Drama Mix-" for "Innocent Love". As I know, Utada is among the artists that has most songs become the theme songs of popular Japanese dramas. Big applause for Utada!!!

Tonight, as I saw 8tv Quickie was giving out Utada latest English album "This is the One" for lucky winners, I think it is already the time for me to write something about Utada here. Utada songs are never the same as other pop songs, as she is the songwriter for all her own songs, she got her own unique ideas towards music and always let her feelings free flow in her songs to the best. Never be forgotten, beside the unique music, her lyrics are another awesome strength that lure the listeners into her music world. Even though she is only 16 years old when she wrote the song "First Love", Utada love song had attracted millions of listeners. Throughout the years, from experience of marriage to divorce, and also the hard times when she suffered from ovarian tumour, once again she returned with the album "Heart Station" with more mature lyrics and more complicated feelings in her songs. "Flavor of Life" described the feeling of a girl with relationship problem and the way a girl handle it; and "Prisoner of Love" which perfectly portrayed the situation of the characters in the drama "Last Friends" where the characters strive to live on with the controversial relationships.

She has never failed with her Japanese songs, however, when she decided to go for American market in 2004, the response for her English songs was a failure. Utada Japanese style of songs being applied in English songs could not make it through. Over 5 years, this year, she once again stepped on the international music arena with her brand new album "This is the One", with the big hit "Come Back to Me", we know she gonna make it this time. This is the first time I can listen to her English song "Come Back to me" over and over again for more than 10 times per day as no different from her Japanese songs. I thought to myself, "She did it!" In "This is the One" album, we can feel her deepest honesty. She even admitted her betrayal towards her husband in the song "Come Back to Me". In other songs, she wrote in many of her deep feeling and ideas and even her own lifestyles. Through this album, I can say, her distance with her listeners has narrowed. We can feel what she feel, we understand what she went through, and we encourage and support her.

Finally, Utada English songs has gained recognition in the Asia market. We all satisfied with her hard work this time, and we really appreciate her songs which have accompanied us through happy and sad, easy and hard, high and low times. We hope from the bottom of our heart that we can listen more and more Utada songs in the future. Utada, gambatte ne!!!