The Rhinovirus War Continues, So I'm Sure You'll Excuse My Tardiness In Passing Along The Latest Developments In Eli Lilly Pud Sucking

You'll also cut me some slack I'm sure, because if you're a regular visitor to my little blog garden, you saw this coming over a year ago. To the January 31st edition of The New York Times:

Eli Lilly and federal prosecutors are discussing a settlement of a civil and criminal investigation into the company’s marketing of the antipsychotic drug Zyprexa that could result in Lilly’s paying more than $1 billion to federal and state governments.

If a deal is reached, the fine would be the largest ever paid by a drug company for breaking the federal laws that govern how drug makers can promote their medicines.

To recap, although really, you should be keeping up with what I write and know all this already:

1) Zyprexa is approved by the FDA only to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

2) Lilly decided they could sell more Zyprexa if they could get doctors to use it for age-related dementia, as the confused old person market will always be one of the most profitable on earth.

3) It is illegal to promote a prescription medicine for a use not approved by the FDA.

4) After Lilly told doctors it would be a good idea to use Zyprexa for confused old people, it turned out that confused old people who were given Zyprexa were more likely to die. That was the whole idea behind making behavior like this illegal. So something like this wouldn't happen.

5) Lilly will probably soon fork over a billion dollars. No one will go to jail. Because while corporations are given the rights of people, including the right of free speech, they have no bodies to imprison.

Don't cry for Lilly though, as I have a feeling they might come out of this OK:

While Zyprexa prescriptions are falling, its dollar volume of sales is rising because Lilly has raised Zyprexa’s price about 40 percent since 2003.

Let's be clear about what we just read. Lilly has the power to jack up the price of Zyprexa to the point where fewer prescriptions written still means more money for them. Yet that wasn't enough. Their greed still led them to conduct themselves in a way that led to a little face time with federal prosecutors.

Here's my favorite part:

Lilly also said that it had always followed state and federal laws when promoting Zyprexa.

"Hello officer?"

"Yes?"

"Here's $500"

"Why are you giving me this?"

"Because I have always followed state and federal laws when driving in traffic, that's why"

"I see, well have a fine day you law-abiding young fellow. You have done nothing to make you look guilty in the least"

Of course if you read carefully, Lilly doesn't say it followed ALL state and federal laws. I guess what they mean is that they followed most of the state and federal laws. Or maybe just some of them. Damn they must have some good lawyers.

Lawyers whom I hope have better things to do than read this blog.

Day 6 Of The Rhinovirus War. By Diverting My Attention Exclusively To My Own Well Being, The Little RNA Packets Affect The Karma Of My Entire World

The text ads in my G-mail account now say things like "Foster a solider, troops need baby wipes, lemonade....."

and

"Airborne coffee, get your caffeine fix while never forgetting those who serve"

A dear friend told me she was going to church for the first time in 10 years.

My world is crumbling. Google thinks I want to help the troops with something other than the $20,000 I already provide them to kill people I would rather see live and Jesus is picking off my friends. I am powerless because I cannot summon the energy to get out of bed. I am sick.

I must defeat the rhinovirus once and for all and begin to make things right. Tell the troops I am quite embarrassed to be giving them what I give them now, thank you very much. Tell Jesus to get his own friends. It will take more than a baby wipe.

Quite honestly, considering some of the pictures I've seen from Iraq, I would think a troop might need more than a baby wipe as well.

At least I still look good. I would rather be sick and hot than healthy and ugly.

Is that a zit coming in on my forehead?

All may be lost.....

On A Day My White Blood Cells Have Their Rhinovirus Attackers On The Run, Highlights From Today's Pill Counting Action.

The good news; my immune system has forced my body's invaders to flee from their headquarters in my lungs and set up a last stand in my sinuses. I would like to think my immune system has fought honorably and with distinction, adhering always to the principles that distinguish humankind from the uncivilized virus. After all, if you defeat an enemy less civilized than you by becoming uncivilized, who has really won? Remember that as you monitor the news from Iraq.

The bad news; no, I didn't get a day off. The following all happened in a pseudoephedrine-induced cloud that wrapped itself around my brain as I was serving my role in the world's economy of making sure the Viagra was where it needed to be for Valentine's Day:

First customer of the day: "WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE IN THESE?"

Me: "You only have one box in your hand sir"

Customer: "What's the difference?"

Me: "I'd buy whichever one costs less"

Customer: "OK"

Sometimes you get the feeling right away the day is gonna be blogworthy.

First phone call: "I just finished my 3rd Diet Coke. Is it gonna keep me up?"

I do take actual drug questions though. Lots of them. Like from the lady today who asked me what alternatives there are to Cosopt.

"I think I'm allergic to that Cosopt" she said. I looked at her profile and noted she had been using the medicine for over 2 years now. "It's probably not an allergy" I said. What seems to be the problem?

"It burns my eye when I put it in now. Do you know what the doctor could switch me to?"

It turned out the woman had been using some Cosopt eye drops given to her by her friend when her husband passed away. They were a year and a half past their expiration date. The customer knew they were a year and a half past their expiration date. This did not stop the customer from putting them in her eye or give her a possible clue as to why they now burned. She was allergic.

"How many times a day do I take these? Just Once?" said the next hour's retard. He then put a bottle of vitamins on the counter. Guess what brand the vitamins were.

C'mon.....guess........

Do I really have to tell you they were One-A-Day Brand?

By the time I got to the lady who phoned to ask "Are your indoor plants kept outside?" I was starting to wear down. Maybe it was the fact I was sick, maybe it was the chlorpheniramine/dextromethorphan cocktail spinning around my brain. Or maybe it was really true.... 5 years of school, 16 years trying to make a difference in people's drug lives...and it was all for naught. In the end maybe I was about as useful as a women's room urinal. Then I opened my company e-mail.

Every week my company sends out a message letting us know how each of its districts are progressing towards meeting the mandates of the overlords at corporate headquarters. Each district is ranked accordingly, with the District Manager's name highlighted for all to see. This week, the best district in the country, and not by a small margin, was headed by a manager named "VACANT"

The knowledge my District Manager is evidently more useless than me made the rest of the day go OK.

Tonight's Environmental Tip. Running A Fever Is A Great Way To Lower Your Home Heating Bill And Reduce Your Carbon Footprint.

It is 62 degrees in the condo as I type this, yet I am wearing a T-shirt and shorts and actually feel kinda warm. I have big plans for all the money I won't be sending to Pacific Gas & Electric this month.

I am shaking a lot though, and moving like only the most feeble of my elderly customers. I wonder if it would take me 15 minutes to make out a check like it does them? Perhaps this is but a little taste of what old age has in store for me. I just now passed on getting some orange juice because I didn't want to invest the time it would take to walk to the kitchen.

On the other hand, the last thing on my mind this night is being all namby-pamby about something like being unable to set foot in a coffee shop, or pondering whether Hillary Clinton is worse than John McCain because a traitor is worse than an enemy. No, the only thing I am worried about tonight is breathing. There's a charming simplicity to that. The cold viruses in my lungs brought with them a little relief into my life. On some level I'll be sorry to see them go.

I Want You To Remember This The Next Time Someone Tells You The Government Can't Do Anything. Especially If You Come Down With The AIDS.

"Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem."

-Ronald Reagan 1/20/1981

Government scientists have discovered a new way that H.I.V. attacks human cells, an advance that could provide fresh avenues for the development of additional therapies to stop AIDS, they reported on Sunday.

-New York Times 2/11/2008

Notice the first two words in that second quote. Government scientists. I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Far more often than you realize, basic research, the hard, needle in a haystack type stuff that is the foundation of breakthroughs, is the result of your tax dollars, not the research budget of Big Pharma. The first AIDS drug came from the government-run National Cancer Institute, and it looks like the next one will be the result of a big government program straight out of Reagan's nightmares.

Tell me again why I'm supposed to be afraid of socialized medicine?

Dr. Fauci, James Arthos, Claudia Cicala, Elena Martinelli and their colleagues showed that a molecule, integrin alpha-4 beta-7, which naturally directs immune cells to the gut, is also a receptor for H.I.V. A protein on the virus’s envelope, or outer shell, sticks to a molecule in the receptor that is linked specifically to the way CD4 cells home in on the gut, the researchers said.

“The work we did took nearly two years, and there’s little doubt that what we have found is a new receptor,” Dr. Fauci said in an interview

I'll translate that for you. The government spent two years combing through a haystack, and now Big Pharma knows exactly where to look. When things like this happen, Big Pharma shows its gratitude to the taxpayer by making sure any medicines that result are discounted to reflect the amount of research they didn't have to do.

I made that last sentence up. In the real world this is how Big Pharma treats the taxpayer:

Merck & Co. Inc. agreed yesterday to pay $671 million to settle allegations that it overcharged the Medicaid program and gave doctors junkets, dinners and other inducements to promote three of its drugs.

By law, Medicaid must get the lowest price for drugs. An exception, called "nominal pricing," enables the drug company to give lower prices to needy charities. Merck was suspected of giving better deals to hospitals than to Medicaid and not reporting those discounts to the government.

In a statement, the company did not admit wrongdoing.

Of course not. They forked over almost 20% of their profit for 2007 because they did absolutely nothing wrong. Kinda funny though how Merck fought the Vioxx lawsuits tooth and nail but quietly paid off Uncle Sam. Just sayin'

I wish we had more problems like the government Reagan hated so much.

I Actually Like This Video Better Than The Last One I Posted.

Your time's coming John.

We must finish crushing Hillary first.

But your time's comin' old man.

Tonight I Surrendered To The Coffee Shop Neurosis

Every other Saturday I go grocery shopping after work, and every other Saturday I tell myself I shall go to the new coffee shop in the store's strip center as part of my trip. It's not a Starbuck's. Nearly universal opinion says it is far better. Every other Saturday I look forward to finally finding out for myself, and every other Saturday I park as far away from the coffee shop as I can and behave as if the coffee shop and I were two opposite ends of a giant polar magnet.

The coffee shop reminds me of an ex. Not so much an ex really as a fling. The most awesome fling ever that really exists...... in the past. There is no reason the coffee shop should remind me of her. I never went to the coffee shop with the flingee. As far as i know I never even had coffee with the flingee. There's no reason, but the coffee shop most definitely serves as a reminder of what was.

So every other Saturday I tell myself there's no reason and every other Saturday I decide I'm too tired to fight it. Tonight I made it official and gave up forever. It's easier to go without a good cup of coffee than to battle irrational neuroses. I'll stick with the Starbucks.

Maybe this is how people go nuts. They just accumulate one ex after another, taking away an inexplicable behavior from each until one day they are convinced Queen Elizabeth has a spy satellite that is beaming instructions into their head from Buckingham Palace. Maybe the insane among us are just the ones who had the most affection to give.

Maybe I need to find someone soon. Then I could be like the people who closed my business day at the pharmacy. Maybe I could be happy like them. Attractive like them. I bet they get coffee together all the time at any coffee shop they please.

The couple's debit card declined at the register.

"Did you transfer the money into our account like I asked you to?"

"DON'T YOU START WITH ME!!!!!" Then she stormed off. Her UTI wasn't gonna get treated unless I got me some currency, but her pride was more important at the moment.

Maybe none of us are sane.

Lloyd DuPlantis Of Gray, Louisiana May Finally Have Some Competition For The Title Of World's Most Evil Pharmacist

Through the magic of the internet, we go to Boston, a town deeply affected for some reason because a group of large men not from there lost a playfight over an air filled leather sack yesterday:

BOSTON—Prosecutors say they cannot press rape charges against a pharmacist who allegedly posed as a gynecologist and examined two women because of a half-century old state law that says an assault can't be considered rape if consent is obtained through fraud or deceit.

Police charged pharmacist Nicholas Creanza with rape after he allegedly lured the women into the back room of his Springfield pharmacy and gave them exams. Because the women consented to the exams, even though they were being deceived, by law it could not be considered rape, Hampden County prosecutors said in dropping the charges.

Creanza was arrested in 2005 after two women told police he assaulted them at the Louis & Clark pharmacy in Springfield.

From the Louis & Clark website:

Louis & Clark has actively anticipated and responded to the health care needs of the people of our region for nearly forty years, bringing it to its current status as the region’s premier independent pharmacy and health care solutions provider, with eight vibrant locations and an unmatched array of services.

I can't argue with them there. Fake gynecological exams by creepy pervs who aren't doctors would definitely be a health care solution unmatched by any pharmacy in the country. I hope.

Louis & Clark also has a button at the top of their website that reads "Get in Touch." I was afraid to click on it.

Thanks to the alert reader who sent me the story.

Sometimes The Customer Is Not The Idiot, Part Two.

The call came in almost first thing in the morning. I talk to this particular pharmacist a lot, and until today I would have characterized her as unflappable. She seemed a little stressed as she asked if we might have any Biaxin she could borrow. Brand or generic. She didn't care.

I can remember a time when it wasn't unusual for pharmacies to borrow pills from each other in order to take care of a customer. These days though, you pretty much always just send them to the store that has the goods. Probably because we care far less about your business than we used to. Hate to break it to you, but as prescription counts go through the roof, your particular prescription counts for less and less. At any rate, the fact she wanted a borrow and the desperation in her voice told me there was a story here. I made its telling the price of my cooperation.

It seems that the day before, another pharmacist at this store named Hillary received a prescription for Biaxin. Having none on the shelf, she filled it with Biaxin XL and told the customer that they could "just scrape off the enteric coating." Hillary then thought better of it later on that night and left a message on the store's voicemail explaining what she had done. Meaning the pharmacist I was talking to walked in the door and started her day having to clean up a giant stinking pile of crap she had nothing to do with.

It wasn't an accident. An actual real, licensed pharmacist thought about it and deliberately dispensed the wrong drug. I swear to God and anything else holy or evil if you are a pharmacist, and you ever work with me, and you ever do anything like this that I have to deal with, I will not kill you. I will torture you in the most possibly painful way I can think of for as long as I can get away with it.

Of course I also wonder what kind of person hears "scrape the coating off your tablets" and considers that to be a sound plan. But pretty much all the blame goes to the pharmacist here, who should be tortured.

Although her name wasn't Hillary. I changed her name not only to protect the guilty, but hoping to create some sort of negative subliminal impression that will help you do the right thing on Tuesday.

For A Generation We Have Been Told.....

That we can't.

That we can't do right by our own people.

That we can't help but to have some losers, because to elevate some we must knock down others.

The powers that be have told us for a generation that we can't change it.

Yes we can.

We've been told that we can't defend ourselves without permanently putting a boot on the neck of others who've never harmed us.

Yes we can. Please list all the sworn enemies of Norway. That you can't do. There aren't any.

But you can stop listening to the chant of can't. You can break the good 'ol boy network of the blue power suit. You can stop the kick down/kiss up society they have herded you into. You can stop the extremely lucrative industry of war. You can take a step towards a day when your moral worth isn't judged by what's in your wallet.

Remember when our dreams were about putting someone on the moon? I don't either. That's how long it's been.

Remember when we even still had dreams? I kinda do, but I'm getting a little old. Today it's all about not sliding backwards.

You can change it though. Honest. You can. They'll tell you otherwise, but there is no such thing as false hope. Most of you will get a chance to take a little step in the right direction on Tuesday. Take it.