Jenson Button - Gullibility in a Bottle?

It kinda sickens me when I see highly paid sports personalities, actors, pop/rock legends promote the use of pharmaceutical wares - be they prescription medications or consumer products.

I understand that careers are short in the above industries, unless you acting capabilities of the De Niro, Pacino ilk.

Jenson Button is a young man, idolized by many. He performs miracles as he travels at huge speeds in his race car - He has a huge fan base and it's probably hard for him to decipher who his real friends are opposed to the hangers-on who, when the chips are down, will leave him by the wayside and move on to the next hero.

I have no personal interest in Jenson Button, McLaren or Motorsports - in fact, I find Motorsports mind-numbingly boring, to me it's akin to watching a goldfish swim in circles... only far more noisy.

For those that don't know... and I only know because I've sat and researched, Jenson Button is a British Formula One driver from England currently signed to McLaren. His interest in driving fueled by his love for Karting from the age of just 8 years of age.

I'm not about to write a biography on Button, if you want to know more use Google as a resource.

I am, however, interested in Button's recent alignment to British pharmaceutical giant, GlaxoSmithKline. Sure, it's purely about the money - sponsorship deals usually are, only in this instance Button, I truly believe, has been misguided by his people, the very same people that will leave him by the wayside when a better child protegee comes along.

Button is currently promoting GlaxoSmithKline's Lucozade Sports, a drink that has been the subject of controversy during the past few years or so. This really isn't my issue with Button's gullibility, naivety,  ignorance... call it what you will.

The one striking fact is that Button is promoting GlaxoSmithKline, a pharmaceutical company that have a very dark history when it comes to the safety and efficacy of medicines in children and adolescents.

Button, ironically, seen here with a whiskey promotion on his helmet [Fig 1], it would appear is all about the money - and why shouldn't he be, his career will be short.

Fig 1

There are other ways of earning money through sponsorship and to align oneself with a pharmaceutical company with an appaling record of disregard toward children may be something Button's advisers either overlooked or were blinded by the sign of the $$$.

This, is for Button, it's for his advisory team, it's for McLaren.

I doubt for one minute that Button or his highly paid PR team will flinch at the following. I can't imagine that they went into this sponsorship deal without knowing what they were advertising and who the manufacturers were... more importantly, the history of the manufacturers behind Lucozade Sports drinks.

Would Button have agreed to the sponsorship deal if he knew that...

The Rohm & Haas Company and SmithKline Beecham P.L.C. agreed to spend about $125 million to clean up the former Whitmoyer Laboratories site in Myerstown, Pa., the Justice Department said. Whitmoyer Laboratories manufactured veterinary pharmaceuticals from 1934 to 1984. During that time, toxic materials -- aniline and soluble arsenic compounds -- were produced, stored and disposed at the site. [1]

A Wyoming jury awarded $6.4 million to the family of a man who killed three relatives and himself after taking the antidepressant Paxil, manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline [2]

British drug regulators warn that GlaxoSmithKline's popular antidepressant Paxil causes depressed children to become more suicidal and should not be prescribed for them. [3]

Two fourteen-year-old students busted Glaxo for lying about the Vitamin C content of the Ribena drink. [4]

British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline finally admits that thousands of babies in the UK country were inoculated with a batch of toxic whooping cough vaccines in the 1970's. [5]

In September 1992 the Ulverston site (then owned by Glaxo Wellcome) dumped several toxic chemicals in the river Leven, without authorisation. The chemicals included trichloroethylene, chloroform, and chlorobenzene [6]

A new BBC documentary exposes how the city of New York has been forcing HIV-positive children under its supervision to be used as human guinea pigs in tests for experimental AIDS drug trials. GlaxoSmithKline embroiled in unethical clinical trials. [7]

US Senator requests documents from GlaxoSmithKline that highlights the company knew about the Paxil suicide risk in children and adolescents but chose not to go public with its findings [8]

GlaxoSmithKline's Rotavirus vaccine linked to infant deaths [9]

GlaxoSmithKline delayed informing the authorities that a controversial drug increased the likelihood of suicide among teenagers. [10]

A US family awarded $2.5 million (£1.6 million) in damages after a Philadelphia jury decided GlaxoSmithKline's antidepressant Paxil, known as Seroxat in Britain, was responsible for their son's birth defects. [11]


A mass immunisation campaign with a Urabe-containing MMR vaccine was carried out in 1997 in the city of Salvador, NE Brazil, with a target population of children aged 1-11 years. There was an outbreak of aseptic meningitis following the mass campaign in which GlaxoSmithKline's Pluserix was administered. [12]

GlaxoSmithKline Argentina Laboratories Company was fined 400,000 pesos by Judge Marcelo Aguinsky following a report issued by the National Administration of Medicine, Food and Technology (ANMAT in Spanish) for irregularities during lab vaccine trials conducted between 2007 and 2008 that allegedly killed 14 babies. [13]

In the largest settlement involving a pharmaceutical company, the British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges and pay $3 billion in fines for promoting its best-selling antidepressants for unapproved uses and failing to report safety data about a top diabetes drug [14]

Way to go Jenson!

Bob Fiddaman


[1] Smithkline and Rohm & Haas to Clean up Toxic Site [1992 - New York Times]
[2] Jury Awards $6.4 Million In Killings Tied to Drug [2001 - New York Times]
[3] Britain Says Use of Paxil By Children Is Dangerous [2003 - New York Times]
[4] Anna Devathasan and Jenny Suo: The Ribena girls [2007 - New Zealand Herald]
[5] UK babies given toxic vaccines, admits Glaxo [2002 - The Guardian]
[6] North's top polluters named [2002 - BBC News]
[7] Guinea Pig Kids: How New York City is Using Children to Test Experimental AIDS Drugs [2004 - BBC TV]
[8] Sen. Grassley Questions Glaxo on Paxil and Suicide Risk [2008 - Wall Street Journal]
[9] Pneumonia deaths seen with Glaxo vaccine: FDA [2008 - Reuters]
[10] Drugs firms face new laws on test results [2008 - The Guardian]
[11] GSK antidepressant Paxil to blame for baby's heart defects, US jury rules [2009 - The Telegraph]
[12] Outbreak of Aseptic Meningitis associated with Mass Vaccination with a Urabe-containing Measles-Mumps-Rubella Vaccine [2000 - American Journal of Epidemiology, Vol 151, No. 5.]
[13] GSK fined over vaccine trials; 14 babies reported dead [2012 - Buenos Aires Herald]
[14] Glaxo Agrees to Pay $3 Billion in Fraud Settlement [2012 - New York Times]

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Glaxo: Beagles, Blacks and Hispanics

This post was going to solely focus on Glaxo's involvement in the AIDS-related drug tests on parentless children in a home for kids with HIV, known as the Incarnation trials.

Sadly, news has just broke of yet more shenanigans by Glaxo, this time from their Verona HQ in Italy.

Glaxo, it appears, have been accused of holding 32 beagle dogs against their will, something which they claim "has no basis in fact" on their Facebook page. [1]

I'll write about the beagles first then move on to the Incarnation trials.

Browndog is an organisation set up to end all experiments on dogs in the UK. I recently joined their Facebook page as news is filtering through that protesters have gathered outside Glaxo's HQ in Verona, Italy. It's alleged that Glaxo hold 32 beagles for experimentation.

This from the Glaxo Facebook page:

[1]

However, Browndog, seem to think otherwise and have posted a recent photo from outside the Verona plant. [2]

2

Glaxo have also responded to a comment claiming that they don't do tests/experiments on Beagles anymore, in fact, they go as far to say that, "Aptuit acquired the Verona research centre from GSK in 2010." [3] They even included a link to back up their claim.

3

Whatever the case may be, Glaxo's Facebook page has been inundated with messages of protests by dog lovers far and wide. It's easy to see why there is such a hoo-har given that beagles are a much loved breed of dog. Here's one undergoing some sort of test [4]

4

Glaxo are no strangers to controversy, in fact this whole post was going to re-hash a story from some time ago but I had to get in the breaking beagle news, if only to play a small part in their release from either Glaxo or Aptuit. In fact, if it transpires that Glaxo have nothing to hide then the title of this post may be changed from, 'Glaxo: Beagles, Blacks and Hispanics' simply to 'Glaxo: Blacks and Hispanics'

Glaxo and the Incarnation trials

So, what exactly were the Incarnation trials and how are GlaxoSmithKline linked?

Well, at the time of the breaking news Glaxo were, through various media releases, named as one of the sponsors in a pretty shameful trial going on at the Incarnation Children's Center [ICC] in New York.

In 2004,  Liam Scheff, an investigative reporter, had gained access to information that foster children at ICC had been subjected to experimental AIDS drug trials. Scheff learned that children were removed from their guardians who had refused to give those they had adopted drugs that were making the children sick. He also learned that children who could not tolerate swallowing the drugs were coerced [forced] to have plastic tubes surgically inserted in their stomachs to ensure that the drugs were administered.

Two days ago I finally managed to track down the BBC documentary, "Guinea Pig Kids", first broadcast on BBC television on Tuesday, 30 November, 2004. The half-hour long documentary, made by Liam Scheff, is harrowing viewing. I've provided the documentary in its entirety at the foot of this post.

If you are looking for an all out attack on Glaxo you'll be disappointed. In fact they are only briefly mentioned. This from the narrator of Guinea Pig Kids, Amanda St John:

In a mass grave owned by the Roman Catholic Church close to Manhattan, over a thousand children’s bodies, including some who were enrolled in the trials, lie beneath a tarpaulin. Officially their deaths are recorded only as resulting from ‘natural causes’.

For months, we tried to get answers from those behind the trials – from Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, where many of the tests were devised. From Incarnation Children’s Centre. From the Catholic Church. And from the ACS; the authority ultimately responsible. None would comment.

The drug companies which have supported trials at Incarnation include some of the world’s largest. Among them Britain’s own GlaxoSmithKline.

They also refused to be interviewed for this program saying only that all trials have stringent standards and are in compliance with local laws and regulations.

You have to watch the documentary to see exactly what Glaxo are suggesting "are in compliance with local laws and regulations." It's pretty grim viewing.

Pay particular attention to what Jacklyn Hoerger has to say. Hoerger was a pediatric nurse who worked at Incarnation for five years.

If they were vomiting, if they lost their ability to walk, if they were having diarrhea  if they were dying; that all of this was because of their HIV infection and to be expected and that we were doing the best we could to save them from that.

It didn't come as my first thought at all to question the medication and since I had worked with pediatric AIDS for many years and had given the medication, I just faithfully gave it as I was told by the doctors.

Guinea Pig Kids also features a 15 year old boy who relives the experience of his time at the Incarnation Children's Center:

My friend, Jolice, she never, never ever liked to take her medicine. So they used to hold her down and force it down her throat. I tell her every single day, ‘please take your medicine; you don’t want a tube in your stomach’. But she didn't listen to me. That’s what she got. And my friend Daniel, he didn't like to take his medicine either and he got a tube in his stomach.

The Guardian newspaper broke the story in the UK, they wrote:

Orphans and babies as young as three months old have been used as guinea pigs in potentially dangerous medical experiments sponsored by pharmaceutical companies, an Observer investigation has revealed.

British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline is embroiled in the scandal. The firm sponsored experiments on the children from Incarnation Children's Centre, a New York care home that specialises in treating HIV sufferers and is run by Catholic charities.

The documentary, as you will learn, highlights how the drugs were being used on the kids just to test the 'toxicity' of Aids medications, one of which was Glaxo's AZT [also known as Zidovudine]

As far as I'm aware Glaxo have never been brought to task about their involvement in these trials. It begs the question, why?

Be they beagles, black or hispanic children, GlaxoSmithKline have a lot of unveiling if they are to be true to their word of clinical trial transparency.

Glaxo's major shareholders include, Dodge & Cox Stock,  Royal Bank Of Canada, Invesco Advisers, Inc, Bank of New York Mellon Corp and Wells Fargo Bank NA.

Glaxo have also recently formed a partnership with F1 racing group, McLaren. Everybody's hero, Jensen Button, is supporting the GSK initiative. If only he knew...

Here's Guinea Pig Kids.

Bob Fiddaman

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VROOM! VROOM! Glaxo Team Up With Formula 1 Aces McLaren

GlaxoSmithKline have proudly announced on their webpage that it has formed a long term strategic partnership with McLaren Group.

Formula 1 racing enthusiasts can now stay awake watching cars go round and round with one of Glaxo's products.

It baffles me why a prestigious British company [McLaren] would want to team up with a company who have such a tainted history and disregard of children and consumers who take their prescription medication.

If McLaren had done their homework they would have learned about GSK's suppression of information in clinical trials, information regarding their diabetes drug Avandia and antidepressant Paxil [Known as Seroxat in the UK]

By teaming up with GlaxoSmithKline it would appear that McLaren are sticking their fingers up to patients who have suffered severe withdrawal at the hands of Glaxo's Paxil, giving the middle finger to those children born with serious heart defects because of Glaxo's Paxil. [See Kilker v GSK] Maybe McLaren are sticking their fingers in their ears and covering their eyes at Glaxo's suppression of information regarding their product Avandia too? Where Glaxo, once again, withheld important safety information from those taking it. Safety information along the lines of "Avandia can cause heart attacks and strokes." Check the report by the Senate Finance Committee, who accused GlaxoSmithKline of knowing about the drug's risks well before they became public.

I could point to the evasion of tax Glaxo have been accused of in the past too [they settled those particular accusations out of court] I'm sure McLaren's legal team would know all about those though, if they don't then one has to ask why, if they do, then they don't mind being associated with the alleged criminal activities of their new partners..

Way to go McLaren!

I look forward to your racing vehicles going round and round emblazoned with the GSK logo...and more than likely one of their products. I can just see it, substitute Marlboro Cigarettes for Glaxo's Zyban.



Enjoy the videos.







GlaxoSmithKline – one of the world’s leading research-based pharmaceutical and healthcare companies – is committed to improving the quality of human life by enabling people to do more, feel better and live longer.

Fid 


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