The Lancet tells Lundbeck: “It is time to stop issuing platitudes…"

On June 9th, the Lancet, the renowned medical journal of reference, posted on its website an open letter to Mr. Ulf Wiinberg, CEO of Lundbeck. This letter, signed by 63 medical professionals, outlines a number of strong arguments to demonstrate, if need be, that Lundbeck is not actually doing anything to stop the distribution of pentobarbital to U.S. departments of corrections.

The conclusion of the letter “It is time for Lundbeck to stop issuing platitudes and ensure that its products are used properly to benefit human health” pretty much nails the situation down to what it is: Lundbeck’s politically correct posture, followed by more wait and more deaths in the United States, certainly is not a suitable answer to address the problem. Lundbeck even posted a deafening press release on its website that is worth a read, not more.

One media stunt after another, Lundbeck continues to fool even the most active abolitionist organizations in the United States, that naively believe Lundbeck to be truly dedicated to saving lives and to resolving the pentobarbital problem in the best possible time. There has been no such move, no action since the 1st pentobarbital execution of John Duty in Oklahoma on December 16th, 2010… One would hope that any pharmaceutical laboratory would react in a nanosecond when its patients’ lives are at stake!

But if you care to scratch under the surface of this particular scandal, you will find other very interesting facts regarding Lundbeck’s patients. For example, how Lundbeck sells the drug Deanxit to India and Sri Lanka, a drug that is not fit for human consumption in Denmark and elsewhere in the Western world, or how Lundbeck’s famous anti-depressant medication Citalopram drives some of its users to suicide and sometimes even to psychotic moods leading to murders, but Mr. Wiinberg continues to deny the side effects of his magic drug.

This is some kind of record, the kind that should lead to the closing of a laboratory obviously not in the least interested in human health care.

So, no more excuses, no more delay, the solutions exist and are already implemented by Lundbeck to guarantee the safe distribution of two of its products, Vigabatrin and Xenazine. So what’s the hold-up here? No incentive, no motivation to stop its outrageous participation in state-sanctioned murders in the United States??

As for Mr. Wiinberg’s reply to the Lancet, it is a clear demonstration of Lundbeck’s passivity, which has turned into mere criminal negligence. The urgency no longer calls for “continuing the dialog with human right organizations, the medical community and authorities…”; and the issue here is not about “more transparency”, it is about taking action and saving human lives NOW! What else is there to consider when 13 Lundbeck’s patients have already been killed in the United States and 7 more stand to lose their lives on the gurney for the month of June alone, thanks to Lundbecks’s pentobarbital.

Source: The Pentobarbital Experiment, June 14, 2011

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