Japanese pharmaceutical company Daiichi Sankyo Co Ltd has agreed to pay US$39 million to the US over kickbacks it paid physicians to prescribe its drugs, the US Department of Justice said on Friday last week.
Daiichi Sankyo Inc, the group’s US subsidiary, is to make the payment to the US federal government and to state Medicaid programs to settle the allegations, first raised by a former company sales representative who provided evidence of the kickbacks.
According to the department, the company’s actions involved inviting multiple physicians together to lavish dinners to speak on often identical topics and paying them for the speeches.
The doctors were expected to favor the company’s treatments, the prescription of which could cost federal and state healthcare programs.
“Drug companies are prohibited from using lavish entertainment and padded speaker-program payments to induce physicians to prescribe their drugs for beneficiaries of federal healthcare programs,” US Attorney for the District of Massachusetts Carmen Ortiz said in the statement. “Settlements like this one show that the government will continue to pursue healthcare companies that use kickbacks to promote their products.”
The probe into the company’s conduct began when former sales representative Kathy Fragoules filed a complaint on behalf of the US, as allowed under whistle-blower provisions of the US’ False Claims Act, which protects the government against fraud.
Fragoules is to earn a US$6.1 million share from the Daiichi Sankyo payout.
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