Note to Readers: On Dr. Evil, Lawsuits, and Big Pharma

Racket this morning put out the second part of a series on pharmaceutical industry corruption. Written by my friend and former co-worker, journalist-turned-physician Dr. Matt Bivens, it describes the indescribable mischief caused by a single letter to the editor published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1980. The piece also contains a video exhibit produced during discovery in a lawsuit involving Cephalon, Inc., now known as Teva. The firm’s sales staff decided to have fun discussing how to market its new oral fentanyl painkiller, Fentora® by making a spoof video of the iconic Austin Powers character Dr. Evil. In an unintentional irony, this “doctor” explains how his firm would use (air quotes) studies (air quotes) to convince humanity that Fentora® is the cure for “all breakthrough pain.”

The existence of this video has been reported on before, but Matt struggled to find the actual exhibit at first, even though it had been shown in open court. Eventually he pushed through and found the powerful visual (see the story for the full clip). In conjunction with a basic PACER search on larger pharmaceutical companies showing an awesome number of lawsuits, it led to a conclusion: there must be a sizable quantity of fascinating litigation exhibits that press outlets for whatever reason have either not heard of or ignored.

So, I’m making a general appeal to our readers: if you’re in medicine or law, or any field really, and know of an exhibit or exhibits in a case that could use a little sunlight, please write to [email protected]. A case title or party is really all we’ll need. We’re assigning someone to searching out exhibits and archiving interesting ones, so this might provide a good start. Thanks, thanks for your patience, and hope you enjoy Matt’s work.