RKN Global on Bribery

Bribery involves giving or receiving a financial advantage or another type of advantage so in order to improperly alter the recipient’s behavior. The act of bribery does not have to involve money; it can involve gifts, tickets to events, or special treatment during a business trip, for example.

 

Bribery can affect almost every aspect of our world, from multi-million dollar businesses, to education, from health to politics to transport, and more.  Acts of bribery can have a profound effect on peoples’ lives, and in some cases may even prevent them from getting the right medical treatment they need, or having a say on how their country is run.

 

In one recent case, the founder of the drug company ‘Insys Therapeutics’ faced charges that involve bribing pharmacists, doctors, and other medical staff. The case also involved kickbacks, which are essentially a commission that that taker of the bribe receives for performing a particular function.

 

Prosecutors said that the case involving the company’s founder involved bribes and kickbacks in a bid to boost sales of an opioid spray that is thought to reduce pain in those suffering from cancer. Eighty times more powerful than morphine, the spray, known as Subsys, had been approved by the FDA and was only meant to be used by cancer patients who were suffering from breakthrough pain.

 

 

RKN Global’s founder, Ronald K. Noble, notes that authorities in the United States have been fighting an opioid epidemic throughout the country.

 

While the fight against the opioid epidemic was in full throttle, Insys Therapuetics allegedly offered bribes and kickbacks to medical staff to encourage them to write unnecessary prescriptions to patients, many of who may not have had cancer.

 

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