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Monday, May 30, 2005

Big Pharma's bad news shared by at least one generic manufacturer

Able Laboratories-a manufacturer of over 40 generic medications- has stopped production and recalled its products.Its history of problems with the FDA are outlined here.
Its CEO has quit and the company's president has taken over. Apparently the company has had problems since 1992 and have been under surveillance by the FDA, had been previously fined and some its officials had been forced to resign earlier. Manufacturing problems and quality control issues have been on the table for quit a while. This is the kind of thing that must make patients feel angry and betrayed to the extent they were coerced by their insurance plan's pharmacy management company to accept generic drugs.
Interesting reading is a 1989 FDA report
on several generic drug manufacturers problems which documents some egregious behavior by several companies (including bribing an FDA chemist) but finds no violations for Abel Labs, their problems apparently surfacing a while later.

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