Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 8:47 am  

Back on topic - very interesting programme on citizen Arthur on inside/out on BBC north last night.

Seems even his own devotees are turning against him. Forging a letter from a dying man that is pretty low ball behaviour.

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 9:51 am  

Sal Paradise wrote:

Back on topic - very interesting programme on citizen Arthur on inside/out on BBC north last night.

Seems even his own devotees are turning against him. Forging a letter from a dying man that is pretty low ball behaviour.

Some pretty damming accusations against him and his small troika. A massive slush fund from which the top NUM echelon awarded themselves loans, whilst the rank and file batted out a year on strike. His autocratic and secretive decision that he was entitled to a Redundancy package, and without informing, far less obtaining permission from the NUM, writes himself a large cheque in excess of £200k! And what about the hundreds of thousands he's cost the NUM over his antics with that London flat? The very same flat that he tried to buy under Maggie thatcher's Right to Buy legislation, whilst conveniently ignoring the fact it was owned by the NUM!

You have to have a measure of sympathy for the thousands who placed their faith in this guy, and years later find it was their own Union leaders, noses firmly wedged in a Animal Farm stylee in the NUM trough, who royally loved them up the booty.

Maggie must be wetting herself up there......

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 10:51 am  

She wet herself when she got turfed out of No10.
Did you see the blubbering damsel?
Good old Art set the ball rolling.
Even a sacrificial lamb, as such, of the left.

But we got there.

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 11:14 am  

SmokeyTA wrote:

GPS practices in the US are part of some pretty Fsking huge businesses. Thankfully in the UK state control (in the main) has kept us largely from the evil the free market perpetuated in this industry

The Dr's are indeed wrong to do what they did. But if Microsoft for instance were to offer you $500'000 to recommend their product for a use it didn't advertise was part of its capability, but they promised you it was capable of this and provided reams of documentation to back it up would you do it?

Regardless, the Dr's part of the illegal kickback scheme had nothing to do with Merck for example, withholding their data on Vioxx for five years resulting in up to 140'000 cases of serious heart disease nor was it the Dr's who spent $1b fighting the action.

Let's look at that again just to make sure it sinks in. And just add none of this is now disputed. Big Pharma company Merck developed a drug called Rofecoxib (marketed as vioxx) for 5 years they knew that this drug caused serious heart disease. For 5 years they sold Vioxx knowing it caused serious heart problems. The made about $2.5billion per year from selling a drug they knew caused serious heart disease. Merck made, during that time, $12.5billion from selling a drug they knew caused heart disease. During this time up to 140'000 had a heart attack because of it. It is estimated up to 40% of those were fatal.
Merck has spent $1billion fighting wrongful death cases because it's behaviour. It has set aside $5billion for compensation for the up to 60'000 people who died. They had a list of Dr's who had voiced concern about vioxx they set out to discredit. Merck employees sent e-mails about those Dr's saying "We may need to seek them out and destroy them where they live,"http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/drug-company-drew-up-doctor-hit-list/story-e6frg6n6-1225693586492

How many more examples would you need to understand that the medicinal market just doesn't work and free market theory is simply not applicable to some industries?

There are side effects to every drug - I take a number for a heart condition and you can hardly get the pills in the packets for the list of side effects. Viagra was a drug discovered from a side effect

The questions about Vioxx:
1. Did the benefits of the drug outweigh the negatives i.e. did it helps millions - given the size of the sale it must have been widely used. There are plenty of drugs out there with some bad side effects.
2. How many of the 140k had heart attacks as a result of taking the drug and how many would have had them anyway?
3. The question must be asked of the licencing authorities as how a drug with such known side-efects got to market plenty fail at that stage - or did the side effects emerge post general use? Did the drug ever get licenced here?

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 11:26 am  

WIZEB wrote:

She wet herself when she got turfed out of No10.
Did you see the blubbering damsel?
Good old Art set the ball rolling.
Even a sacrificial lamb, as such, of the left.

But we got there.

Only one loser in that battle and it wasn't Maggie!!

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 11:35 am  

Sal Paradise wrote:

Only one loser in that battle and it wasn't Maggie!!

As long as she's resting peacefully now, that's the main.

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 9:15 pm  

Sal Paradise wrote:

There are side effects to every drug - I take a number for a heart condition and you can hardly get the pills in the packets for the list of side effects. Viagra was a drug discovered from a side effect

The questions about Vioxx:
1. Did the benefits of the drug outweigh the negatives i.e. did it helps millions - given the size of the sale it must have been widely used. There are plenty of drugs out there with some bad side effects.
2. How many of the 140k had heart attacks as a result of taking the drug and how many would have had them anyway?
3. The question must be asked of the licencing authorities as how a drug with such known side-efects got to market plenty fail at that stage - or did the side effects emerge post general use? Did the drug ever get licenced here?

Vioxx I think is now licensed again, but now with the side-effects described, and is not often now prescribed. The 140k cases of heart disease were those estimated to be attributed to Vioxx rather than simply general heart disease.

Merck were aware of the issue, they hid their findings and systematically intimidated and attacked those doctors and researchers who tried to bring it to light, that's why it took five years for the truth to be found out.

Drugs do have side effects, however those side effects are part of the prescription decision. What Merck did wrong wasn't that they created a drug which helped some but had a risk of heart attack, but that it hid this risk which meant that it was prescribed to some it shouldn't and offered kickbacks to doctors to prescribe this drug ahead of others whilst hiding this risk but also for symptoms it has never been licensed for

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 10:01 pm  

SmokeyTA wrote:

Vioxx I think is now licensed again, but now with the side-effects described, and is not often now prescribed. The 140k cases of heart disease were those estimated to be attributed to Vioxx rather than simply general heart disease.

Merck were aware of the issue, they hid their findings and systematically intimidated and attacked those doctors and researchers who tried to bring it to light, that's why it took five years for the truth to be found out.

Drugs do have side effects, however those side effects are part of the prescription decision. What Merck did wrong wasn't that they created a drug which helped some but had a risk of heart attack, but that it hid this risk which meant that it was prescribed to some it shouldn't and offered kickbacks to doctors to prescribe this drug ahead of others whilst hiding this risk but also for symptoms it has never been licensed for

The FDA must take some blame here - 80 million people were prescribed this drug 99% of which suffered no side effects and probably enjoyed a much improved standard of 'living' i.e. reduced pain. Merck did hide some the side effects but what cannot be contested the drug did a lot more good than it did harm. If you asked the majority of the patients, knowing the potential side effects and the state of their health, I bet most would still have opted for the treatment.

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 10:07 pm  

WIZEB wrote:

As long as she's resting peacefully now, that's the main.

To see Arthur the broken man he is made it all worth while. The man was only interested in one thing - Arthur, the miners were just puppets in his game. Sadly for Arthur he was outplayed, out thought and out manoeuvred by a far cleverer opponent. He was weighed, he was measured and he was found wanting.

Re: Scargill was right! : Tue Jan 14, 2014 10:41 pm  

Sal Paradise wrote:

Sadly for Arthur he was outplayed

By someone playing with a stacked deck...