The state government of Kano, Nigeria, filed criminal charges against the U.S. pharmaceutical company Pfizer in July for improper drug experimentation on children. The Nigerian government is demanding $7 billion in damages and compensation for the families of the children.
In 1996, Kano experienced an outbreak of meningitis, a serious medical condition that affects the central nervous
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Pfizer sent physicians to Kano to test a new anti-meningitis drug called Trovan on Nigerian children. At the time, Trovan had not been approved for use by adults or children in United States. But the meningitis outbreak in Kano offered Pfizer a rare opportunity to test the drug on children. Meningitis epidemics are uncommon in the United States.
Pfizer picked patients from a field hospital where children were waiting to get treated. The hospital had been administering approved medications.
Of the 200 children who unknowingly took part in the Pfizer trials, more than 50 died. Many others suffered permanent disabilities, including deafness and inability to speak.
The children’s parents assert that they did not know they were submitting their children to an experimental drug trial, and never gave Pfizer consent to test an unregistered drug on their kids. While Pfizer denies all allegations, it has been unable to produce any records documenting that the children or their parents were informed of the experiment.
Further, Pfizer has been relying heavily on a letter from a Nigerian hospital’s ethics committee approving the experiment. The letter is dated March 28, 1996—a week before the experiment began. However, the hospital had no ethics committee in March 1996 and the letterhead stationary used did not exist until months after the experiment’s conclusion. (Washington Post 2006)
This is yet another crime of capitalism—a system in which profits rule over human needs.
Pfizer is the world’s largest research-based pharmaceutical company. In 2006, it grossed over $48 billion in revenue. It expected Trovan to gross $1 billion in the first year of approval.
To increase profits, Pfizer works hard to minimize expenses, like those entailed in conducting ethical, responsible drug trials. As a result, children suffering from life-threatening illnesses in oppressed countries are treated like lab rats.
The lawsuit against Pfizer is an attempt to compensate the victims of the pharmaceutical giant’s murderous actions. But true justice will not be achieved until the system that fuels these actions is defeated.
