Merck and Co. and river blindness MANUEL VELASQUEZ‚ Business Ethics. Concepts and cases 4th edt.‚ Prentice Hall‚ Upper Saddle River‚ New Jersey‚ 1998 River blindness is an agonizing disease that affects some 18 million impoverished people living in remote villages along the banks of rivers in tropical regions of Africa and Latin America. The disease is caused by a tiny parasitic worm that is passed from person to person by the bite of the black fly which breeds in river waters. The tiny worms
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TO: Dr. Roy Vagelos‚ Chairman and CEO Merck Corporation. January‚ 1991. The decision to move forward with the program to donate the new drug Mectizan on a large scale to the affected population in the Third World needs to be systematically analyzed. There are two especially important angles from which this decision needs to be considered. The first concern that needs to be taken into account is that of the stockholders and investors in this company‚ whose interests you are ultimately charged with
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Merck & Co.‚ Inc. and GlaxoSmithKline plc October 20‚ 2014 Concepts A. Common Stock i. Authorized – 5‚ 400‚000‚000 shares ii. Common stock issued – 2‚983‚508‚675 shares iii. In 2007‚ Merck issued 2‚983‚508‚675 shares (one cent par value) Total dollar value: 2‚983‚508‚675*0.01=29‚835‚086.75 iv. Common shares held in treasury – 811‚005‚791 v. Common shares outstanding – 2‚172‚502‚884 (shares issued – treasury shares) vi. December 31‚ 2007 market cap - $125‚157‚891‚147
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Matthews‚ Ph.D. February 10‚ 2004 Applying Ethics to the Merck Case The purpose of my essay is to show whether the business decisions made by the management team of Merck pharmaceutical are ethical. Using corporate assets for charitable purposes‚ the company manufactures and distributes a drug called Mectizan at no charge to impoverished nations and their inhabitants. I will expound on three ethical theories and then analyze the Merck case according to each theory‚ summarizing how the authors
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Introduction and Situational Analysis Merck and River Blindness ethical dilemma is whether to pursue research that may or may affect the profits‚ or to choose a safer choice and go for profit rather than researching the drug. The outcome from researching the drug could possibly lead to healing the deadly and dangerous disease known as River Blindness. This drug is known to kill the parasite that has caused the disease. The problem with this situation was that the consumers of the drug could not pay
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6‚ page 358 5 References 6 Assignment 3 – Class 3 # 4‚ page 313 – Merck & Vioxx According to The New York Times article‚ “Merck to Pay $950 Million Over Vioxx” by Duff Wilson‚ the following lawsuits have been settled by Merck: Merck has agreed to pay $950 million and has pleaded guilty to a criminal charge over the marketing and sales of the painkiller Vioxx‚ the company and the Justice Department said Tuesday. Merck agreed to pay a $321 million criminal fine and plead guilty to one misdemeanor
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decision (not covered in class?) Based on the pyramid of social responsibility‚ Merck is required to be profitable (base). Since the research of development will never be profitable to shareholders Merck should do develop the drug. Based on Merck’s actual value system‚ it wants to be ethical and even be a good corporate citizen. So Merck should conduct the research. Question 8 - If you were the senior executive of Merck‚ what would you do? (Open question) I would make assessment of the potential costs
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research scientist working for Merck and Company‚ discovered evidence that one of the company’s drugs might kill the parasite that causes river blindness. He then decided to request permission to research this new finding. The mangers for the company noticed that it would take enormous amount of funding and time to develop this new vaccine. This new product could be really hard to market and who was going to actually buy it; it could also damaged the market share that Merck currently had by selling
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First established in 1668 in Darmstadt‚ Germany‚ Merck is currently (in 1978) one of the largest prescription drug producers in the world. After coming off a 10 year drug drought in the late 1970s‚ Merck put a large amount of money into research to continue its dominance in the prescription drug industry. The research-first approach worked and since then Merck has increased sales significantly. Merck’s mission was well stated by founder George W. Merck. “We try never to forget that medicine is for
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heart attacks f) Merck blamed naproxen for skewing the results against Vioxx 3) New England Journal of Medicine Omission g) Merck omits three heart attacks from article submission h) Inclusion of omitted data caused a significantly greater result 4) FDA Reaction i) Letter regarding downplay of risks j) Addition of warning label to Vioxx k) Additional study results 5) Approve Study l) Results with placebo group cause Merck to recall drug
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