US PHARMACEUTICAL FIRM HOSPIRA UNDER FIRE OVER USE OF ITS DRUGS IN EXECUTIONS

January 6, 2012: Doctors from around the world call on Hospira to impose restrictions on sale of muscle relaxant for use in lethal injections. One of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies, the Illinois-based firm Hospira, is coming under heavy pressure from the medical profession to tighten up its procedures to prevent the use of its drugs in US executions. 
25 prominent doctors from the UK, Italy, India and Australia have published an open letter in the Lancet to Michael Ball, Hospira's chief executive. David Nicholl, a neurologist at City Hospital in Birmingham, on behalf of the 24 other signatories, said: “Earlier this year, your company determined that you could not prevent the diversion of the use of your company's product, thiopental, for use in capital punishment, so you stopped producing it completely. This resulted in US states that carry out the death penalty ultimately switching to pentobarbital, manufactured by Lundbeck.
Lundbeck, initially, were hesitant to act, but, after a critical letter, took decisive action in the form of a restricted distribution system to tighten up their supply chain to ensure that pentobarbital was used only for legitimate clinical purposes. Lundbeck's response has truly been exemplary (to the extent that some of us even bought shares in the company).  Hospira is now the sole supplier of pancuronium, which is also used for executions in the USA. To date, Hospira has refused to comment on what, if any, action it will take to stop the abuse of this drug. Pancuronium is an extremely effective muscle relaxant when used in an appropriate hospital setting, but when used for executions, there is the very real possibility of causing extreme pain and suffering in a paralysed prisoner. No responsible pharmaceutical company should have anything to do with executions. As your own code of business conduct states, Hospira has an “ethical compass” to “accept the responsibility of being an ethical global citizen”. It is time for Hospira to live up to those fine words, without affecting patients' care, by putting in place a restricted distribution system for pancuronium. Lundbeck recently sold pentobarbital, under the trade name Nembutal, to an American company called Akorn. But it did so only on the condition that Akorn continued the restricted distribution system. In his response to the Lancet letter, Hospira's chief executive writes that he shares the doctors' concern about the improper use of its drugs in US executions. "We do not support the use of our products in lethal injections," Ball says. He adds that Hospira has written to every state to make clear the company's opposition.  But Nicholl said that words were not enough. "I don't think that stating their opposition is satisfactory. There's more that they can do – they can follow Lundbeck's example and impose an end-user agreement that will put a stop to this."
Lundbeck confirmed to the Guardian that it has offered to provide advice to all other pharmaceutical companies, including Hospira, on how to set up an end-user agreement that will effectively block use of medical drugs in killing prisoners. "Hospira is, of course, welcome to contact us," a Lundbeck spokesman said.
This is the 2nd time that Hospira has come under fire for the use of its drugs in judicial killings. A year ago it suspended all production in America of sodium thiopental, a barbiturate widely used as the 1st stage of the lethal cocktail, after it became clear that it could face penalties in Italy, where it was also manufacturing the sedative. (Source: The Guardian, The Lancet, 06/01/2012)