Public Employee Press

Browne addresses AFL-CIO lawyers

Consumer groups and drug plans are increasingly going to court to fight abusive practices by pharmaceutical companies that range from wooing doctors with junkets to price fixing and marketing unsafe products.

DC 37 lawyer Audrey A. Browne shared her insights on this process with attorneys from other unions at the AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee conference in Chicago in April.

Browne, director of regulatory compliance and contract procurement of the DC 37 Health and Security Plan, discussed how unions can fight illegal drug industry practices and achieve savings by suing pharmaceutical companies.

By joining class-action lawsuits, union plans can not only cut costs but also curb further abuses by drug companies. Successful suits send a message that unions “will become the 800-pound guerrilla that the bad guys will think twice about ripping off again,” Browne said.The DC 37 Health and Security Plan and other union plans have joined with Prescription Access Litigation, to go after “Big Pharma” in court. PAL is a project of the Boston-based Community Catalyst, a nationwide coalition of community, senior, union and consumer health advocacy groups.

In February, a drug manufacturer agreed to a $24 million settlement in a case brought by the DC 37 plan and others. The lawsuit charged the company, Serono Laboratories Inc., with using phony prescription criteria to improperly promote its AIDS medication Serostim and marketing the drug for purposes not approved by the Food and Drug Administration.