Business Ethics and Society assignment

Running Head: MNGT 3711: BUSINESS ETHICS AND SOCIETY            1
MNGT 3711: BUSINESS ETHICS AND SOCIETY                    2
MNGT 3711: BUSINESS ETHICS AND SOCIETY
Table of Contents
Introduction    3
Answer to Q1    3
Answer to Q2    5
Answer to Q3    7
Answer to Q4    9
Conclusion    12
References    13
Introduction
Merck a popular pharmaceutical company, which enjoyed popularity of being ethically and socially responsible company, when to it comes to manufacturing of drugs. It ranked first in earning profits of $7.33 billion and ranked fifth in terms of market value with 24 percent as share. It was most admired company and even labeled as “The miracle company”. However, since 2006, the challenges surrounded this giant as one of its products Vioxx a blockbuster pill need to be recalled off from the market due to cardiovascular problems to the patients. It even faced somewhere around 6000 lawsuits for that and been penalized.
Answer to Q1
Yes, I believe that the step to recall the medicine Vioxx from the market was ethical and socially responsible decision taken by Merck. Despite looking for several alternatives in terms of modifications in the medicine, Merck was not sure of future results of medicine on patients. In order to show the innocence and concern on its part this step was highly demanded. This decision might have saved the company from other uncertain future damage.
Merck was famous for its research labs as it developed various drugs one after another continuously for various diseases such as tuberculosis, hypertension, cholesterol and AIDS (Sroka & Szanto, 2018). It used to spent huge amount of $3 billion in research annually. It was even said that company’s history is shaped up with research and it is scientifically intense and driven by loyalty.
It even started working on medicines for cervical cancer, rotavirus and for insomnia, lymphoma and the effects of stroke. It was always determined to develop products, which can be used for the benefit of humanity. At Merck, scientists developed medicine originally for veterinary use. However, when they discovered that it can cure river blindness they modified it for the later use and distribute it free to poor people (Becker, 2018).
Merck marketed the product to doctors and hospitals by encouraging them to prescribe more and instead giving them gifts such as free meals, tickets for sports events. They sponsored the educational events for physicians, who offered reports based on their medicines, supported doctors by providing them financial assistance and giving opportunities by inviting them to conduct clinical trials. The expenditure of $422 million generated big profits for the company with this marketing strategy (Reeves & Sinnicks, 2021).
They even trained their marketing personnel to dodge the questions asked by doctors by giving them manuals to read so that they should avoid any question raised by doctors. Advertising proved to be highly valuable for Merck in case of Vioxx. They advertised directly to the consumers. In this way, patients were free to decide the preferred medication for them though it had its own disadvantages. It was estimated that every dollar spent on advertisements gained $4.25 in return from sales (Cote, 2021).
Vioxx was pitched as a treatment for several problems like menstrual symptoms, acute pain in adults, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. It became blockbuster medicine since then by generating $2.1 billion of sales in United States. It was even known that many years of research and testing was involved in developing Vioxx and getting it approved by FDA. Vioxx was partially covered under health insurance as well as compared to other drugs, which were not having this privilege (Cote, 2021).
Merck with trade association Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) donated large amount of money on political fronts. They were even connected to the much known PACs. They made huge expenditures supporting political agendas outside the arena. Moreover, they were also involved with lobbyists by sending around $40.7 million, which oversaw drug industry. They give quick drug approvals, patent protections and Medicare prescription drug benefits and even levy restrictions on import of drug from Canada.
Recalling the blockbuster drug from the market was not an easy decision but Merck did it. The colon polyp study, which was conducted for 18 continuous months on individuals for Vioxx showed results of possible heart attacks or strokes when the medicine taken more than twice in a day for longer periods. These risks were unacceptable even at clinical trial phase (Sroka & Szanto, 2018). They even thought of adding some elements to it so that it will prevent blood clots but then dropped the idea. They thought of proposing the label on the medicine as an additional warning but again that will be against the ethical standards, which the company was following for so long.
There was too much brainstorming over data with mixed opinions from doctors and scientists on whether to withdraw Vioxx from market or not. No one was sure what are the reasons, for which drug was causing the heart attacks (Cote, 2021). Finally, after informing FDA, physicians and pharmacists, it was decided to call it back voluntarily, keeping interests of patients and safety as priority after a three year of clinical study on patients using the drug.
Answer to Q2
According to the case, Merck could have taken various steps to do things differently. Right from the early stages of research and development of the product, it needs to concentrate on the possible side effects of the drug. If in research, it is proved and diagnosed the possibility of potential cardiovascular threats to the patients then advanced research needs to be carried on as to find out why (Boda, 2019). In order to keep safe the brand image, integrity of product and reputation extensive research needs to be followed on by exercising common sense.
It is quite understood that no pharmaceutical drug is 100 percent safe but the data, which was collected after APPROVE and VIGOR tests, which indicate persistence of life threatening condition after the usage of drug need to be analyzed thoroughly (Ahmed, Vveinhardt & Streimikiene, 2017). The question needs to be answered why such tests were not conducted during research phase before bringing the drug to the market. They also need to assess the reason why none of the scientists involved with the company and doctors who were undertaking clinical trials in association with Merck were able to detect this concern. In the view of this, Merck needs to raise the standards of research and testing as well as the quality of clinical trials to...