FAIRFIELD COUNTY
BUSINESS JOURNAL May 16, 2016 | VOL. 52, No. 20
2 | MOMS AT WORK
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Sound investment vs. D.C. frugality MURPHY HARBORS NO ILLUSIONS OF $860M BILL APPROVAL
BY REECE ALVAREZ ralvarez@westfairinc.com
T
o learn firsthand the importance of preserving the quality of the Long Island Sound as he pushes for a significant increase in federal funding, U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy toured Norm Bloom & Son’s Copps Island Oyster shellfish company in Norwalk. The operators of the third-generation, family-run business have been plying the waters of Norwalk and beyond for more than 60 years. Earlier this month, Murphy released his Long Island Investment Plan, an $860 million proposal to support Connecticut’s
$30 million shellfishing industry by increasing funding for initiatives to support the health of the sound and its shoreline industries. “I know that number sounds big to people, but we have to start setting the targets high for the federal programs that help clean up the sound and will help restore the ability of shellfishermen to be able to do business here,” Murphy said while touring the business on May 5. “This is my opportunity to be able to bring what they are doing back to Washington so I can talk to my colleagues on a firsthand basis about how important supporting the shellfish industry is and how research on how to do better with this industry is really critical to their survival.”
Copps Island Oysters, a third-generation Norwalk shellfishery is in full support of U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy’s proposal. Photo by Reece Alvarez
» SOUND, page 6
Boehringer Ingelheim and FDA ramp up anti-counterfeit medicine efforts BY KEVIN ZIMMERMAN kzimmerman@westfairinc.com “INTERNET PHARMACY. CHEAP GENERIC MEDICATIONS ONLINE.” “Eating this KILLS diabetes!” And of course the eternally popular “Try Viagra for Free” and its infinite number of variations. Messages with subject lines
like these pop up in most people’s email inboxes on a daily, if not hourly, basis. And while many recipients simply delete them — or, if their spam filters are doing their jobs, never see them at all — a large enough number apparently click through and visit online pharmacies like GlavMed and
Canada Drugs. There they purchase their Lipitor, Pradaxa and, yes, Viagra at considerably lower prices than what they would pay at their local CVS or Walgreens. When their medications arrive — apparently in the same packaging that drugmakers Boehringer Ingelheim, Lilly and Pfizer employ — they duly ingest them. End result: Nothing whatsoever. Or an adverse reaction. Or, in some cases, they die. Welcome to the world of counterfeit medicine, one of the biggest scourges facing the prescription medicine industry.
The illicit trade extends far beyond buying pills from a guy in his basement. In 2010, the World Customs Organization estimated that the global market for counterfeit drugs was worth $200 billion, as compared with the combined worldwide heroin and cocaine markets, which stood then at $160 billion. “If it’s too affordable to be true, it’s probably not true.” So says J. Aaron Graham, executive director for brand safety and security at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc. (BIPI) in Ridgefield, the U.S. headquarters for the privately held German
drug maker. BIPI has partnered with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to get the word out to patients and health care providers via the “Know Your Source” initiative. The program involves posters in English and Spanish alerting patients about what to look for — safety information missing, product names different than expected, packaging that seems shoddy or unlike what they’ve seen before. Literature for physicians, nurses and pharmacists is also being distributed, warning that » COUNTERFEIT, page 6