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GSK agrees to $20m settlement for Chinese bribery allegation

pharmafile | October 3, 2016 | News story | Business Services, Sales and Marketing China, GSK, GlaxoSmithKline 

GlaxoSmithKline has agreed to settle a bribery allegation in China with a payment of $20 million to the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

The SEC accused a Chinese subsidiary and China-based joint-venture of the pharma firm of bribing foreign officials and healthcare professionals with gifts, travel and shopping excursions from at 2010 to June 2013. The company recorded these expenditures as legitimate business expenses such as medical association sponsorships, employee expenses and marketing costs. GSK failed to maintain adequate internal accounting controls and an anti-corruption compliance programme during this time.

According to a GSK spokeswoman, the company cooperated fully with the SEC investigation and agreed to the resolution while neither admitting nor denying the allegations. It has also agreed to provide status reports on its implementation of anti-corruption measures for the next two years and claims to have set reforms in motion including compensation of sales representatives and the end of payments to healthcare practitioners for advocating for the company’s products to other prescribers.

The US Department of Justice has closed its investigation and will be taking no further action.

Matt Fellows

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