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If Sanofi is an example of how a leader in vaccine manufacturing conducts business, everyone should be concerned
BY AMANDA WILLIAMS
In March 2021, Canadians received news that Toronto will be home to the new $925 million vaccine manufacturing facility located on Sanofi’s existing site at 1755 Steeles Ave W. in North York. According to a company spokesperson, the site currently produces millions of doses of vaccines against diseases like pertussis, polio, tetanus, and diphtheria. Sanofi has seventy-three manufacturing sites in more than 170 countries and claims to be one of the leaders in the vaccine industry.
Canada’s federal government supports the new facility with a whopping $415 million investment and another $55 million from the Ontario government. Sanofi will invest more than $455 million to build the facility and an additional $79 million a year to fund Canadian research and development. The project is expected to create 165 new jobs in Canada and maintain another 1,100 others.
On Sanofi’s website, you can find a section dedicated to their code of ethics. The company encourages all employees to report concerns while ensuring that they will not be subject to discipline or discrimination. CEO Paul Hudson says, “Integrity is a commitment that must guide our behaviors beyond mere compliance with law and regulation, driving us to make the right choice when facing any situation.”
As we take a look into the company’s history, we learn that Sanofi did not always stay true to its own standard of integrity or ethics code.
On December 19th, 2012, the US Department of Justice announced that Sanofi US agreed to pay $109 Million to resolve multiple allegations including the violation of the False Claims Act by giving free product kickbacks to physicians.
On April 4th, 2016, health officials in the Philippines launched a dengue vaccination program only to announce major problems with the vaccine months later. The Department of Health suspended the vaccination campaign as a nationwide controversy erupted, triggering headlines throughout the country.
Sanofi execs knew full well about the science study and shrugged it off at the time. “There are two main culprits: Sanofi for developing and marketing the vaccine without gaining a basic understanding of the biology of dengue, and the WHO for validating their conclusions,” says Scott Halstead, former director of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research.
Former DOH secretary Susan Pineda Mercado ripped health officials and Sanofi for exposing people to a severe infection. On her Facebook page, she wrote, “This is the biggest government-funded clinical-trial-masked-as-a-public-health-program scam of an experimental drug in the history of the DOH.”
To add even more fuel to the fire, Sanofi acted as if they were above the law. Government regulators cited Sanofi for ignoring warnings that it violated Philippine law by promoting Dengvaxia to the general public through TV and radio ads.
On September 4th, 2018, The Securities and Exchange Commission announced that Sanofi had agreed to pay more than $25 million to resolve charges that its Kazakhstan and the Middle East subsidiaries made corrupt payments to win business.
If these are examples of how a leader in vaccine manufacturing conducts business, everyone should be concerned.
In June 2019, Sanofi announced a “Voluntary Departure Program” to reduce it’s R&D departments in France and Germany by 466 workers as it shifts away from cardiovascular drug development. Sanofi, therefore, is going where the money is, toward immuno-oncology and rare diseases, where biologics and gene therapies play a big role, cites BioPharmaDive.
Was Sanofi privy to information that would cause them to change strategies that would allow them to get into the Covid vaccine game in time?
Sanofi’s stakeholders include United Nations Bodies such as WHO, UNICEF, Global Compact, and non-government organizations such as DNDi and to no surprise the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The Gates Foundation was involved in the tabletop exercise called Event 201 that has eerily played out right before our eyes. You can watch the event at www.centerforhealthsecurity.org. The Gates foundation also has ties to countless organizations surrounding the implementation of Covid measures and has been extremely vocal about his desire to vaccinate the world, as well as his views on population control, which many can say has contributed to vaccine hesitancy.
Every step the government has taken to “keep us safe” has essentially backfired. They have based their decisions on modeling rather than evidence, and Canadians are losing trust and faith in their government. The new facility is expected to enhance influenza pandemic preparedness efforts and vaccine manufacturing capacity and is to be completed by 2026.
What process does the government use to decide which companies are trustworthy, qualified, and eligible to receive millions of dollars and the power to conduct experiments on the general public? Even the WHO currently has multiple lawsuits filed against them, including negligence and crimes against humanity. Who is responsible for holding these companies accountable and ensuring another government-funded program doesn’t fail? Canadians want answers.