Big Pharma thread seen among killers
On Monday, Merck CEO Ken Frazier, announced he was leaving The American Manufacturing Council.
Referring to the horrible events in Charlottesville where a 20-year-old who suffers from schizophrenia and - according to his high school teacher - became obsessed with German military history and Nazism, drove through a crowd of protesters killing one and injuring 19, stated: "America's leaders must honor our fundamental values by clearly rejecting expressions of hatred, bigotry and group supremacy, which run counter to the American ideal that all people are created equal."
What a strange non sequitur. It is obvious that Mr. Frazier's intent was to assure America his hands were clean and magnify the focus on the president, but why? What do the actions of a young mentally ill racist have to do with the CEO of Merck, one of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies?
Could it be that the ever tightening coupling of his industry's overprescribed psychotropic drugs with our country's multi-decade affliction of mass murder may again be coming to the forefront? From Zoloft at Columbine through Lexapro at Newtown to the yet-to-be-disclosed "antipsychotic medication" used by the accused Charlottesville man, the one thread that binds the killers together is that which is spun by Ken Frazier's Big Pharmaceutical factories. Unfortunately for Mr. Frazier, this time there are no gun companies to blame.
Paul Kocan
Naperville