P. S. Sahni & Shobha Aggarwal
Bayer being allowed to hawk its drugs and agri-products in India like any other multinational corporation is one thing; being permitted to have COVID facility right within its plant premises leaves room for mischief given its track record since the Holocaust days. Bayer’s parent company – Bayer AG became a Nazi party donor and was the single largest donor to the election campaign of Adolf Hitler. One of its subsidiaries supplied the poison gas, Zyklon-B which speedily exterminated one million people in concentration camps under the watchful eyes of the SS personnel and Gestapo. Bayer AG conducted illegal drug and vaccine trial on Jews.
The correspondence between the Bayer managers and the commander of Auschwitz concentration camp reads:
“With a view to the planned experiments with a new sleep-inducing drug we would appreciate it if you could place a number of prisoners at our disposal,”
“We confirm your response, but consider the price of 200 RM [reichsmarks] per woman to be too high. We propose to pay no more than 170 RM per woman. If this is acceptable to you, the women will be placed in our possession. We need some 150 women,”
“We confirm your approval of the agreement. Please prepare for us 150 women in the best health possible,”
“Received the order for 150 women. Despite their macerated condition they were considered satisfactory. We will keep you informed of the developments regarding the experiments,”
“The experiments were performed. All test persons died. We will contact you shortly about a new shipment.”
During the Nuremberg trials, the U.S. prosecutor commented that the role of Bayer AG was more dangerous than that of the Furher yet only a few top level management people were sentenced to one and a half to eight years imprisonment, but then set free early.
During the AIDS pandemic in 1980s Bayer’s medical products – Factor VIII & IX – for use in thalassemia patients were found to be contaminated with HIV, the virus causing AIDS. Bayer management was aware of this; its technical experts then informed the management that the technology to remove HIV from its products was too costly. Bayer management then decided to export its contaminated products to Asia and Latin America in 1984-85 – much after such products were taken off the U.S. market. This criminality was like awarding death sentence to thalassemia patients who were administered this drug and contracted HIV infection. Bayer escaped unscathed in Asia, Latin America but was sued in USA.
We at ABVA (AIDS Bhedbhav Virodhi Andolan) wrote to the government and staged a protest on 28 February, 1990 i.e. National Science Day outside the ICMR office, New Delhi urging the authorities to:
“Institute and enforce strict screening procedures and criminal penalties for blood banks and blood product manufacturing companies.”
The response of the Indian Government was not surprising. A few months after the contaminated blood product issue was made public, the AIDS Bill was introduced in Parliament without any clause indicating specifically that hospitals, blood banks and large pharmaceutical companies manufacturing blood products which could spread HIV –would be criminally prosecuted or black-listed. The big blood product manufacturing companies were let off the hook!
Ever since the COVID-19 pandemic hit China in January 2020, Bayer has been pushing the drug HCQ (Hydroxychloroquine) for treatment of severe cases of COVID-19. Most countries fell into the trap. In USA over 1300 Veterans were administered the drug; not only no benefit was noticed but the number of deaths increased; the WHO withdrew the drug in June 2020 for use in patients.
In early July 2020 Indian authorities gave permission to Bayer to start a 100-bedded COVID care centre in Aurangabad, Maharashtra for treatment of n-Coronavirus cases. Bayer has few other products ready for trial on patients. What is the guarantee that the facility right in its plant premises – outside the public glare and state scrutiny – would not be used to conduct secret trials of newer products and vaccines? Bayer could repeat its role of experimenting on patients in illegal, unethical, and surreptitious manner.
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