By Bae Ji-sook
Staff Reporter
Police raided the offices of a medical equipment company, four pharmaceutical companies and three Seoul National University Hospital professors Wednesday to secure evidence of illegal rebate practices.
According to Jongno Police Station, Thursday, the doctors, who work at the department of anesthesiology and pain medicine, received about 35 million won ($28,000) worth of party goods and cash from the companies as a sponsorship for a seminar they hosted.
During their raid on the offices, the investigators secured credit card bills and accounting books. They plan to summon the doctors next week.
The companies have reportedly admitted to the suspicions but said the sponsorship was not a bribe because they did not expect anything in return. The doctors are reportedly denying the allegations.
The scandal broke only a month after the Korea Pharmaceutical Manufacturers’ Association and the Korean Research-Based Pharmaceutical Industry Association came out with detailed standards defining rebates in their self-imposed agreement for transparent business practices.
They said pharmaceutical firms that provide meals worth more than 100,000 won to doctors and pharmacists will be subject to disciplinary action as the gifts will be considered illegal rebates.
Though the industry is striving to get rid of the rampant rebate practice, insiders remain skeptical.
“If the hospitals do not step up to root out the irregularities, rebates will always remain. Hospitals do not support the doctors financially for seminars and other events. Therefore, they turn to such companies for help,” an intern doctor at a Seoul hospital said, declining to be identified.
She said medical professors tend to take rebates from pharmaceutical firms to finance their trips to overseas seminars. “They know it’s not right. But doctors and their staffers can’t refuse them, as hospitals do not pick up the bills in many cases,” she said.