GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) could find itself on a new blacklist in China blocking pharmaceutical companies and medical device manufacturers implicated in bribery from selling their products.
China will introduce the list of companies found to have paid bribes as it continues to crack down on graft in the health care sector, Reuters reported.
The National Health and Family Planning Commission said Friday that China’s health care departments will compile a list of offending manufacturers, agents and individuals, which will be published online. This list will come into effect in early March.
Firms on the list once will be banned for two years from selling within the region where they were implicated. Those appearing on the list twice in five years will be banned nationally for two years.
The blacklist follows several high-profile health care fraud investigations in China, the highest profile perhaps the investigation that individuals at British drugmaker GSK bribed doctors and health officials in order to boost sales of GSK drugs. GSK has said that the allegations involve individuals who work at the company and that bribery is not supported by the company. GSK has called the alleged behavior “shameful.”
The blacklists will include those found guilty of relatively minor bribery but who may not have been punished by China’s courts, as well as those who have received administrative punishments from sector and financial watchdogs, Reuters said.
The blacklists will display the name of the manufacturer or agent, its business address and legal representative, as well as details of the alleged crime, according to the commission.
GlaxoSmithKline operates its U.S. headquarters in Research Triangle Park.
