J&J’s CEO Gets Whopping Bonus Despite Problems

Johnson & Johnson’s CEO William Weldon received a whopping $1.98 million bonus for 2010. J&J is positioning this as a 45% cut in the bonus, while the average employees are facing significant bonus cuts and salary freezes.

Weldon’s multi-million dollar bonus seems radically excessive given his management of the company over the last few years. Outside observers had expected J&J’s Board of Directors to take a hard line and withhold Weldon’s entire bonus. Evidently, J&J’s Board is just as clueless as Weldon. Giving Weldon a massive bonus will only continue to erode employee morale and rewards the bad decisions he has made.

Ironically, on the same day that J&J announced Billy Weldon’s massive bonus, the company also recalled nearly 700,000 bottles of Sudafed 24 Hour Extended-Release packaging. Unlike previous J&J recalls, this was not because of contamination with 2,4,6-tribromoanisole (a chemical pesticide that contaminated Tylenol). Instead, the Sudafed packages were improperly labeled.

And This Week’s J&J Friday Recall Is – Sudafed

In typical J&J fashion, another Friday, another recall. This time around is Sudafed 24 Hour Extended-Release tablets. The reason for the recall is improper product labeling. The recall covers nearly 700,000 packages.

Why is this not surprising?

Deborah Peel on the Eve of HIMSS

Another year and another HIMSS. Last year, anti-technology activist Deborah Peel was laughed out of Atlanta. In the year since, she’s basically done nothing (see recent post). On the eve of this year’s HIMSS, I thought I’d check back in on her. She still hasn’t posted anything to her blog in over a year (last post was Dec. 31, 2009). I know I sometimes slip in updating Pharm Aid, but I’d expect Peel to have a single, original thought in 12 months. Perhaps I’ve over-estimated her need for self-promotion and narcissism.

I hope she attends HIMSS this year! No doubt she’ll be in the booth of No More Clipboard (where I caught up with her last year). Regardless of whether you agree with her or not, Deborah Peel is good, entertaining fun.

Another Week, Four More J&J Recalls

In what has become a near-weekly occurrence for the embattled New Jersey-based pharmaceutical company, Johnson & Johnson announced this week that it was recalling lots of four different drugs. On February 15th, J&J recalled antipsychotic Invega (due to possible contamination and risk of infections as well as sub-potency in some formulations), which has already been linked to at least one adverse event. On February 17th, J&J recalled Dermabond (poor manufacturing; inferior color quality) and Securestrap (product and packaging sterility problems). On February 18th, J&J recalled a number of lots of RA drug Simponi (injection pens may deliver sub-potent product dose).

Previously, the company has tried to contain the PR damage to just its McNeil division and only its Fort Washington, Pennsylvania facility. However, the current batch of recalls show the manufacturing lapses stretch around the world – from Fort Washington to Switzerland and places in between – as well as impact many different J&J divisions. The problems with J&J are systemic and widespread.

J&J’s Tampon Problem

As previously reported here on Pharm Aid, J&J has a feminine problem – namely o.b. tampons. o.b. tampons are missing from store shelves and the company can’t explain why. It’s a big secret.

Earlier today, I was at a grocery store in Pennsylvania and noticed that o.b. is back on Safeway store shelves. But it’s a different o.b. Or maybe it’s the same o.b. tampon, but the package is really low grade and in Spanish. It’s like what you might find at a bodega in Panama, but this is a Safeway grocery store. Where in the world is J&J importing this o.b. from?

This is not the quality you’d expect of a J&J product - back when Johnson & Johnson stood for something. But maybe it is the quality we should be expecting from the new J&J...from William Weldon's J&J.