Last Updated on December 16, 2021
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has launched an investigation into Endo Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and AbbVie Inc. over allegations that they marketed drugs as puberty blockers for children, despite the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) not authorizing them for this use.
Paxton is investigating Endo Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and AbbVie Inc. under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, according to a press release available on the Texas Attorney General’s website.
According to Paxton, “These pharmaceutical companies allegedly advertised and promoted hormone (puberty) blockers for unapproved uses without disclosing the potential risks associated with these drugs to children and their parents.”
Apparently two of the medications, Supprelin LA and Lupron Depot, were approved by the FDA to “treat children with Central Precocious Puberty (CPP), when the puberty process begins prematurely.”
Federal government sources suggest CPP is estimated to affect as many as one in 5,000 girls, though it is less common among boys. It is not related to transgenderism or gender dysphoria.
Paxton’s office adds that “Vantas, along with other forms of Lupron, has been prescribed for palliative treatment of prostate cancer.”
“These drugs are now being used to treat gender dysphoria even though they are not approved for such use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA),” wrote the Attorney General’s office.
It added, “The OAG has the authority to investigate false, misleading, and deceptive conduct by businesses in Texas, and to take legal action to enforce the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act.”
Endo International, the company that owns Endo Pharmaceuticals, is “an American Irish-domiciled” pharmaceutical company that saw over 93% of its sales generated within the United States in 2017.
Endo International was profiled by Bloomberg as a “tax runaway” in a project originally published in 2014 and updated in 2017. The Philadelphia Business Journal reported that the company planned to save millions by relocating to Ireland.
AbbVie, similarly, has been accused of offshoring profits.
In June of this year, U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, a prominent Democrat, noted in a letter to the company’s CEO that, in 2020, AbbVie showed a pretax loss of $4.5 billion in the United States, but an overseas pretax profit of $7.9 billion. He accused the company of avoiding taxes in the United States.
This is not the first time in recent months Texas has made headlines on the topic of transgenderism.
As National File exposed earlier this year, multiple high profile Texas Republicans including Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, and Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan all received large donations – more than $1.7 million combined – from a political action committee linked to a transgender clinic specializing in children.
Multiple forms of legislation designed to protect children from potentially irreversible treatment at transgender clinics failed during the most recent legislative session, with Texas Republicans opposed to transgenderism for children blaming Abbott and the Republican leadership.
However, the transgender youth clinic clinic profiled extensively by National File due to its apparent relationship with high profile Republicans has since closed.
