According to a letter from a House committee to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), U.S. biopharmaceutical companies are conducting clinical trials alongside the Chinese military.

“Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) of the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party requested information from the FDA about the alarming practice of U.S. biopharmaceutical companies conducting clinical trials alongside the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and in Xinjiang, where the CCP is engaged in genocide of the Uyghur people,” a press release from the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party read.

“Reps. Neal Dunn, M.D. (R-FL) and Anna Eshoo (D-CA) joined the inquiry, in which the lawmakers raised serious concerns that the PLA is co-opting sensitive intellectual property through these clinical trials and questioned the ethics of conducting these trials in Xinjiang,” it continued.

“Publicly available information on the FDA’s website, ‘clinicaltrials.gov’, reveals that major U.S. biopharmaceutical companies have conducted hundreds of clinical trials alongside a PLA entity over the last 10 years. In addition to work with the PLA, the lawmakers identified U.S. companies conducting clinical trials in Xinjiang. The CCP forces ethnic minorities in Xinjiang to participate in gruesome medical procedures, which likely overlap with FDA-approved research,” it added.

From the New York Post:

Hundreds of the clinical trials have taken place in China at Chinese military-affiliated medical centers and hospitals, the letter notes, including one ongoing test for an advanced Alzheimer’s treatment.

Those include the PLA’s General Hospital and Medical School, the PLA’s Air Force Medical University and the Hospital of the PLA, which is operated by the PLA’s Academy of Military Medical Sciences (AMMS).

The US Commerce Department has already banned companies from swapping tech with AMMS over concerns that it could threaten national security.

Other trials have been conducted in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, where China has been carrying out a genocide against the Muslim Uyghur population.

Some female victims have been raped or sterilized in the abominable “re-education camps” while others have reportedly even had their organs harvested.

“​​As we know, there is simply no ability for firms to conduct due diligence to ensure that clinical trials done in XUAR are voluntary,” the House select committee members point out in their letter.

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* Images from Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party X Post *

“In their review of U.S. clinical trials that included sites at China’s military hospitals, the lawmakers specifically homed in on an ongoing trial of Eli Lilly’s Alzheimer’s disease drug donanemab—which was recently approved in the U.S. as Kisunla—and a former study of Pfizer’s Inlyta in liver cancer,” Fierce Pharma noted.

Fierce Pharma reports:

In light of the concerns, the lawmakers from the House Select Committee are asking the FDA to answer a slate of questions around U.S. inspections of PLA facilities, the agency’s oversight of IP and technology transfer risks, and other topics.

The select committee issued its letter as the House gets ready to vote on the related BIOSECURE Act next month.

The bill, which was introduced earlier this year by former Republican congressman Mike Gallagher, proposes halting federal contracts with certain Chinese biotech outfits that allegedly pose a national security risk to the U.S. The legislation would effectively prevent other drugmakers from doing business with these targeted firms, threatening a significant chunk of their business.

The bill currently lists respective R&D and manufacturing contractors WuXi AppTec and WuXi Biologics by name, as well as a clutch of genomics sequencing firms, though more companies of concern could be added into the mix in the future.

Read the full letter HERE.

 

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