With a question presented to the Senate Industry Commission, Adriana Poli Bortone, president of Io Sud, asked the Minister of Health and the Minister of Labor to clarify "the numerous layoffs, especially to the detriment of scientific representatives of the drug", implemented by pharmaceutical multinationals operating throughout the national territory. "I was deeply struck - said Adriana Poli Bortone - by the unscrupulous behavior implemented in Italy, but above all in our Southern Italy, by numerous foreign pharmaceutical companies". In fact, "although market data indicate a sector that, more than others, has been able to withstand the crisis, most pharmaceutical companies – added the senator in a note – resorted during 2009 to the use of the social safety nets envisaged by the Government; to this it should be added that many of them used the method of transferring a company branch as a tool to effectively lay off workers without complying with the laws of labor law. Through the transfer of company branches, numerous pharmaceutical multinationals utiche thus had the opportunity to 'sell off' jobs to shell companies which, with punctual precision, declared bankruptcy in the following months with the consequent dismissal of their workforce". A method, according to Poli Bortone, "by no means sporadic, and it was above all the drug sales representatives who paid the price, with an overall layoff (data provided by the Federation of Pharmaceutical Sales Representatives) of over 7,000 workers".
Pharmacist33 – 18 January 2010 – Year 6, Number 6
