Merck leaves Italy in the silence of politics

Fedaisf editorial staff

December 1, 2015

Constantly improves profits, does not invest in Italy e also fires Italian employees. This is the case of the drug multinational Merck that on December 31st he will fire another 186 employees, despite the fact that the contract for the molecule on an anti-diabetic drug expires in two years, so in theory there could be new space. But the US governance has decided to cut it: from 2007 to today, 1,500 people in total have been sent away, of the 2,000 who worked in Italy.

Among other things, the two regions that have made the most profits in Italy are about to be dismantled: the Lombardy and Puglia. While Sicily remains open, perhaps because, dare some, it is the region to which the director of Merck Italy. In essence, the multinational that has a precise economic response from the proceeds of drugs reimbursed by the SSN unloads thousands of workers on the community, who go into mobility despite not having economic problems. This is the path followed by two questions, the first in the Chamber signed by 22 deputies of the Democratic Party, the second in the Senate signed by colleagues from the M5S.

Immediate abandonment with a liquidation is proposed to the older ones, but the crux of the years until retirement remains. Worse goes to the younger ones who are offered a one-and-a-half year transition to a sister company, with a 50% salary reduction: but with the tragedy that at 45 they would no longer know where to relocate. In 2008 the multinational closed the factory in Baranzate di Bollate (Milan) with 130 workers, and sold the IRBM research center in Pomezia which employed 150 workers. Also the year after the Schering Plough (purchased 12 months earlier) placed 93 workers on redundancy, the MSD 18; in 2010 Schering Plow another 96 and closed the plant Comazzo (Lodi) with 150 workers. In 2013 another closure, this time in Pavia with 250 employees and in 2014 the ophthalmological line business branch (occupying 35 units) was sold to Santen.

In the two questions, the Job commissions whether the ministers of labor and health are aware of the industrial plan followed by American multinational pharmaceutical company Merck. And this for a number of reasons: first of all because it is not a company in crisis; secondly because until today it has provided for maximize earnings "by dramatically reducing the number of employees, with a high level of education, without making productive investments on the national territory".

Logica would have liked at least a discussion table to be convened between the parties, not only to safeguard the level of employment, but to understand the reasons that are leading a drug giant to gradually abandon the Italian market. Despite the fact that in Italy there is an increase in drugs with a high technological content. Just like the ones made by MSD.

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01/12/2015 – Francis De Palo – Formiche.net

Editor's note: Kenneth C. Frazier is Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President,Merck & Co. Inc. Nel corso dell’anno fiscale 2014 ha percepito un compenso totale di $ 25.029.370

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