The AstraZeneca logo is photographed at the 2021 World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai, China, on July 7, 2021.
Cost Photo | Future Publishing | Getty Images
AstraZeneca The stock had its worst day since March 2020 on Tuesday amid reports that dozens of the drugmaker’s China executives may have been implicated in the country’s largest insurance fraud case in years.
The Anglo-Swedish company has invested heavily in the world’s second largest pharmaceutical market. explain Last week, the company’s president in China, Wang Liang, was under investigation and the drugmaker would cooperate with authorities.
AstraZeneca has not disclosed the contents of the investigation or whether Wang, who grew up in China and has worked for the company for more than a decade, has been detained by authorities.
The investigation by Chinese authorities has now been expanded to include the Public Security Bureau, Supervisory Commission and other relevant agencies, financial media company China Business News reported on Tuesday, citing a person familiar with the matter.
The report added that medical representatives had previously been caught falsifying prescriptions for AstraZeneca’s lung cancer drug Tagrisso to allow patients to purchase the drug through the state’s health insurance plan.
“As a matter of policy, we do not comment on speculative media reports, including reports related to ongoing investigations in China,” AstraZeneca said.
“We will fully cooperate with the Chinese authorities if requested,” the company added, saying its operations and drug shipments remained in China.
AstraZeneca is one of China’s largest multinational drugmakers, accounting for 13% of its total revenue. The company said last year it would build a $450 million factory in the country and has signed several licensing deals with Chinese companies.
However, AstraZeneca’s more than 30-year presence in the country has not been without challenges in prescription and sales.
In 2022, Chinese authorities summoned AstraZeneca officials over an investigation into alleged health insurance fraud by AstraZeneca employees and ordered the drugmaker to step up marketing activities.
this FTSE 100 The component fell 8.4% on Tuesday, hitting a seven-month low of 10,118 pence, the second-biggest decline in the blue-chip index.
