Becton Dickinson and Needle Sticks

Becton Dickinson and Needle Sticks

        In my judgement, Becton Dickinson had an obligation to provide the safety syringe in all sizes in 1991. I think that Becton Dickinson should have done everything in its power to make the safety syringes as safe as possible, no matter how much it cost them. The workers throughout the health care industry needed the safety syringes to protect themselves from AIDS, Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, other lethal diseases, and also numerous viral, bacteria, fungal, and parasitic infections that were being contracted through accidental needle sticks. In the health care industry safety and caring is their main goal and Becton Dickinson was not concerned with safety or caring.

        Manufacturers should definitely be held liable for failing to market all the products for which they hold exclusive patents. Many people could have avoided injury, if all products from Becton Dickinson were made available. Some nurses even died from the diseases contracting from the accidental needle sticks. The health care industry had to spend millions of dollars to basically fix the wrong doing of the needle stick manufacturers, so the manufacturers should definitely be held responsible for the costs and wrong doing they caused.

Becton Dickinson’s use of the GPO system in the late 1990s was completely unethical. Becton Dickinson’s use of the GPO system caused wrong doing and even deaths. Retractable Technologies Inc. had a completely better, safer product for health care workers to use, but because of the contracts the GPO had with Becton Dickinson, health care workers missed out and contracted many diseases and infections, that lead to sickness and some deaths. A monopoly is the exclusive possession or control of the supply or trade in a commodity or service. A monopoly is exactly what the GPO system was and it was not ethical at all.

Luckily, Becton Dickinson was found guilty of infringing on Retractable’s safety syringe patents by coping their design and then manufacturing and selling the syringes under its own name. Becton Dickinson had to pay millions of dollars to Retractable and to some of the many people they hurt.