IG Farben
IG Farben head office, Frankfurt, completed in 1931 and
seized by the Allies in 1945 as the headquarters of the Supreme Allied Command.
In 2001 it became part of the University of Frankfurt.
Interessengemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG (German for
'Dye industry syndicate corporation'), commonly known as IG Farben, was
a German chemical and pharmaceutical conglomerate. Formed in 1925 from a merger of six chemical
companies—BASF, Bayer, Hoechst, Agfa, Chemische Fabrik
Griesheim-Elektron, and Chemische
Fabrik vorm. Weiler Ter Meer[1]—it was
seized by the Allies after World
War II and divided back into its constituent companies.[a]
In its heyday, IG Farben was the largest company in
Europe and the largest chemical and pharmaceutical company in the world.[4] IG Farben
scientists made fundamental contributions to all areas of chemistry and the
pharmaceutical industry. Otto
Bayer discovered the polyaddition for the synthesis of polyurethane in
1937,[5] and three
company scientists became Nobel laureates: Carl Bosch and Friedrich Bergius
in 1931 "for their contributions to the invention and development of
chemical high pressure methods",[6] and Gerhard Domagk in
1939 "for the discovery of the antibacterial effects of prontosil".[7]
The company had ties in the 1920s to the liberal German People's Party and was accused by the Nazis of being an "international
capitalist Jewish company".[8] A decade
later, it was a Nazi
Party donor and, after the Nazi takeover of Germany in 1933, a major government
contractor, providing significant material for the German war effort.
Throughout that decade it purged itself of its Jewish employees; the remainder
left in 1938.[9] Described
as "the most notorious German industrial concern during the Third Reich",[10] IG Farben
relied in the 1940s on slave labour from concentration camps, including 30,000
from Auschwitz.[11]
One of its subsidiaries
supplied the poison gas, Zyklon B, that killed over one million people in gas chambers
during the Holocaust.[b][13]
The Allies seized the company at the end of the war in
1945[a] and the
US authorities put its directors on trial. Held from 1947 to 1948 as one of the
subsequent Nuremberg trials, the IG Farben trial saw
23 IG Farben directors tried for war crimes and 13 convicted.[14] By 1951
all had been released by the American high commissioner for Germany, John J. McCloy.[15] What
remained of IG Farben in the West was split in 1951 into its six constituent
companies, then again into three: BASF, Bayer and Hoechst.[a] These
companies continued to operate as an informal cartel and played a major role in
the West German Wirtschaftswunder.
Following several later mergers the main successor companies are Agfa, BASF,
Bayer and Sanofi. In 2004 the
University of Frankfurt, housed in the former IG Farben head office, set up a permanent exhibition on
campus, the Norbert
Wollheim memorial, for the slave labourers and those killed by Zyklon
B.
Bayer
Bayer played a key role in the Wirtschaftswunder
in post-war West
Germany, quickly regaining its position as one of the world's
largest chemical and pharmaceutical corporations. In 2006 the company acquired Schering, in 2014
it acquired Merck
& Co.'s consumer business, with brands such as Claritin,
Coppertone and Dr. Scholl's, and in 2018 it acquired Monsanto,
a leading producer of genetically engineered crops, for $63 billion.[11] Bayer CropScience develops genetically modified crops and pesticides.
Monsanto
Sale to Bayer
In September 2016, Monsanto agreed to be acquired by Bayer for US$66
billion.[93][94] In an
effort to receive regulatory clearance for the deal, Bayer announced the sale
of significant portions of its current agriculture businesses, including its
seed and herbicide businesses, to BASF.[95][96]
The deal was approved by the European Union on March 21,
2018,[97][98] and
approved in the United States on May 29, 2018.[99] The sale
closed on June 7, 2018; Bayer announced its intent to discontinue the Monsanto
name, with the combined company operating solely under the Bayer brand.
Roundup Weed Killer Cancer: What’s the Risk?
In recent years, Monsanto has become the subject of thousands
of Roundup
lawsuits due to the claim that its active ingredient (glyphosate) causes
cancer, including non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Plaintiffs are seeking
compensation claim to cover medical costs and other expenses related to their
cancer diagnosis.
Bayer
Bayer AG (/ˈbeɪ.ər, ˈbaɪ.ər/;
German: [ˈbaɪɐ]) is a German multinational pharmaceutical and life sciences
company and one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Headquartered in Leverkusen, Bayer's
areas of business include human and veterinary pharmaceuticals; consumer
healthcare products; agricultural chemicals, seeds and biotechnology products.
The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index.[5] Werner Baumann has
been CEO since 2016.[6]
Founded in Barmen
in 1863 as a dyestuffs factory,
Bayer's first and best-known product was aspirin. In 1898
Bayer trademarked the
name heroin for the
drug diacetylmorphine and marketed it as a cough suppressant and non-addictive
substitute for morphine until
1910. Bayer also introduced phenobarbital; prontosil, the
first widely used antibiotic and the subject of the 1939 Nobel Prize in
Medicine; the antibiotic Cipro (ciprofloxacin); and
Yaz (drospirenone) birth control pills.
In 1925 Bayer was one of six chemical companies that
merged to form IG
Farben,[7] the
world's largest chemical and pharmaceutical company. The Allied Control Council seized IG Farben after World War II,[a][8] because of its role in the Nazi war effort and involvement in the Holocaust,
which included using slave labour from concentration camps and the purchase of
humans for dangerous medical testing. It was split into its six constituent
companies in 1951, then split again into three: BASF, Bayer and Hoechst.[9][10]
Bayer played a key role in the Wirtschaftswunder
in post-war West
Germany, quickly regaining its position as one of the world's
largest chemical and pharmaceutical corporations. In 2006 the company acquired Schering, in 2014
it acquired Merck
& Co.'s consumer business, with brands such as Claritin,
Coppertone and Dr. Scholl's, and in 2018 it acquired Monsanto,
a leading producer of genetically engineered crops, for $63 billion.[11] Bayer CropScience develops genetically modified crops and pesticides.
Sidley Austin Clears PR Firm of Wrongdoing in Work for
Monsanto
The firm concluded that FleishmanHillard did not break
the law when it compiled lists to be used in Monsanto's PR campaign to obtain
reregistration in Europe of the controversial pesticide glyphosate, known
commercially as Roundup.
By Simon Taylor | September 09, 2019 at 03:07 PM
Authorisation of the pesticide glyphosate, known
commercially as Roundup, was up for renewal in the EU this year. Photo by
Sheila Fitzgerald/Shutterstock.com
The lobbying firm working for agrichemical company Bayer
did not break the law by compiling information about stakeholders, according to
a report by law firm Sidley Austin that
was commissioned by Bayer.
Bayer HealthCare paid Sidley Austin $200,000 to lobby
government on Medicare reimbursement
WASHINGTON AP - Bayer HealthCare, a subsidiary of German
drug maker Bayer AG, paid Sidley Austin LLP $200,000 to lobby the federal
government in the first half of 2007, according to a recent disclosure form.The
firm lobbied Congress and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services on
Medicare reimbursement issues and other matters, according to form posted
online Aug.
September 20, 2007 at 12:00 AM
WASHINGTON AP – Bayer HealthCare, a subsidiary of German drug
maker Bayer
AG, paid Sidley Austin LLP $200,000
to lobby the federal government in the first half of 2007, according to a
recent disclosure form.
Bill Ayers wife, Bernadine Dohrn, worked with Michelle
Obama at Sidley Austin in the 1980's?!
Various sources | 10-09-08 | Me
Posted on 10/9/2008, 6:55:42 AM by jrooney
Bill Ayers wife,
Bernadine
Dohrn who was a leader of the
weather undergound and a domestic terrorist that advocated violence against
innocent Americans, worked with Michelle Obama at
Sidley
Austin in the 1980's it has been
reported by various sources.
Obama connection to Sidley Austin still strong
The future president was an intern in 1989. The future
first lady was an associate. Barack Obama turned
down a job offer at the end of his internship, Michelle Obama left the firm, and the two married in 1992. wo
decades later, Sidley
Austin is faring well under the
Obama administration.
Sidley Austin also lobbies for clients with big stakes in
Washington, including the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America,
Bayer
HealthCare and Grifols, a global
healthcare company. In 2011, the firm had 21 registered lobbyists in the
capital and pulled in nearly $3 million in lobby fees.
President Obama on the 65th Anniversary of the
Liberation of Auschwitz and Birkenau
Jan 27, 2010
President Obama delivers remarks commemorating the 65th
anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz and Birkenau in a taped message for
the ceremony in Krakow, Poland, and Auschwitz-Birkenau. The ceremony brought
together Polish officials, Holocaust survivors, and European and world
leaders, including Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. January 27, 2010.
Obama Mocks & Attacks Jesus Christ And The Bible /
Video / Obama Is Not A Christian
Oct 12, 2008
Obama Mocks and Attacks Jesus Christ And The Bible.
A top U.S. evangelical leader is accusing Sen. Barack Obama of deliberately
distorting the Bible and taking a "fruitcake interpretation" of the
U.S. Constitution.
Obama thanks Muslims for 'building the very fabric of
our nation'
By Cheryl K. Chumley - The Washington Times - Tuesday,
July 29, 2014
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/29/obama-thanks-muslims-building-very-fabric-our-nati/
President Obama and his wife sent out a joint statement to Muslims
in America for the Eid-al-Fitr holiday, thanking them for their contributions
in “building the fabric” of the country.
The statement, as posted on the White House website,
reads in part: “As Muslims throughout the United States and around the world
celebrate Eid-al-Fitr, Michelle and I extend our warmest wishes to them and
their families. … [The holiday] celebrates the common values that unite us in
our humanity and reinforces the obligations that people of all faiths have to
each other, especially those impacted by poverty, conflict and disease.”
The Obamas then express appreciation to the Muslim
community for helping forge America.
“In the United States,” the statement continued, “Eid
also reminds us of the many achievements and contributions of Muslim Americans
to building the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our
democracy. … On behalf of the Administration, we wish Muslims in the United
States and around the world a blessed and joyous celebration. Eid Mubarak.”
The greeting “Eid Mubarak” means “blessed celebration.”
IG Farben
IG Farben head office, Frankfurt, completed in 1931 and
seized by the Allies in 1945 as the headquarters of the Supreme Allied Command.
In 2001 it became part of the University of Frankfurt.
Interessengemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG (German for
'Dye industry syndicate corporation'), commonly known as IG Farben, was a German chemical and
pharmaceutical conglomerate. Formed in 1925 from a merger of six chemical
companies—BASF, Bayer, Hoechst, Agfa, Chemische Fabrik
Griesheim-Elektron, and Chemische
Fabrik vorm. Weiler Ter Meer[1]—it was
seized by the Allies after World
War II and divided back into its constituent companies.[a]
In its heyday, IG Farben was the largest company in
Europe and the largest chemical and pharmaceutical company in the world.[4] IG Farben
scientists made fundamental contributions to all areas of chemistry and the
pharmaceutical industry. Otto
Bayer discovered the polyaddition for the synthesis of polyurethane in
1937,[5] and three
company scientists became Nobel laureates: Carl Bosch and Friedrich Bergius
in 1931 "for their contributions to the invention and development of
chemical high pressure methods",[6] and Gerhard Domagk in
1939 "for the discovery of the antibacterial effects of prontosil".[7]
The company had ties in the 1920s to the liberal German People's Party and was accused by the Nazis of being an "international
capitalist Jewish company".[8] A decade
later, it was a Nazi
Party donor and, after the Nazi takeover of Germany in 1933, a major government
contractor, providing significant material for the German war effort.
Throughout that decade it purged itself of its Jewish employees; the remainder
left in 1938.[9] Described
as "the most notorious German industrial concern during the Third Reich",[10] IG Farben
relied in the 1940s on slave labour from concentration camps, including 30,000
from Auschwitz.[11]
One of its subsidiaries
supplied the poison gas, Zyklon B, that killed over one million people in gas chambers
during the Holocaust.[b][13]
The Allies seized the company at the end of the war in
1945[a] and the
US authorities put its directors on trial. Held from 1947 to 1948 as one of the
subsequent Nuremberg trials, the IG Farben trial saw
23 IG Farben directors tried for war crimes and 13 convicted.[14] By 1951
all had been released by the American high commissioner for Germany, John J. McCloy.[15] What
remained of IG Farben in the West was split in 1951 into its six constituent
companies, then again into three: BASF, Bayer and Hoechst.[a] These
companies continued to operate as an informal cartel and played a major role in
the West German Wirtschaftswunder.
Following several later mergers the main successor companies are Agfa, BASF,
Bayer and Sanofi. In 2004 the
University of Frankfurt, housed in the former IG Farben head office, set up a permanent exhibition on
campus, the Norbert
Wollheim memorial, for the slave labourers and those killed by Zyklon
B.
Bayer
This article is about the Life Science, chemical and
pharmaceutical company. For other uses, see Bayer (disambiguation).
"Bayer Aspirin" redirects here. For the
pharmaceutical product, see aspirin.
FDA Reverses Its Position on Daily Aspirin
August 04, 2014
By Dr. Mercola
If you haven't had a heart attack, step away from the
aspirin bottle... If you are one of the 40 million Americans who take an
aspirin every day, you may want to heed the latest warning from the US Food and
Drug Administration (FDA).
After many decades of promoting aspirin, the FDA now says
that if you have not experienced a heart problem, you should not be
taking a daily aspirin—even if you have a family history of heart disease. This represents a significant
departure from FDA's prior position on aspirin for the prevention of heart
attacks.
On its website, the FDA now says:1, 2
"FDA has concluded that the data do not support
the use of aspirin as a preventive medication by people who have not had a
heart attack, stroke or cardiovascular problems, a use that is called 'primary
prevention.' In such people, the benefit has not been established but risks —
such as dangerous bleeding into the brain or stomach — are still present."
Their announcement was prompted by Bayer's request to
change its aspirin label to indicate it can help prevent heart attacks in
healthy individuals. Aspirin
generated
$1.27 billion in sales for Bayer
last year,3 and from Bayer's request, it appears they want everyone
to be taking their drug.
But the FDA says "not so fast"—and rightly so.
Evidence in support of using aspirin preventatively has gone from weak to
weaker to nonexistent. This is why I've been advising against it for more than
a decade. It looks as though aspirin, even "low-dose aspirin" (LDA),
may do far more harm than good.
In fact, it is debatable whether or not aspirin has ANY
protective benefits against cardiovascular disease, even if you have suffered
a heart attack or stroke. Recent scientific studies have uncovered a number of
serious side effects, suggesting that whatever aspirin may offer may be
overshadowed by its risks, especially when safer natural alternatives exist.
As is true for nearly all medications, the longer we
watch for side effects, the more we tend to find—even for drugs like aspirin
that have been around for more than 100 years. Just because aspirin is an
over-the-counter drug and has been around for more than a century does not mean
that it's harmless.
Aspirin May Conceal a Cardiac Event in Progress
Roughly 800,000 Americans die from cardiovascular disease
annually, which includes heart attacks and stroke. This is why heart health has
been such a major focus, and why aspirin was hailed as a "wonder
drug" by those who believed it was a safe and effective preventative. But
that ship has sailed.
Nearly 10 years ago, Dr. John G. F. Cleland, a
cardiologist from the University of Hull in the UK, wrote an excellent article
published in the British Journal of Medicine4 casting doubt
upon the efficacy of aspirin therapy for prevention of heart attacks.
Based on a series of meta-analyses from the Antithrombotic
Trialists' Collaboration,5 which is an enormous body of research
following more than 100,000 patients at high risk for cardiac events, Dr.
Cleland concluded that aspirin therapy was not saving lives. Rather, aspirin
seems to change the way vascular events present themselves.
The number of non-fatal events may be reduced, but the number
of sudden deaths is actually increased, because what most physicians
don't realize is that surprisingly aspirin can mask a cardiac event in
progress.
Dr. Cleland also found that studies touting aspirin's
benefits are seriously flawed and interpretation of those studies is biased.
Since Cleland's original study, a deluge of scientific studies have further
exposed aspirin's failure, which I have summarized in the next few sections.
Studies Show Aspirin Is a Dismal Failure at Preventing
Heart Attacks
The following table lists, chronologically, a sampling of
studies showing that taking aspirin may do more harm than good. Regardless of
whether you're a man, woman, or diabetic, aspirin has failed miserably. This
list of studies is not comprehensive.
Aspirin Increases Your Risk of Bleeding
Not only has aspirin failed to reduce the prevalence of
heart attacks and strokes, but the list of its adverse effects seems to grow
greater the more that it is studied. Chief among these is gastrointestinal
bleeding, as aspirin interferes with your platelets—the blood cells that allow
your blood to clot. According to one article, long-term low-dose aspirin
therapy may double your risk for a gastrointestinal bleed.14
Aspirin also increases your risk for a brain bleed,
especially if you are older. One study found a high mortality rate for elderly
individuals who had been taking aspirin prophylactically when they suffered a
head trauma, resulting in deadly brain hemorrhage.15
Aspirin Destroys the Lining of Your Gastrointestinal
Tract
Regular aspirin use also destroys the lining of your
gastrointestinal tract, increasing your risk for duodenal ulcers, H. Pylori
infection,16 Crohn's disease,17 diverticular
disease, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and intestinal perforations. More
than 10 percent of patients taking low-dose aspirin develop gastric ulcers. The
damage to your duodenum—the highest part of your intestine into which your
stomach contents pass—can result in duodenal ulcers, which are prone to
bleeding. Even low-dose aspirin is proven to cause problems.
A Japanese study found a higher incidence of bleeding at
the ulcer sites of patients with duodenal ulcers taking low-dose aspirin (LDA)
therapy, versus those not taking LDA.18 An Australian study also
showed that aspirin causes gastroduodenal damage even at the low doses used for
cardiovascular protection (80mg).19 And Japanese researchers found
that aspirin had caused "small bowel injuries" to 80 percent of study
participants after only two weeks of aspirin therapy.20
Even MORE Bad News for Bayer
Each year, 15,000 people die and 100,000 people are
hospitalized as the result of aspirin and other NSAIDs—and these are probably conservative
estimates. But aspirin may be one of the oldest killer drugs! Strong historical
evidence points to aspirin overdose as
a major contributor to high death tolls during the 1918 influenza pandemic.
Aspirin toxicity can result in hemorrhage and fluid buildup in your lungs,
which can result in death. If you are interested in the evidence for this,
please read Dr. Karen Starko's fascinating paper in Clinical Infectious
Diseases.21
Lending even more weight to Starko's work, an animal
study in 2010 suggests that treating the flu with antipyretics (such as
aspirin) may increase your risk of death. This study involved animals, but the
results were compelling enough for the researchers to make an "urgent
call" for human studies.22 Aspirin also depletes your body of
important nutrients, including vitamin C, vitamin E, folic acid, iron,
potassium, sodium, and zinc,23 as well as impairing your melatonin
production.24 And in addition to aspirin's growing list of bodily
assaults, routine aspirin use has been associated with even broader health
problems, such as:
·
Increased risk of one type of breast cancer in
women (ER/PR-negative)25
·
Increased risk of kidney failure
·
Hearing loss27 and tinnitus28
·
Erectile dysfunction:
Aspirin and other NSAIDs have been linked to a 22 percent increase in your risk
of erectile dysfunction (ED), according to Kaiser researchers who studied more
than 80,000 men29
The Real Key to Protecting Your Heart Is Reducing
Chronic Inflammation
Getting back to the subject of your heart, with all of
these adverse effects, why risk taking aspirin when there are safer and more
effective alternatives? About one in three deaths in the US are attributed to
cardiovascular disease—but 25 percent of those are preventable.
The key is to address chronic inflammation, which can be
accomplished by making specific lifestyle changes that encompass diet,
exercise, sun exposure, and bare skin contact with the earth. In the remainder
of this article, I will focus on heart-health strategies that work FAR better
than aspirin. For additional information, please refer to our prior article
about cardiovascular disease.
Heart Health Tip #1: Adopt a TRULY Heart-Healthy Diet
My "heart-healthy diet" is vastly different
from what government regulators and most conventional cardiologists
recommend—because mine is actually based on science. The
following table summarizes my basic nutritional recommendations, all of which
will help quell chronic inflammation. For further guidance about how to proceed
with your diet, I suggest reviewing my Optimized Nutrition Plan.
No comments:
Post a Comment