No Deadly Drug - Hardcover

Tom Ferguson; Joe Graedon

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0671748696 ISBN 13: 9780671748692

Publisher: Pocket Books, 1992

Synopsis

When a teenaged girl dies in his emergency room for no apparent reason, San Francisco physician Dr. Gabe Austin investigates and learns that a megacorporation's newest anti-viral medication may have fatal side effects.

About this title

Reviews

In this provocative first novel, Graedon (author of the perennial bestseller The People's Pharmacy ) and physician Ferguson posit that a major pharmaceutical company is willing to resort to violence and murder in order to keep a deadly drug on the market. The open ing chapters are especially well done. California-based consumer activist Dr. Gabe Austin, who watches the daughter of a close friend die a terrible death, believes that a new prescription drug called Virazine is responsible. The charismatic chief executive of Kimberly Pharmaceuticals seems willing to do anything to prevent Austin from making his suspicions public. From this point, the story begins to fall apart. Kate Reiley, Gabe's old flame, is hired at Kimberley; she is a world-class marathoner recently targeted for an assassination attempt (during a major race) to keep her quiet. Gabe foils the killer in a physical battle before hundreds of witnesses as the book races to a violent conclusion--and then continues to yet another one. There are some nice twists and surprises at the end, including a hired gun whom few will suspect, but too many dangling threads and unlikely situations diminish the plot's overall impact.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A suspense debut--from medical writer Ferguson and Graedon (coauthor of The People's Pharmacy)--in which spectacular cerebrovascular accidents fell Californians like ninepins. The deaths appear to be an unpleasant side effect of a new herpes medicine. Ultradedicated emergency-room physician and media star Gabe Austin is about to hang up his bloody scrubs and enjoy a long deferred date with old flame Kate, herself an ultradedicated physician and world-class marathoner, when an ambulance delivers a young woman with a killer headache and blood pressure through the roof. Ultradedication, alas, is not enough to save the young woman's life, and the hitherto healthy (save for the odd bulimic episode) girl succumbs in the middle of a CAT scan. A baffled Dr. Austin takes time off from his emergency room, his TV spots, and his column and flies off to a medical convention in Reno with Kate, who now works as chief wellness manager for a huge drug firm. After extending professional courtesies with Kate in her luxurious suite, Gabe gets some computer information about other otherwise healthy Californians who have, like his late friend, suddenly fallen victim to strokes. The only thing the victims had in common was a dose of a new herpes medicine made by, uh-oh, Kate's firm--which will go to any length to protect its investment in the drug. Among the firm's weapons are a lawyer who most unpleasantly resembles the late Roy Cohn and his beefy driver. Valiant docs. Vile corporations. Bad medicine. -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: Pocket Books
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0671748696
• ISBN 13: 9780671748692
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256