Big Pharma corporation involved in cocaine trade and dumping nuclear waste in St. Louis suburb paid zero taxes in 2015

Monday, March 07, 2016 by: Sarah Landers
Tags: Coca-Cola, Mallinckrodt, zero taxes

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(NaturalNews) Coca-Cola has been a household name since the company was first created back in 1886 by a pharmacist in Atlanta named Dr. John. S. Pemberton. Within two years of its creation, Coca-Cola became the world's number one selling carbonated beverage, and today is sold in over 200 different countries, according to Business Insider.

Coca-cola has a share of 42.8 percent of the U.S. carbonated drinks market, and approximately 1.7 billion servings are consumed every single day. The brand itself is worth an estimated $74 billion. So it's not surprising that the company chooses to keep its recipe a secret. In fact, until 1903, the recipe actually contained cocaine from the coca leaves themselves.

Nowadays, the recipe is cocaine-free but still kept top secret – although it seems that's not the only secret surrounding the manufacturing process and companies that Coca-Cola does business with.

Importing coca leaves

According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, "It is illegal to bring coca leaves into the U.S. for any purpose, including to use for brewing tea or for chewing." There is only one company in the U.S. that is legally allowed to import coca leaves – namely Stepan Company, which is based in Illinois. As stated by BGR, Stepan Company has special permission from the DEA to import upwards of 100 metric tons of coca leaves every year, most of which come from Peru.

At its New Jersey factory, Stepan Company then extracts the cocaine from the leaves, before they are shipped to Coca-Cola to be included in its unique syrup recipe. Big Pharma's Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals then purchases the cocaine from Stepan Company, and it is ultimately used for medicinal purposes.

Questions have been asked about what "medicinal purposes" require such an enormous amount of cocaine – approximately 333 kilos of cocaine per 100 metric tons of coca leaves – with an estimated street value of $16.7 million.

And Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals is now in the limelight for apparently not paying any taxes in 2015.

Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals

According to USA Today, Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals is one of 27 companies that paid no income tax in 2015, apparently because this Big Pharma company is based outside of the U.S. The website for Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals states that the company is registered in Dublin, Ireland – which might explain why out of its $215.3 million pre-tax profit, the company escaped paying $114.7 million in taxes.

This isn't the first time that the Mallinckrodt name has made the press, and the Mallinckrodt Group is under scrutiny for much more than its tax evasion. In 1973, the Mallinckrodt Group dumped tens of thousands of barrels of nuclear waste in St. Louis, which has recently been liked with more than 2,700 cases of cancer in the local area.

According to Workers World, the landfill occupies around 200 acres of land in Bridgeton, and has been on the U.S. EPA's Superfund National Priorities List since 1990, when nuclear contamination began to surface near a creek and children's playground.

The EPA has been monitoring the site, but hasn't actually done anything to clean up the mess caused by the Mallinckrodt Group. Over the past few months fires have broken out at an underground landfill site which is in very close proximity to the radioactive waste fill – but it seems nothing is being done to protect the community nearby.

Residents have been voicing their concerns about the nuclear waste for more than 30 years, as reported by Workers World, due to the prevalence of birth defects, cancer rates and a number of rare diseases – such as a rare form of leukemia in children.

How is it that a corporation operating in the U.S. for so many years can evade tax to the value of $114.7 million dollars in a single year – and get away with doing irreparable environmental damage on U.S. soil? And why does Coca-Cola continue to line its pockets with money from such a dark and dirty corporation? Yet another reason to avoid Coca-Cola and its many junk food products on your next shop.

Sources include:

NaturalNews.com

USAToday.com

Twisted.News

Workers.org

Evil.News

BusinessInsider.com

BRG.com

Help.CBP.Gov

Mallinckrodt.com

Newsday.com

Science.NaturalNews.com