| Wall Street reporter’s inaccurate reports are becoming patient safety issue claims biomedical company CEO | | Print | |
| Written by M.E.Garza | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Monday, 29 June 2009 03:49 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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A San Francisco bay area television station recently reported that the technology is a promising path to a major medical advance and earlier this month, Oculus shares rose after the company received an expanded 510(k) label clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to market it’s Microcyn® Skin and Wound Cleanser with preservatives as both a prescription and over-the-counter formulation. The new prescription product is indicated for use by health care professionals to manage the debridement of wounds such as stage I-IV pressure ulcers, diabetic foot ulcers, post-surgical wounds, first- and second-degree wounds, grafted and donor sites. Not long after the announcement, TheStreet.Com’s biomedical columnist Adam Feuerstein leveled an accusation that Oculus “appeared to be skirting U.S. drug laws by claiming that its wound-cleansing product containing common diluted bleach has drug-like therapeutic properties.”
“This is becoming a patient safety issue and putting public safety at risk,” Alimi told BioMedReports in an exclusive recorded interview. “It’s no longer [about] attacking a company and the market potential and market cap. You’re damaging public safety.” Alimi, was concerned enough to craft a letter to CNBC’s Jim Cramer who co-founded TheStreet.com in 1996 and took the company public in 1999. “[I] copied the gentleman [Feuerstein] who had written the report, “explained the Iranian-born, Alimi. While the Oculus CEO made it clear that he believed the publication and writer were entitled to their constitutionally protected opinion he felt that the publication had fallen short of reporting the truth and science behind the technology accurately. “When you haven’t done your due diligence and you don’t understand the basic chemistry of our product [and] you make recommendations like that you are putting patients’ safety at risk,” insists Alimi. “There has to be a level of integrity in the research written and I think that’s really lacking in their case.” Last month, Dr. William A. Carter, the CEO of Hemispherx Biopharma (NASDAQ:HEB) angrily reacted to slanted attacks and base-less reports by stating that “Adam Feuerstein wouldn’t know good science if it bit him in the ass.” Investors across the internet have also lashed out against Feuerstein’s coverage on message boards - many of them leveling threats of physical violence while others have called for investigations by federal authorities and even lawsuits. Feuerstein has responded to some of the anger by stating that “Carter's bluster [was] designed to divert attention away from the real matter at hand” and by clarifying to his reader that he writes his columns and stories when he uncovers information that he thinks is important for investors to have. Recently, Thomas Clarke, who had served as CEO of the financial news website, announced that he was leaving the publicly traded company “effective immediately.” It was reported that Clarke’s abrupt departure came less than a day after Jon Stewart’s Comedy Central cable hit, The Daily Show, aired tape of Jim Cramer explaining in a Street.com webcast how he, as a hedge fund manager, manipulated value to serve some publicly traded companies and investors at the expense of others. Stewart’s show took Cramer, CNBC, and financial “journalism,” in general, to the cleaners but Feuerstein has insisted and written: “I don't make this job personal. I like to find good stories to write about -- stories that hopefully help investors make some money in biotech. (The best way to do that, sometimes, is to avoid buying certain stocks) If the stories are controversial, it's all the better, because those are usually the most fun.” In the case of Oculus, the “story” has definitely not been perceived as “fun” and appears to fall short of fact- scientific or otherwise- according to Alimi. Bleach is sodium hypochlorite which is anti-microbial at a high pH (pH scale of 8 and higher). “When you take that solution to a lower pH, you no longer have sodium hypochlorite as your active [ingredient], you have Hypochlorus acid (HOCI)” explains Alimi. “It’s a different chemistry. And Hypochlorus acid can be converted to different chemicals in a wound depending on how it’s manufactured, so that is a significant difference in the chemistry of our product.” Alimi points out that when a physician uses bleach in a wound, he will surely kill the infection in that wound, but he will also kill tissue and cause harm in the wound bed. In addition, diluted bleach solutions have not shown any wound healing impact- something that independent medical studies and trials have attributed to Microcyn®. Some feel that this type of reporting can be directly blamed for TheStreet’s continued troubles and decline in the current bear market. As recently reported, the publication’s stock recently dropped below $2 per share, down from $9.50 per share a year ago. In recent years it had traded as high as $16 per, but it has also suffered with the decline in the media and advertising markets as well as a major purge of subscriber newsletter operations. Its success was initially tied closely to Mr. Cramer’s popularity, but the recent heavy criticism may finally be reflecting in the company’s (NASDAQ:TSCM) stock price performance. In a strange twist, many have noted that stocks which have been the subject of slanted reports by Mr. Feuerstein, have just been added to the Russell 3000 index while TSCM itself has been booted as a financial services sector stock. An excerpt of Mr. Almi’s interview with BioMedReports can be heard below. In it, he reacts to investors’ questions about litigation, TheStreet.Com’s coverage and whether or not Oculus has considered issuing additional common shares. 
BiomedReports is not paid or compensated to report news and developments about publicly traded companies. Full disclosure can be read at the bottom of / About Us / Section Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites           
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Comments (13)
JMB
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... Thank you Mr. Garza for shining light on the behavior of TheStreet, and its integrity-challenged writer. It is important that the investing community call out its bad-actors publicly and try to reduce the harm they engender. You have done a good service with this article. |
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Asheesh
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... I am not an expert on Chemistry and just go by recommendations of experts like Street.com authors. But, I must say, a few days back I when I researching small Bio stocks, there wasn't a single stock that street.com gave a favorable rating. I am not saying that the ratings were wrong or right (I dont know), but it looked strange - not a single company is good, though many of them are up atleast 40-50% YTD. |
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Rob Gorgol
said:
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... I don't like F boy or what the street is doing. However, whenever you add water to chlorine you get HOCL with pH being the variable that indicates how much HOCL is formed vs the hypochorite ion (OCL-). So bleach isn't far from the truth, but how it's formulated for a specific purpose is valid. |
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claym711
said:
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... I commend Mr. Alimi for stepping up and standing up against Feuerstein. apparently... Former Congressman Calls for Investigation of CNBC's Jim Cramer http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2009/20090312152514.aspx |
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GEORGE DAHL
said:
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... A PRODUCT THAT WORKS.TESTS,STUDIES AND DOCTORS CONFIRM THIS! COULD IT BE POSSIBLE THAT MR. F AND CRAMER COULD BE SHORT THISS STOCK? REMEMBER DAN DORFMAN USE TO SHORT A STOCK THEN WRITE IT UP NEGATIVE IN THE HEARD ON THE STREET COLUMN. TO MANY STUDIES TO MANY DOCTORS SAY IT WORKS.YOU SIMPLY COULD NOT GET SO MANY TO SAY IT WORKS TO BE ANYTHING ELSE BUT TRUE. |
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Nancy K
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... Thank you for this article exposing the real life tragedy of unethical manipulation of health care stocks. These are often new drugs & therapies that make the difference of life or death. Opinion writers are entitled to their opinions, but not entitled to spout frankly false information. Undereducated tho he may be, Feuerstein knows or ought to know that there are laws against libel and laws against interference with business. Maybe Mr Madoff would appreciate having a cellmate?! |
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sliderulex
said:
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... Adam F is not qualified to comment or judge chemistry-based companies. Adam F has a degree in political science, not biochemistry or organic chemistry. So Adam F's attacks against biochem/biopharma companies have no merit. To prove this, have Adam F appear before a panel of experts and have him describe how the chemistry of a product, say Hemispherix Biopharma's Ampligen, works. Adam F neither understands the mechanism of operation, nor the language of the science. Yet, he bashes it. Anyone can see that Adam F is completely unqualified to make comment about the companies he attacks. Clearly then, he and his handlers have other reasons to attack, than sound scientific ones. Give you one guess what they would be. |
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Rob Gorgol
said:
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... They don't short them their buddies do and the SEC says it's completely legal as long as they disclose any positions they themselves own. It's apparently well known, and they continue so... |
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THP
said:
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... Please don't bother to read or click on AF article or even go to the street page. This will drive their rating and stock down for giving false or mislead information from factual data. |
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wohrlebird
said:
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... I have been personally using this stuff for over 5 years and it works great. I gargle with it when colds appeared to be coming and splashed on open cuts and wounds. Great results. |
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yki
said:
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... The Street works here on biostocks. About 95% of them go south when FDA says its word. You bash them and you´re 95% right. Readers happy. Advertisers happy. You HAPPY. Some are not but does it matter; that´s always so.. |
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justmeinnh2
said:
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... I know this is a very old article, but that idiot Adam Feuerstein is at it again, this time with Adventrx Pharmaceuticals. He is a danger to patients! |
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