FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE Thursday, March 27, 2003
Merck
Attempts to Hide Important Investment Facts From Shareholder Proxy Vote
Washington, DC - "It is clear from their actions, that Merck does not want
their stockholders to know the truth about how they conduct their
business," said Fr. Thomas Euteneuer, president of Human Life International
(HLI), a Merck & Co. stockholder. "If this is 'ordinary business'
as Merck claims, then they wouldn't have petitioned the Securities and Exchange
Commission for permission to remove the indicting language from our stockholder
proposal."
Working with Children of God for Life and Pro Vita Advisors, HLI drafted
Stockholder Proposal No. 7 which made clear -despite claims of employing,
"the highest standards of ethics and integrity," in its business
practices-that Merck & Co. continues to use aborted fetal cell lines in the
creation of certain vaccines. The original resolution sought to educate
investors to potential business and financial repercussions related to the
continued use of these cell lines. Merck sought to hide from investors
that:
In a five-page letter, Merck originally pleaded with
the SEC to keep the entire resolution off the company's proxy vote, but failed
at that effort. Merck did succeed, however, in convincing the SEC to
remove the language that would have informed voters of these potential risks.
Merck has refused to acknowledge that they profit from the destruction of human
life despite the fact that $34.6 million of their $7.2 billion net income for
2002 was from viral vaccine sales.
Debi Vinnedge, executive director of Children of God for Life, stated, "We
believe stockholders have a right to know these types of details about a company
in which they are investing. If that company is subject to boycotts,
investment warnings and resolutions like the one from the CMA, it could suffer a
severe loss in sales and devaluation in stock."
To view the Merck Prox: http://www.merck.com/finance/proxy/pr2003/proposal_4.html