Company to stop making drug commonly used in executions By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 22, 2011; 12:00 AM
The U.S. company that makes a drug most states use in lethal injection announced Friday that it would no longer produce the powerful anesthetic, a decision that throws capital punishment in the United States into disarray.
The decision by Hospira of Lake Forest., Ill., was prompted by demands from Italy, which does not have capital punishment, that no sodium thiopental - which the company had planned to make at its plant outside Milan - be used for executions, officials said.
"We determined we could not prevent the drug from being diverted for use in capital punishment," said Dan Rosenberg, a Hospira spokesman. He noted that the company never condoned the drug's use for lethal injection and had hoped to continue making it for medical use.
Hospira's move will force states and the federal government to look for alternatives to the drug, which could require lengthy approval processes and result in costly, long-running legal challenges.
The company had planned to shift production from a plant in North Carolina to a facility in Liscate, Italy. But after those plans became public, the Italian Parliament demanded the company ensure the drug would be used only for medical purposes.
