LinkedIn likes | GSK, AstraZeneca investigated by watchdog over employees' social media activity

Pharmaceutical giants GSK and AstraZeneca have landed in hot water after their employees defied company social media policies, breaking UK marketing code.

According to reports from industry publication Fierce Pharma, recent Prescription Medicines Code Of Practice Authority (PMCPA) investigations into the drug companies identified cases in which employee social media activity, including LinkedIn ‘likes,’ broke rules about the promotion of medicines.

AstraZeneca has disputed the watchdog’s allegations that employees “refuse to cooperate and respect” UK marketing code, and in one case successfully defended a claim that two senior staff ignored requests to unlike LinkedIn posts.

It argued that one of the senior employees in question had never been asked to “withdraw a like, reaction or comment,” and that the other had been asked to remove a social media like and had done so immediately.