Top Italian surgeon held in heart-valve 'corruption' scandal

A leading Italian heart surgeon was arrested yesterday on suspicion that he had received large bribes to buy Brazilian-made heart valves that investigators believe may have caused the deaths of 20 transplant patients.

Dr Dino Casarotto, a surgeon of international repute and head of the cardiac department at a hospital in Padua, northern Italy, where Italian transplant surgery was pioneered in the 1980s, was arrested in Padua and taken to a police station for questioning, after which he was transferred to a prison in the city centre.

Dr Casarotto's arrest came after Antonio Sartori, a businessman dealing in medical equipment, said he had paid the equivalent of millions of euros to Dr Casarotto and other leading surgeons to induce them to use the valves.

An earlier confession by Mr Sartori led to the arrest two weeks ago of two heart surgeons in Turin, whom Mr Sartori said had accepted one and a half million lira in bribes (£500) for each of 300 Brazilian heart valves used in their hospitals – about one fifth of the retail price of the valves. The two doctors, Michele di Summa and Giuseppe Poletti, admitted their involvement in the scandal and have been freed on bail.

Mr Sartori provided further information this week to Padua's public prosecutor, Paola Cameran, who is investigating the death of a local man, Antonio Benvegnu, believed to be the first victim of the suspect valves. Mr Sartori said that he had been passing bribes to Dr Casarotto regularly since 1991.

Dr Casarotto has yet to make any comment on the affair and could not be reached before his arrest yesterday.

Mr Sartori claimed that he passed the money to Dr Casarotto in cash during hurried meetings in a bar on the edge of the city. He said Dr Casarotto was willing to accept half a million lira per valve at the outset, but later increased his price to one million lira. The transactions ceased one year ago when police began investigating the first suspicious death. Mr Sartori denied there was anything wrong with the valves and said he had paid bribes as it was the only way he could do his work.

In a separate affair, the British pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline has been accused of offering enormous inducements to nearly 3,000 Italian doctors to persuade them to use more of the firm's products. Italian prosecutors claim the firm, the biggest in Europe, conducted a determined campaign, codenamed Operation Jove, to soften up Italian doctors, bombarding them with free gadgets, medical apparatus and cash, as well as paying for them to attend "medical tours" such as one at Monte Carlo which happened to coincide with a Formula One race event there.