To: RCN Council and Executive Leadership Team, Royal College of Nursing (RCN) Cc: RCNi Board of Directors; RCN International Committee

Date: 10.9.2026

Dear Members of the RCN Council and Executive Leadership,

As registered nurses, midwives, healthcare professionals, dedicated members of the Royal College of Nursing, and members of the public, we write to express our profound concern regarding commercial partnerships accepted across the RCN Group. More specifically, we refer to the upcoming Nursing Leadership Summit: Migraine and Headache organised by RCNi at RCN HQ, co-designed and sponsored by Teva UK Limited

Teva UK Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Israel-based Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd; a multinational pharmaceutical company entangled with the Israeli military, part of the institutional apparatus of apartheid and responsible for corporate malfeasance, evidenced later in the letter.

We are deeply concerned that the collaboration with Teva, particularly, for a flagship educational event, represents a catastrophic governance failure that violates the core ethical foundations of our profession and potentially cause irreparable reputational damage to the RCN.

This letter outlines the fundamental reasons for the RCN to disengage with Teva, evidence Teva’s misconducts and details appropriate reparations.

1.Reputational Damage to the RCN

Nursing consistently ranks among the most trusted and respected professions in the United Kingdom, held in the highest public esteem for our uncompromising integrity, compassion, and commitment to public service.

Commercial sponsorship is never an altruistic transaction; it provides corporate entities with borrowed legitimacy, moral cover, and institutional prestige. Therefore, in sponsoring a high-profile RCN educational event, Teva is actively leveraging the credibility, ethical standing, and noble reputation of nursing to improve its profile within the medical profession and with the public. Positioning itself as a progressive healthcare ally, sanitising a corporate brand that is deeply complicit in the oppression of Palestinians and corporate maleficence across the globe.

2.The Fallacy of "Neutrality" Amidst Genocide

The RCN leadership consistently cited institutional "political neutrality” in response to repeated challenges by members to take a clear, principled stand on the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Accepting commercial sponsorship from a corporate titan deeply woven into the Israeli state’s military apparatus, and its wartime mobilisation is the very antithesis of neutrality. An organisation representing nurses cannot claim impartial neutrality while accepting commercial revenue, granting brand visibility, and ceding conceptual input to a commercial entity actively supporting an armed force responsible for healthocide—the calculated, systematic destruction of an entire healthcare infrastructure, its facilities, and its workforce.

Neutrality cannot be invoked to suppress member advocacy and professional solidarity, only to be discarded when commercial sponsorship opportunities arise.

Since the escalation of military violence and oppression in October 2023, the global medical community has witnessed the deliberate obliteration of healthcare in Gaza. United Nations bodies, the World Health Organization, and international human rights monitors have documented:

-Over 1,700 healthcare workers killed—including nurses, doctors, paramedics, and allied healthcare staff, averaging more than two healthcare colleagues killed every single day.

-Hundreds of healthcare workers arbitrarily detained, abducted, and subjected to systemic torture in military detention centres, resulting in documented deaths in custody.

-Coordinated sieges, attacks, bombardments, and the forced collapse of most hospitals and primary care clinics across the Gaza Strip.

This systematic targeting of healthcare constitutes a grave crime against humanity. Allowing Teva; an Israeli multinational that has mobilised material and political support for this very military campaign, to brand our union's headquarters is an unconscionable betrayal of our fallen Palestinian colleagues and a direct violation of the professional values embedded within our NMC Code.

As detailed in investigative reporting and international monitoring dossiers—including Declassified UK, the OpenIntel Complicity Index, the Stop Teva Coalition, Healthcare Workers 4 Palestine Spain, and the international civil society petition submitted to the UN Global Compact:

-Direct Military Provision and Equipment Donations:Following the declaration of a total siege on Gaza in October 2023, Teva established logistical collection points across five Israeli sites, delivering roughly 1.5 tonnes of equipment, to the Israeli military.

-Operational Military Integration: Senior leadership within Teva confirmed that between 10% and 20% of Teva’s domestic workforce were mobilised into the military during the genocide in Gaza. Notably, Hadar Mama, CEO of Teva's domestic logistics subsidiary (Salomon, Levin & Elstein - SLE), commanded active Israeli military operations inside the Gaza Strip while concurrently directing Teva's corporate logistics, receiving supply consignments gathered by Teva personnel.

-Combat Troop Support Programmes: Teva maintains a long-standing relationship with military battalions via the IDF’s "Adopt-a-Battalion" initiative and directly finances mental health and psychological support programmes for combat forces through schemes such as "Support the Soul" (with Momentum) and partnerships with Thank Israeli Soldiers (TIS).

-Self-Declared National Instrument: Following October 2023, Teva’s Global CEO Richard Francis and regional leadership explicitly designated Teva as "the national pharmaceutical and healthcare company of Israel," openly boasting that the company was able to "have been part of a war and still performed the way it did".

The petition calling for Teva’s removal from the UN Global Compact illustrates that its misconduct extends beyond military complicity to systemic anti-competitive practices, environmental offences, and international bribery:

-Antitrust Violations and Record Penalties: In 2024, the European Commission imposed a historic €462.6 million fine on Teva for abusing its dominant market position, misusing divisional patent procedures, and systematically disseminating misleading information to delay the entry of a generic competitor to its multiple sclerosis medicine, Copaxone.

-Foreign Bribery and Criminal Penalties: In 2016, Teva agreed to pay over $500 million to resolve criminal charges under the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for bribing government officials across Russia, Ukraine, and Mexico to artificially boost public drug registrations and state tenders.

-Price Fixing and Collusion: In 2023, Teva entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with the US Department of Justice, admitting to collusive price-fixing conspiracies on essential generic medicines, in addition to prior penalties for unlawful pay-for-delay arrangements across Europe.

-Environmental Offences: Teva has previously been penalised millions of dollars for chronic violations of environmental protection statutes, including the discharge of hazardous pollutants into water and air systems.

Partnering with an entity bearing this track record directly compromises the RCN's governance standards and degrades public trust in our profession.

Recommendations for Immediate Action

We strongly recommend that the RCN Council and Executive Leadership take the following actions as upmost priority:

Immediately cancel the Nursing Leadership Summit: Migraine and Headache scheduled at RCN HQ to protect the RCN from any reputational injury. Of note, a Teva-sponsored mental health symposium in south London was cancelled in the Autumn 2025 when local residents, service-users and NHS staff campaigned against Teva’s sponsorship of the event.

Launch an urgent, independent investigation into the governance and oversight failures that allowed RCNi to enter into this precarious commercial agreement.

Impose a total and permanent moratorium on all active and pending commercial, advertising, and sponsorship agreements across the entire RCN Group with Teva and any corporate entity linked to military occupation, arms procurement networks, or attacks on healthcare infrastructure.

Co-produce a binding Ethical Sponsorship and Procurement Policy alongside members, establishing robust, human-rights-centred exclusions grounded in international humanitarian law and the protection of healthcare neutrality.

Thank you for taking the time to read and understand the concerns raised, we await your response.

Yours sincerely,

Name

Nurses 4 Palestine

Nursing Arm of UK Health Petitions to the Royal Colleges

And the Signatories of this open letter

References

Declassified UK Curtis, M. The Israeli firm aiding the NHS and IDF. Available at: declassifieduk.org/the-israeli-firm-aiding-the-nhs...

OpenIntel UK Teva Pharmaceuticals: Israel Complicity Index Dossier. Available at: https://openintel.uk/teva-pharmaceuticals/

Stop Teva Coalition Research Dossier: Corporate Complicity, Captive Markets, and Ties to the IDF. Available at: https://stopteva.nl/research/

Healthcare Workers 4 Palestine Spain (HW4P) Teva and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Available at: hw4p.es/blog/teva-y-el-ejercito-de-israel-idf-teva...

Action Network / Global Health BDS for Palestine Petition to UN Global Compact for Removal of Teva Pharmaceuticals from List of Participants. Available at: actionnetwork.org/petitions/letter-to-un-global-co...