Whose cross is it anyway...

Red Cross image courtesy Wikipedia

May 8th 2002, the International Red Cross Society themed its World Red Cross Day as “Stop Misuse of the Red Cross Emblem” (the Geneva Convention of 1960 restricts the use of the emblem).

From then on, only personnel of the Red Cross Movement, the Army Medical Corps, the Red Crescent Societies and a few other bodies were allowed to use "its emblem" in India. With this, all Chemist and Clinical establishments in India moved over to a Green Cross.

Turns out that Johnson & Johnson has been using the red cross since 1887. This was "much before" the chartering of the American Red Cross, (found in 1881 by Clara Barton ?), which it is suing now because they have licensed the trademark to several business for commercial purposes.

There is a nice PR battle going on between the two organizations. Most important is the Red cross' allegations that, "J&J demands that the Red Cross, stop the Red Cross and its licensing partners from using the Red Cross emblem permanently on first aid, preparedness and related products sold to the public". While J&J maintains, "The goal of this civil complaint is to restore the long-held legal boundaries surrounding the use of the Red Cross trademark" which has been established between both organizations during the century old strong cooperation.

I think, currently, it is J&J - 1 and Red Cross - 0. Thanks to Mark Everson, the Red Cross' president loosely stating, "For a multi billion-dollar drug company to claim that the Red Cross violated a criminal statute, . . . simply so that J&J can make more money, is obscene." So much for the nuances in languages in Red Cross' press releases

Update (13th Aug '07): Kilmer House (one of the many blogs of J&J) has an update on the who issue with some background.

I work for J&J currently. These are my personal opinions and don't have anything to do with the company stand.