News at a glance: Ben Franklin ’s anticounterfeiting, science’s English language barrier, and disclosing stigmatized identities to students

INFECTIOUS DISEASES Drugmaker expands access to TB drug A man with tuberculosis undergoes an electrocardiogram at an Indian clinic that treats drug-resistant TB. UNIT PARANJPE/AFP/GETTY IMAGES The pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson (J&J) last week agreed to help make a therapy critical to fighting drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB) more widely available and affordable. J&J said it would allow competitors to market generic versions of the lifesaving drug, bedaquiline, in 44 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where the company has active patents. The United Nations–affiliated Stop TB Partnership’s Global Drug Facility, which announced the deal with J&J, now sells the drug in LMICs for $45 per month for a 6-month course; generic versions are estimated to cost $8 to $17 per month. The announcement came 2 days after bestselling fiction author John Green assailed the company on social media, claiming it made minor modifications to the drug to extend its patent protection in the 44 LMICs. J&J called that “false.” India’s patent office denied J&J a patent extension there in March. The expiration of a key J&J patent this week is expected to make generic versions available in dozens of additional LMICs. WORKPLACE A hard road for nonnative English The predominance of English in scientific communications makes it dif...
Source: ScienceNOW - Category: Science Source Type: news