Pfizer Creates Three Separate Businesses, But Spinoffs Are Not Imminent
As promised, Pfizer execs have settled on the latest installment in a much-discussed plan for splitting apart their various businesses. The next step begins in January and involves creating three entities - two will collect prescription drugs, over-the-counter items and vaccines, while a third will specifically house drugs that already face generic competition and still more that will lose patent protection by 2015. Each will operate as a separate global business.
The idea, of course, is to eventually ‘unlock’ shareholder value, a move the drugmaker has increasingly explored over the past two years as a way to deflect ...
Source: Pharmalot - July 29, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: esilverman Source Type: blogs
Merck 'Evergreens' Off-Patent Lipitor By Creating Combination Drug With
No Additional Benefit
By Glyn MoodyBig pharma often gets a rather rough ride here on Techdirt, what with its attempts to stop governments granting licenses for life-saving and low-cost generics in emerging countries, engaging in legal action to prevent drug safety information being released, and paying kickbacks to doctors. But sometimes you get the impression that drug companies really go out of their way to be disliked, as this great post by Josh Bloom on the Medical Progress Today site, pointed out to us by John Wilbanks, demonstrates:[Merck] just received approval for the cholesterol-lowering combinat...
Source: PharmaGossip - July 11, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
Low Rate Of Problems With Statins In Study Of Quarter Million Patients
A very large analysis of previously published studies finds that statins are generally safe and well tolerated, but helps confirm previous links to a small increased risk for diabetes and elevation of liver enzymes. Some statins were better tolerated than other statins and lower-dose statins were better tolerated than high dose statins. In a paper published in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, Huseyin Naci and colleagues report their findings from a systematic review of clinical trials with statins for both primary and secondary prevention. The data from 55 placebo controlled trials and 80 trials inclu...
Source: CardioBrief - July 9, 2013 Category: Cardiology Authors: Larry Husten Tags: Prevention, Epidemiology & Outcomes atorvastatin Pravastatin primary prevention Rosuvastatin secondary prevention Simvastatin Source Type: blogs
Should the FDA approve lovemaking technique?
Everybody knows that having sex is beneficial for your health. It lowers your blood pressure, reduces risk of heart attack, improves your self esteem and reduces stress (as per webmd.com). I think that one of the most important gifts God gave us is the ability to love.
But recently I realized that there’s a problem with love: Unlike so many other things that keep us healthy, lovemaking procedure is not approved by the FDA!
There are no randomized controlled studies about the safety of lovemaking, no government recommended doses, no side effects. Nothing! So I asked myself: how can we do it without FDA and government...
Source: Doctor Kalitenko antiaging blog - June 13, 2013 Category: Physicians With Health Advice Authors: admin Source Type: blogs
ProPublica Publishes Medicare Part D Prescriber Data
In 2010, the "investigative journalist organization" known as ProPubilca, through donations from the Pew Foundation and several other organizations geared towards attacking industry, began the "Dollars for Docs" campaign. As we have covered extensively since the launch of that campaign, ProPublica aggregated the payment reporting data of approximately 15 manufacturers who were reporting their payments publicly—either as a requirement of a corporate integrity agreement (CIA) with HHS-OIG, or voluntarily—and then created a searchable, aggregated website.
Additionally, ProPublica teamed up with national and local med...
Source: Policy and Medicine - June 13, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Thomas Sullivan Source Type: blogs
How Big Pharma Drives Up Medicare Spending Without Improving Seniors’ Health By Sy Mukherjee
The Medicare Part D prescription drug program for seniors wasted $1.4 billion paying for brand name drugs that were no more effective than their cheaper, generic counterparts, according to a new study by the Veterans Affairs Pittsburgh Healthcare System. That excess spending was driven in large part by pharmaceutical companies’ efforts to delay generic drug patents and undermine competition that would lower health care costs.
Researchers compared drugs used by veterans who get VA benefits against those used by seniors on Medicare Part D. The results were unambiguous: Part D beneficiaries consistently used expensive bran...
Source: PharmaGossip - June 11, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
May Diabetes-Related News Snippets
Conclusion: "Compared with pravastatin, treatment with higher potency statins, especially atorvastatin and simvastatin, might be associated with an increased risk of new onset diabetes."22% higher risk with Lipitor (atorvastatin) and 18 percent higher with Crestor (rosuvastatin).In mainstream press coverage, Drug company shills,, a.k.a. well known cardiologists, bend over backward to ignore this latest confirmation of a phenomenon that has been public knowledge for more than a year. The reason that statins cause diabetes may have to do with the fact that they impair the operation mitochondria--the part of the ce...
Source: Diabetes Update - June 3, 2013 Category: Diabetes Authors: Jenny Source Type: blogs
Strengthen Medicare: End Drug Company Price Setting
It’s no secret that, four years ago, President Obama cut a deal with the pharmaceutical industry. He promised that so long as the drug companies did not block health reform, federal law would continue to prohibit Medicare from negotiating drug prices. Instead, the pharmaceutical industry would get 30 million new customers and remain free to set drug prices for Americans. This single policy will cost Medicare and U.S. tax payers hundreds of billions of dollars over the next ten years.
If Congress wants to contain long-term Medicare spending and keep health care affordable in America, lawmakers should start with the low-...
Source: Health Affairs Blog - May 28, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Authors: Diane Archer Tags: All Categories Health Care Costs Medicaid Medicare Pharma Policy Spending Source Type: blogs
Ranbaxy: Looking Under the Rock
Here's an excellent, detailed look from Fortune at how things went off the rails at Ranbaxy and their generic atorvastatin (Lipitor). The company has been hit by a huge fine, and no wonder. This will give you the idea:
On May 13, Ranbaxy pleaded guilty to seven federal criminal counts of selling adulterated drugs with intent to defraud, failing to report that its drugs didn't meet specifications, and making intentionally false statements to the government. Ranbaxy agreed to pay $500 million in fines, forfeitures, and penalties -- the most ever levied against a generic-drug company. (No current or former Ranbaxy executives...
Source: In the Pipeline - May 16, 2013 Category: Chemists Tags: The Dark Side Source Type: blogs
Ranbaxy pleads guilty and agrees to $500 million penalty
LProsecutors say guilty plea by Ranbaxy is largest financial penalty against a generic drug companyWashington: A subsidiary of India’s largest pharmaceutical company has agreed to pay a record $500 million (Dh1.83 billion) in fines and penalties for selling adulterated drugs and lying to federal regulators in a case that is part of an ongoing crackdown on the quality of generic drugs flowing into the USFederal prosecutors say the guilty plea by Ranbaxy USA Inc represents the largest financial penalty against a generic drug company for violations of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, which prohibits the sale of impu...
Source: PharmaGossip - May 14, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: insider Source Type: blogs
ESC on anticoagulants; FDA on Liptruzet; Midei suit; MitraClip
ESC on anticoagulants; FDA approves atorvastatin/ezetimibe combo (Liptruzet) ; Midei suit settled; MitraClip (Source: Blogs@theHeart.org)
Source: Blogs@theHeart.org - May 10, 2013 Category: Cardiology Authors: theheart.org Tags: This week in cardiology from heartwire Source Type: blogs
Merck in the Mirror: Profits, Not People, Come First. Shame!
"How can Merck look itself in the mirror?", asks Josh Bloom of the American Council for Science and Health (see here)."This week, Merck, with some questionable help from the FDA, gave more ammunition to industry critics, who typically maintain that the industry contributes little innovation, and is simply concerned with profits," said Bloom."For the most part, this criticism is biased and uninformed, but this time I'm siding with the critics. Because Merck is trying something that is as good an example of marketing without innovation as you'll ever see."Derek Lowe, respected author of In the Pipeline blog, agrees. "I can't...
Source: Pharma Marketing Blog - May 10, 2013 Category: Pharma Commentators Tags: Zetia Profits before patients Merck Lipitor Source Type: blogs
