Hello, everyone, and how are you today? A shiny day is unfolding on the Pharmalot corporate campus and we hope the warm weather helps many of the people in our region with the recovery process after the storm. Like many others, we are boiling water, although in our case, this is for the mandatory cup of stimulation. We hope you will join us. Meanwhile, here are some headlines from around the world. Have a good day and stay in touch...
Head-To-Head Crestor Versus Lipitor Results Due Soon (Reuters)
Pfizer And Dr. Reddy's Settle Lipitor Patent Lawsuit (Bloomberg News)
Docs Want Alternatives To Benlysta Lupus Drug (Associated Press)
Troubled Wipe Maker Hires Abbott Exec As COO (MSNBC)
Another Study Says Arena Diet Pill Beats Placebo (Reuters)
Pharma Paid US Docs $150M So Far This Year (Financial Times)
Valeant Beats Paladin In Bid For Afexa (Pharma Times)
United Drug To Lay Off 150 Employees (Outsourcing Pharma)
Dairy Giant Buys Indian API Maker (The Economic Times)
EDITOR’S NOTE: Please check this post for updates throughout the morning
sunrise pic thx to benimoto on flickr
3 Comments
This Crestor thing is history redux. Therapeutic switches from the more potent Lipitor to the less potent generic simvastatin have been happening for awhile, even when doctors Rx for brand name Zocor. Both Crestor and Lipitor have CV outcomes improvement in their labeling, so unless the SATURN trial has comparative morbidity/mortality data, which I'm pretty sure it doesn't, then the payers will most likely ignore this study and push generic atorvastatin when Lipitor goes off patent.
Former Hoffman Roche president Stephen G Sudovar (SGS associates)refused to visit his 100 yr old mother this past Monday, who is homebound in the well documented flood plain of Wayne, New Jersey. Sudovar is currently under a Passaic New Jersey Superior (Hon Judge Mary Margaret McVeigh)Court order to be present when his sister and court assigned faclilitator, Benni Versaci of Spectrum Geriatrics of Butler New Jersey seek to visit with the aged mother. Sudovar has been named a a defendant in an action brought by his sister because among other reasons, Sudovar had a covert financial proxy drawn up in New Jersey and signed and filed in Delaware over the aged mother and another sibling also had a medical proxy covertly signed as well. There after the def's moved the infirmed matron to a residence on a commercialy zoned lot where trucks and a metals rcycling yard are doing 24 hr per day operations in the flood zone and have refused to allow the aged mother to return to her own home which sits on the high grounds of Waymne
Part of the reluctance on Benlysta is that rheumatologists can probably do as well or better at treating flareups of lupus with tapering doses of predisone, a drug they know very well and is dirt cheap.
The obvious study would be for the sponsor to do a head-to-head comparison of Benlysta vs prednisone, but are afraid to do so because they know that they won't be able to show superiority to a drug that costs pennies/day.