Trends urge need to focus on prevention
©Charlie Bibby Testing times: a scientist at the Institute of Cancer Research assesses new drugs. Companies face everhigher costs before they see a return In the long run we may…
India: ‘Weak system’ threatens development
©Getty ‘No frills’ hospital in Bangalore cuts costs When Jacintha Shekar, a 46-year-old New Delhi housekeeper, was diagnosed with stage-three uterine cancer last year, her family tried desperately to get…
Innovation: Pharmaceutical groups become victims of their own success
Every few months, the Hever Group – an informal gathering of the heads of research and development at the large pharmaceutical companies – comes together for what Jan Lundberg of…
Lundbeck fined for ‘pay for delay’ deals
European regulators have fined Lundbeck, the Danish pharmaceutical company, €94m for paying rivals to delay cut-price competition for one of its antidepressant medicines. The action – which Lundbeck said it…
Royalty Pharma abandons bid for Elan
Royalty Pharma has abandoned its hostile $8bn bid for Elan, leaving the future of the Irish pharmaceutical group unclear after its investors voted against the management’s own proposed acquisition strategy.…
‘Pay for delay’ deals to be scrutinised
Payments by drug companies to delay generic competition will be open to fresh antitrust scrutiny in the US, following a Supreme Court ruling on Monday. In a decision that boosts…
Novartis pioneers health project in China
©AFP China may be one of the world’s largest markets for companies from Rolls-Royce to Rolex, but beneath that veneer of wealth lies poverty so extreme that millions still have…
Elan shareholders support buyback
Royalty Pharma’s $6.7bn hostile bid for Elan was set to lapse on Monday after shareholders created a stalemate, by approving the Irish pharmaceutical company’s proposed share buyback while rejecting its…
Single preventive pill to be sold online
A medical professor frustrated by regulatory barriers has turned to the internet to distribute a combination of existing medicines for preventing heart attacks in healthy people. Professor Sir Nicholas Wald…
Can financial engineering heal medical funding?
©Science Photo Library A cervical cancer cell: a concerted effort to cure cancer must rank as one of the least controversial proposals going Can financial engineering cure cancer? It is…
Drugs groups face penalty over generics
Payments by pharmaceutical companies to generic rivals to delay the launch of competing medicines are coming under fresh pressure on both sides of the Atlantic, with a European regulatory penalty…
Social intelligence
Many people might think that social media constitute little more than a cacophonic background commentary on modern life. But for some companies they are proving a goldmine. Buried among the…
Elan puts itself up for sale
Elan, the Irish pharmaceutical business facing a $6.7bn hostile bid from Royalty Pharma, said on Friday it was putting itself up for sale, in a move swiftly dismissed by the…
Glaxo’s MS drug tests put on hold
GlaxoSmithKline has put on hold tests on human volunteers of an experimental compound for multiple sclerosis, after claims of fraud in a scientific paper that led it to dismiss its…
Generic drug groups fined $2.15bn
Generic drug makers Teva and Sun Pharma will pay $2.15bn to Pfizer and Takeda to settle a long-running patent dispute in the US over Protonoix, a stomach acid treatment. The…