PharmaReports.net

NICE garners new fans–and new critics

PharmaBlogs — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:15:26 +0000

The U.K.'s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence may be the healthcare business's favorite love-to-hate-it institution. The agency analyzes drugs and other treatments for their cost-effectiveness, and sometimes it makes decisions that patients find cold-blooded, to say the least.

And pharma often agrees, often for its own cold-blooded reasons: If NICE rules against a medication, then the National Health Service doesn't pay for it, and a huge potential market is lost. Not to mention the fact that other governments often watch NICE's decisions and tailor their own drug reimbursements accordingly.

As the U.S. looks to be mulling a version of this cost-effectiveness analysis, in an attempt to rein in wildly out-of-control healthcare costs, NICE is getting an entirely new group of critics. But it's also getting a fair number of admirers as well. Jim Edwards at BNet scoffs at all the hand-wringing over NICE's initial rejection of costly kidney cancer treatments, saying that the refusal actually did what it was supposed to: the makers of those treatments now are cutting their prices.

Meanwhile, the New York Times boils down NICE's role--and the role of any imitators--to one question: How much is life worth? That's not the sort of question Americans are accustomed to asking. So what do you think? Is NICE a cold-hearted bean counter? Or the sort of gatekeeper today's healthcare requires?

- read the post at BNet
- check out the WSJ Health Blog's take
- see the article in the NYT

Roche stalls; Genentech soldiers on

PharmaBlogs — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 16:01:33 +0000

A Genentech official tells the WSJ Health Blog that the company's morale hasn't been affected by the still-treading-water Roche buyout. Nor have employees begun to head for the doors. But In the Pipeline is skeptical, both of the supposed unchanged morale and of the eventual deal itself. Report | Report

Cleveland Clinic puts pharma payments online

PharmaBlogs — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:56:09 +0000

The prestigious Cleveland Clinic says it's started airing business relationships that its 1,800 staff doctors and scientists have with drug and device makers. A database of payments of $5,000 and above will be maintained on the clinic's website as part of an overall revamp of its conflicts of interest policies, which has been underway for the past couple of years. With this new move, the Cleveland Clinic steps to the forefront of medical facilities' efforts to bring transparency to their relationships with industry.

The clinic didn't embark on the conflicts-of-interest overhaul completely voluntarily, the New York Times notes. Several years ago, several of its prominent doctors were criticized for their financial ties to the industry. Since then, the clinic has created ways to monitor those ties and established a committee to review any relationships that are considered "significant."

With this new step toward public disclosure, the clinic is right in tune with the times. As you know, disclosure has been a hot topic all year, with Congress investigating ties between doctors and researchers on one side and pharma on the other. At the same time, lawmakers have drafted legislation that would mandate disclosure of pharma and device companies' payments to doctors. And some drugmakers, such as Merck and Eli Lilly, have pledged to start disclosing those payments next year, with or without legislation.

- check out the clinic's release
- read the New York Times story

Merck’s 2009 estimates disappoint Street

PharmaBlogs — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:31:54 +0000

Analysts were disappointed with Merck's 2009 earnings estimates--and when analysts aren't happy, nobody's happy. The drugmaker's stock is already suffering on the news that it predicts revenue to fall off by about 3 percent and profits to drop 6 percent. That leaves earnings at $3.15 to $3.30 a share, excluding restructuring costs, which, given the company's layoff program, should be considerable. Analysts had expected earnings of $3.52 per share on 3 percent revenue growth.

The company is hanging onto its pledge of increasing shareholder value, saying its strong balance sheet will help prop up dividends at their current levels. Plus, the company says it will be able to repurchase some stock--to shore up the share price--and "take advantage of strategic opportunities," which we read to be "pipeline-boosting biotech deals."

- see the Merck release
- read the Wall Street Journal story

Cigna cuts patients’ costs for Lipitor

PharmaBlogs — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:17:16 +0000

Cigna is giving patients and Pfizer a break today. The insurance giant bumped Lipitor up to preferred status on its formulary, cutting copays at a time when the economy is slowing. That's likely to help patients stay on Lipitor, rather than switch to a cheaper generic to save money.

And it helps Pfizer, of course, because the drugmaker is trying to milk as much cash as it can out of the Lipitor franchise before the drug goes off patient in 2011. The more patients it can persuade to keep taking Lipitor--or to switch to the med, as it's been lobbying for--the more money it can reap from the cholesterol powerhouse.

As you know, Lipitor lost a big chunk of scrips when Merck's Zocor went generic and patients switched to that less expensive option. Pfizer has been running studies in an attempt to show Lipitor's superiority to alternative cholesterol meds, hoping to hang onto as many patients as it can. And no wonder: Lipitor brought in more than $12 billion in sales last year for Pfizer, more than a quarter of the company's overall revenues.

- read the Cigna release
- check out the story in the Star-Ledger

Evotec Announces Three-Year Drug Discovery Collaboration

Pharma Industry / Biotech Industry News From Medical News Today — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 12:00:00 +0000

Evotec AG (Frankfurt Stock Exchange: EVT; NASDAQ: EVTC) today announced the start of a research collaboration with Novartis to identify and develop novel small molecule therapeutics. The collaboration will run for an initial period of three years. Evotec will apply its powerful drug discovery platform in combination with its extensive disease biology expertise to advance a drug discovery program against a target nominated by Novartis through discovery into the clinic.

The Tom Daschle Appointment for HHS - What’s Inside?

msenak@comcast.net (Mark Senak) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 12:00:00 +0000

Former Senate leader Tom Daschle has been tapped by President-Elect Barack Obama as the new Secretary of Health and Human Services. Here is some of the legislation Senator Dashcle either sponsored or co-sponsored related to FDA and to the pharmaceutical...

Drug Marketing Techniques May Be Risking Patient Safety, British Medical Journal

Pharma Industry / Biotech Industry News From Medical News Today — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:00:00 +0000

With new drugs being reviewed by regulatory agencies and then released onto the market faster than ever before, patients' safety is being compromised, warns a study published on bmj.com today.

Cleveland Clinic Begins Public Disclosure Of Physician-Industry Relationships

Pharma Industry / Biotech Industry News From Medical News Today — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:00:00 +0000

Cleveland Clinic this week began publishing on its Web site complete disclosures of physicians' and researchers' business relationships and financial ties, the New York Times reports.

Isis Announces That OGX-011 Has Shown Overall Survival Advantage In Prostate Cancer Compared To Standard Therapy In A Randomized Phase 2 Study

Pharma Industry / Biotech Industry News From Medical News Today — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 08:00:00 +0000

Isis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq: ISIS) announced that OncoGenex Pharmaceuticals, Inc. provided positive survival results from a randomized Phase 2 clinical trial of OGX-011 in combination with docetaxel and prednisone ("the OGX-011 arm") compared to docetaxel and prednisone alone ("the control arm") for first-line treatment of metastatic castrate resistant prostate cancer. The current 10.