- Health facility to open in Tonopah in June (reviewjournal.com)
About 10 months after the only hospital in a 100-mile radius closed, Tonopah will welcome a new medical center, according to Northern Nevada health care group Renown Health...will open June 1 at the site of the former Nye Regional Medical Center in a partnership between Renown and the Nye County Board of Commissioners, it was announced Tuesday at a meeting of the board...The site...will use secure telehealth videoconferencing technology to connect patients with doctors, said Rich Conley, director of Renown Regional Medical Center...The technology will “help patients access primary care providers as well as more than 30 specialties...“This partnership with Nye County allowed us to create an innovative and sustainable solution for the residents of Tonopah and the surrounding communities in central Nevada,”...Renown said it is working to expand the number of services that the facility will offer by looking for an on-site advanced practitioner, hiring more support staff and expanding lab and imaging services...“It was important to us to restart health care services, and we are glad Renown stepped in to help find a solution for this community,” Nye County Commissioner Lorinda Wichman said...
- Valeant forms internal committee to oversee drug pricing (reuters.com)
Valeant Pharmaceuticals International Inc, which has acknowledged mistakes in its drug pricing practices amid U.S. congressional probes, said on Thursday it has formed a new committee to oversee pricing of the company's drugs...The Patient Access and Pricing Committee will initially be chaired by Joseph Papa, Valeant's new chairman and chief executive officer... the committee will review the pricing of Nitropress, Isuprel, Cuprimine and Syprine...Valeant raised the price of Isuprel by about 720 percent and Nitropress by 310 percent...Prices of the other two drugs, used to treat a genetic disorder that causes copper to build up in the body's organs, were raised by 5,878 percent and 3,162 percent, respectively...This new committee will take a disciplined approach to reviewing the company's pricing of drugs, and will consider the impact on patients, doctors, and our health care industry partners...
- Traders: How to play sagging biotech stocks (cnbc.com)
Biotech stocks dragged on the market Friday, and some "Fast Money" traders contended that the pain may not be done...Gilead Sciences shares sank 9 percent on the day, after the pharmaceutical company posted earnings and revenue Thursday that fell short of expectations. The iShares Nasdaq Biotechnology ETF (Exchange Traded Funds), meanwhile, dipped 2.7 percent on Friday...that investors need to be "careful" choosing biotech stocks amid headwinds like the ongoing criticism around drug pricing...Trader Guy Adami was also cautious on the sector, saying he would not buy any of its stocks until the biotech ETF cracks $285 per share. It closed at about $268 on Friday...
- France gets G7 to discuss global regulation of medicine prices (reuters.com)
France will press its G7 partners this month to launch an "irreversible" process to control the prices of new medicines, part of a global drive to make life-saving drugs more affordable...President Francois Hollande said in March he would push for the international regulation of drugs prices when he meets other G7 leaders in Ise-Shima, Japan on May 26-27...We need to initiate this process with firmness, and the president wants it to be irreversible...G7 nations are home to most of the leading drug makers and while governments are keen to tackle rising health costs they may be reluctant to pitch themselves against their own pharmaceutical industries...G7 delegations have begun initial talks on the issue but no one expects a breakthrough in the near future...
- Pharmacy Week in Review: May 6, 2016 (pharmacytimes.com)
Mike Glaicar, Business Development: Pharmacy Times...(PTNN) This weekly video program provides our readers with an in-depth review of the latest news, product approvals, FDA rulings and more.
- Sanofi, Amgen cholesterol drugs win UK backing after price cuts (reuters.com)
Two rival cholesterol-lowering injections from Sanofi and Amgen have been recommended by Britain's healthcare cost watchdog after the manufacturers offered special discounts to the country's state-run health service...Sanofi's Praluent (alirocumab)...and Amgen's Repatha (evolocumab) are both so-called PCSK9 medicines...The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence said in draft guidance on...that both drugs could be considered for use by people whose cholesterol is still not under control despite trying other treatments...It stressed that the medicines would only be cost-effective with the promised discounts...Both drugs cost more than 4,000 pounds ($5,780) per patient a year in Britain. That is already a lot less than their U.S. list price of around $14,000, but Sanofi and Amgen have committed to discount the British price by a further undisclosed amount for the UK National Health Service
- GSK CEO: Big pharma should keep investing in R&D (cnbc.com)
GlaxoSmithKline CEO Andrew Witty attributes the company's success to sticking to the tried-and-true business model of investing in research and development and not transitioning to an acquisition model...the key is to be patient and to see the value of investing in innovation...What we have to stay focused on is the fundamentals of the value of innovation and discovery of medicines and vaccines that make a real difference to patients...The alternative acquisition model in the health care industry has drawn criticism during this election year. In theory, the M&A strategy can save companies significant sums as they can purchase mature, fully developed products without having to invest in R&D...
- Sanofi ready to up offer for drugmaker Medivation, could oust board (finance.yahoo.com)
Sanofi said it could raise its proposed $9.3 billion deal to buy Medivation if the U.S. cancer drugmaker engaged in talks, threatening to go directly to shareholders to oust the board if not...Sanofi Chief Executive Olivier Brandicourt wrote in a letter to the board of Medivation published on Thursday that the transaction was a priority for the French drugmaker and it was committed to seeing it through...Medivation said...it had received a letter from Sanofi that "simply restates an inadequate proposal that...substantially undervalues the Company, its leading oncology franchise, and innovative late-stage pipeline"...Medivation's first-quarter earnings missed most analysts' forecasts...company reported non-GAAP net income of 11 cents per diluted share, up from 8 cents a year earlier, but much less than the average 23 cents expected by analysts...Sanofi is keen to boost its presence in cancer treatments...Medivation, known for its Xtandi prostate cancer treatment...
- Colombia moves to override patent for Novartis cancer drug (statnews.com)
The Colombian health ministry plans to override a patent that Novartis holds on its widely used Gleevec cancer treatment, the latest clash between the pharmaceutical industry and some governments over intellectual property and access to medicines...The move...could prompt the government patent office to grant a so-called compulsory license to allow a generic company to make a lower-cost version of the drug...Compulsory licenses allow generic drug makers to make low-cost versions of brand-name medicines without the consent of the company holding a patent...a Colombian government committee explained that issuing licenses to other companies would be in the public interest by widening access and saving health care dollars. Issuing a license would "restore competition for this product in the Colombian market,"..."A Declaration of Public Interest leading to a compulsory license should never be used as a mechanism to force price negotiations,"..."This runs counter to the spirit and intent of a compulsory license and its legal framework, and would create a damaging precedent that could apply to all patent-covered innovations — pharmaceutical or otherwise."
- J&J Ordered to Pay $55 Million Over Cancer Linked to Talc (bloomberg.com)
Johnson & Johnson must pay $55 million to a 62-year-old South Dakota woman who blamed her ovarian cancer on the company’s talcum powder in the second such trial loss this year...State court jurors in St. Louis...awarded $5 million in compensation and $50 million in punitive damages to Gloria Ristesund, who was diagnosed with cancer in 2011 after using J&J’s talc-based feminine hygiene products for almost 40 years...J&J is accused in more than 1,000 lawsuits in state and federal courts of ignoring studies linking its Shower-to-Shower product and Johnson’s Baby Powder to ovarian cancer. Women contend the company knew the risk and failed to warn customers..."Unfortunately, the jury’s decision goes against 30 years of studies by medical experts around the word (world) that continue to support the safety of cosmetic talc,’’...Ristesund had several risk factors for ovarian cancer...That included a family history of cancer, having endometriosis and the fact she had no children...