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Amgen to pay $762 million fine for improper drug marketing

Biotech giant Amgen Inc. pleaded guilty in federal court to improper marketing of its anemia drug Aranesp and has agreed to pay $762 million in criminal fines and civil settlements to resolve complaints from company whistle-blowers. Federal prosecutors in New York said the Thousand Oaks company was "pursuing profits at the risk of patient safety" by encouraging doctors to use its popular anemia drug for unapproved uses to boost sales and to take market share from a rival drug maker.

20 Dec 2012

Recreational use of HIV drugs leading to pre-treatment resistance in South Africa

NPR's "Shots" blog examines how "opportunists who market street drugs may be undermining the global struggle against AIDS," writing, "In South Africa, two mainstay HIV drugs have found their way into recreational use."

20 Dec 2012

Malaria progress at risk as funding for global response levels off, WHO report states

"The remarkable gains made in the treatment of malaria over the past decade are under threat because of insufficient increases in funding over the past two years, according to an annual progress report by the World Health Organization," the Guardian reports.

20 Dec 2012

SR9238 compound can reverse effects of fatty liver disease

Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have developed the first synthetic compound that can reverse the effects of a serious metabolic condition known as fatty liver disease. True to its name, the disease involves an abnormal buildup of fat in the liver.

20 Dec 2012

NIDA's 2012 Monitoring the Future survey shows rates stable or down for most drugs

Continued high use of marijuana by the nation's eighth, 10th and 12th graders combined with a drop in perceptions of its potential harms was revealed in this year's Monitoring the Future survey, an annual survey of eighth, 10th, and 12th-graders conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan.

20 Dec 2012

Aspirin use may increase risk of age-related macular degeneration

People who regularly took aspirin 10 years prior to examination had a small but statistically significant increase in the risk of a subtype of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), according to a study by University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers.

20 Dec 2012

New data on drug use

Teenagers abuse prescription medication more than anything else besides marijuana. Tomorrow, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy is set to release new data on youth drug use.

19 Dec 2012

Vismodegib team wins Drug Discovery of the Year award

The British Pharmacological Society proudly announces that its first annual Drug Discovery of the Year award has been won by the discovery team developing vismodegib for the treatment of basal cell carcinoma (a type of skin cancer).

19 Dec 2012

Probiotic supplements can benefit body during and after antibiotic use

Recent data suggests that the average American is bombarded with up to 5,000 varying media messages on a daily basis, which can make it tricky to discern fact from fiction. When it comes to your health, there should be absolutely no doubt that the products you select are effectively working to produce the desired results. This is especially true when it comes to the use of probiotics with antibiotics, because some forms are less effective when combined with antibiotics.

19 Dec 2012

Amgen expected to enter a guilty plea to unspecified charges

The biotech giant is expected to plead guilty in a New York federal court criminal case. Some reports suggest the charges relate to "misbranding" -- which refers to the promotion of drugs for uses that have not gained the Food and Drug Administration's approval.

19 Dec 2012

New antibiotic principle for fighting bacterial infections

Scientists at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have presented a new principle for fighting bacterial infections, in other words, a new type of antibiotic, in the FASEB Journal.

19 Dec 2012

Clopidogrel pretreatment for PCI does not reduce risk of overall mortality

Among patients scheduled for a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI; procedures such as balloon angioplasty or stent placement used to open narrowed coronary arteries), pretreatment with the antiplatelet agent clopidogrel was not associated with a lower risk of overall mortality but was associated with a significantly lower risk of major coronary events, according to a review and meta-analysis of previous studies published in the December 19 issue of JAMA.

19 Dec 2012

Budding yeast an acceptable model system to study KP1019 anti-cancer drug

Researchers have found that the budding yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) is an acceptable model system to study KP1019, an anti-cancer drug that uses ruthenium, a rare metal, a new study found. Researchers had previously been interested in studying KP1019 because it is believed to cause cancer cell death and is not known to have negative secondary side effects for healthy tissues.

19 Dec 2012

British Pharmacological Society celebrates the start of annual meeting

The British Pharmacological Society (BPS) today celebrated the start of its annual meeting, which will cover the latest research in drug discovery over the next three days, including a special focus on discoveries in cancer treatment.

19 Dec 2012

Study: Half of the benefit of taking sleeping pills comes from the placebo effect

Half of the benefit of taking sleeping pills comes from the placebo effect, according to a major new study published in the British Medical Journal.

19 Dec 2012

Alcohol and antibiotics: an interview with Dr Randall

Contrary to popular belief, there are only a handful of antibiotics that can interact with alcohol to cause unpleasant effects. The two main antibiotics you should definitely avoid drinking alcohol with are metronidazole (brand names include Flagyl) and tinidazole (brand names include Fasigyn).

18 Dec 2012

Scientists decode VEGF/Ang1/Syx pathway that regulates leakiness of blood vessels

A research team led by scientists at Mayo Clinic in Florida have decoded the entire pathway that regulates leakiness of blood vessels — a condition that promotes a wide number of disorders, such as heart disease, cancer growth and spread, inflammation and respiratory distress.

18 Dec 2012