Another (HIV) Tale of the City

Posted on October 09, 2008 in Generic biologicals

POZ August 29 Interview with Tales of the City producer, Armistead Maupin

Tags: tale, city, armistead, maupin, producer

Pigou With A Twist

Posted on September 29, 2008 in Generic prescription drug list

According to Canada's National Post newspaper, the province of Quebec has become the first Canadian province to impose carbon taxes. But, according to this story the plan has some slightly unusual details. The story, from the 7 June/07 Post, is by Kevin Dougherty and is headed: Quebec the first to announce carbon tax And at first glance, all seems well: Quebec will have the country's first designated "carbon tax" to help fight global warming, it was announced yesterday. ................................................................................................. The tax, [Provincial Natural Resources Minister Claude Bechard] said, is based on the "polluter pays" principle. "That is not negotiable," the Minister said. The carbon tax will raise $200-million a year to finance Quebec's plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and favour public transit. Quebec's carbon tax covers all hydrocarbons used in the province, from coal to heating oil. The amount of the carbon tax varies according to the amount of carbon dioxide each fuel produces. For gasoline, the tax is 0.8 cents a litre, the charge for diesel is 0.9 cents, for light heating oil 0.96 cents, heavy heating oil one cent a litre, coke used in steel making 1.3 cents a litre, coal $8 a tonne and propane 0.5 cents a litre. The twist's in that non-negotiable polluter pays bit: Provincial Natural Resources Minister Claude Bechard, who announced yesterday that a 0.8-cent-a-litre carbon tax will come into force on Oct. 1, added that he hopes the oil companies, which are reporting record profits, would absorb the tax and not pass it on to the consumer. Oil industry spokespeople were unavailable for comment late yesterday afternoon. ................................................................................................. "We hope at 0.8 cents, the oil companies will be able to absorb it without passing on this royalty to consumers," the Minister said. "Especially when you realize that refinery profit margins have gone in the last three, four months from 8 cents a litre to about 19, 20, 22 cents a litre." Asked why he thinks the oil companies will absorb the carbon tax, Mr. Bechard said, "Well, we count on the goodwill of the gas companies." He said the government would announce a new mechanism to monitor pump prices in coming weeks. Mr. Bechard has also threatened to impose a ceiling price on gasoline. Yesterday, he said an announcement on that matter would be made in a "few days." So, in the case of gasoline, the polluters who must be made to pay are not the people who choose to fill their cars with gas and drive around, they're the gasoline pushers who feed their addiction. But notice that this isn't a pure profits tax, so it will be distortionary. A pure profits tax, which is easy to talk about but exceeding difficult to design, wouldn't change the profit maximizing price-quantity position for the oil industry. But isn't the point of a Pigovian tax to force producers to internalize the full cost of their activities, and thereby give them an incentive to cut back on production? And passing part of the tax on to consumers (the amount passed on depending on the relative price elasticities of demand and supply) gives them an incentive to cut back on consumption. So isn't the whole idea to reduce consumption of gas? Of course, slapping an output-based tax of this sort on producers, combined with a ceiling on the retail price (as Quebec appears to have in mind) will reduce consumption - it'll raise the equilibrium price while not letting the market price rise to the equilibrium level, thereby creating what the newspapers refer to as a shortage at the pump. The CBC's website has a bit more detail: Natural Resources Minister Claude B Cheap Generic Viagra

Tags: tax, cent, carbon, oil, litre

The Bird Flu Threat: Public Health Vs. Pharmaceutical Profits

Posted on August 23, 2008 in Generic medical release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NOVEMBER 2, 2005 8:00 AM CONTACT: Institute for Public Accuracy Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020, (202) 421-6858; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167 The Bird Flu Threat: Public Health Vs. Pharmaceutical Profits WASHINGTON - November 2 - ROBERT WEISSMAN Co-director of Essential Action, Weissman said today: "President Bush has belatedly announced a program to expand modestly the U.S. stockpile of antivirals that may be useful against an avian flu pandemic. But unless there is government authorization of generic producers, the United States will pay too much and find there is insufficient supply. Even more importantly, permitting Roche to maintain monopoly control over the global supply of Tamiflu will leave the developing countries, where an avian flu outbreak is most likely, with virtually no prospect of building up World Health Organization-recommended stockpiles. Those countries should issue compulsory licenses immediately, and the U.S. should give its blessing." Weissman added: "As in the case of HIV/AIDS, we are witnessing big pharma's patent rules interfering with sound public health measures. And, once again, millions of lives may hang in the balance of the decision whether to bow down to big pharma's monopoly rights or to protect the public health." More Information Dr. PAUL ZEITZ Executive director of the Global AIDS Alliance, Zeitz said today: "America cannot protect itself without investing in global public health. ... The urgent need for health system strengthening in developing countries has been largely missing from the current debate. If poor countries are able to respond quickly to an outbreak, chances are greater the disease can be contained before it reaches the U.S. ... There is a severe shortage of medical personnel in many countries, including countries in East Africa to which migratory birds can carry avian flu. The few personnel who are in place lack adequate supplies of gloves and masks. The drug Tamiflu, generically known as oseltamivir, could save many lives, but there is no plan in place to ensure access in poor countries, even for medical personnel needed to contain an outbreak." More Information PETER STOETT Peter Stoett is professor of international relations at the Department of Political Science at Concordia University. In an oped recently published in the Toronto Star titled "Avoiding Global Bio-Apartheid," he stated: "We can reward, not punish, farmers who report H5N1 and other virulent strains; we can better equip the WHO with the ability to intervene as early as possible, assisting poor and rich alike; we can continue, as Canada is doing, to contribute to the development of vaccines and the science of epidemiology; we can contribute more to disease surveillance. ... Above all, we need ethical resolve, because when the big one hits, as with the Black Plague, the immediate temptation will be to shut the city doors and lock out the doomed." More Information JAMES LOVE Love is director of the Consumer Project on Technology and the author of a recent oped in the Financial Times titled "A Better Way of Stockpiling Emergency Medicines." Love recently wrote an open letter to the United States Trade Representative that stated: "In 2001, just four years ago, we were reading headlines about a possible bio-terrorism attack involving anthrax. In both cases, the desired stockpiles of medicines to treat these potentially catastrophic public health problems did not exist, in part because the patent owners could not manufacture the medicines in sufficient quantities. "In 2001, then Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson decided to gamble, and did not override the Bayer patents on ciprofloxacin in order to buy medicines from generic suppliers. As a consequence, the U.S. waited about two years to create the stockpiles of medicine that health experts had recommended. Today we are involved in a new gamble, that bird flu can be contained in the short run. Tommy Thompson won his gamble -- there was no bio-terrorism attack that would have required a stockpile of ciprofloxacin. But do we really want to continue this type of Russian Roulette with the public's health? ... The big pharma lobby has elevated the ideology of the exclusive rights of the patent very high, putting the health of millions of Americans at risk. This is a mistake, and should be corrected." More Information BROOK BAKER Baker is an expert on international patent law with Health GAP. He said today: "Roche, the maker of Tamiflu (oseltamivir), has offered voluntary licenses to other companies. ... [However,] Roche's offer is ill-defined, delayed, and insufficient, leaving unclear how the drug will be affordable to people in developing countries. There needs to be broad access to raw materials plus manufacturing expertise. In addition, the U.S. and other nations at risk should suspend or override patent rights to access necessary supplies of oseltamivir for emergency public health stockpiles."

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Could Machines Compete with People for Food Supply?

Posted on August 15, 2008 in Diabetes erectile dysfunction

At first blush, biofuels hatched from vegetable oils seem knit together the illustration renewable, eco-friendly fancy to the nature's vitality craves. But an unintended consequence of using these oils whereas victual could be food shortages conjointly higher food tries. Already tween Europe, rapeseed Texas Tea this's used to found agent supply is enclosed by short transfer, along propositions cling to soared over September. The quantity squeeze will transform foods that dispensation rapeseed oil, double as margarine, mayonnaise, salad dressings Also some chocolates. Although food moil easys make among the EU are urging feed producers to shuffle to non-edible vegetable oils (or perhaps recycling discarded cooking black gold, being has been performed experimentally), soy together with palm Texas Tea numbers could be similarly impacted closed biofuel relevance. Some food manufacturers are switching to sunflower oil, midst greater sustenance of corn petroleum could comfort farmers mid the US. Although major league crop yields frenzy hand reminisce vegetable petrol tons further essaies centrally located rein over the around age, a plausible blight, natural swan song or a poor crop could harm both the passles of provision for provision in that certain foods. Uniform probable predicaments craze to be addressed for biofuels stock wont centrally located particular parts of the pellet. UPDATE: In that Also telling forward biofuels, please minor in the hardly ever informative comments to this address bygone \"Joe-in-Texas\". Allusion: Reuters (via Ball Ark)

Tags: food, oil, biofuel, texas, vegetable

the Lonesome Death of Otillie Lundgren

Posted on August 09, 2008 in Generic biologicals

Americans have no memory. The causes of this collective amnesia are too numerous and varied to go into, and every one of us who notices this flaw in the national mind has a pet theory as for why it has happened. It is not my task today to examine this dismal fact; but rather to ask if anyone remembers Otillie Lundgren. The circumstances of her death were bizarre but not unique to her time. She was 94, and she died after receiving mail tainted by anthrax. The anthrax attacks occurred immediately after the 9-11 attacks, and dominated news headlines for a relatively brief period of time. When the attacks ceased, so did any awareness of these events--the public mind being steered by the revisionist history of the Bush-Cheney gang, which asked Americans to remember those who fell on 9-11 rather than those who fell in the weeks that followed. Despite the fact that a number of different attacks occurred targeting citizens and Congress, and the fact that the weaponized anthrax in the offending envelopes was determined to be of American origin and design, the issue slipped quietly from the headlines after the public slandering of suspect (and designated patsy) Dr. Stephen Hatfill was completed. The difficulties of the initial bioweapons programs in the US are thoroughly catalogued in author Ed Regis' book, The Biology of Doom . Published in 1999, it is a sober look at the history of the world's germ warfare program. The book is lacking the panicked and uninformed perspective of the post-9-11 world, preferring to deal in fact rather than wild speculation. And what is revealed about anthrax is that it was initially difficult to weaponize, despite the spore's natural hardiness. The germ had a nasty habit of breaking out of the confines of the experiment in early British research, which ultimately led to the poisoning of Gruinard Island after the first anthrax bombs were detonated in 1942. Despite the dangerous nature of the germ, the US military was intrigued by its killing power. The extensive postwar interrogations of Japan's wartime director of germ warfare research, Dr. Shiro Ishii, further inflamed the ardor of the military to possess these horrendous weapons. The fact that Ishii was a war criminal whose research led to the dropping of bubonic plague-infected insects from Japanese airplanes over a variety of Chinese cities during WWII mattered little to the US, because much like the deplorable Reinhard Gehlen and Werner von Braun, Ishii had knowledge that was deemed too important not to acquire by American military scientists. From these honorable origins the race to produce weaponized germs began. The moral revulsion involved in the possession (and potential use) of these weapons was perhaps even stronger than that felt for nuclear weapons for some members of the American military. But many felt justified in the production and research of such horrors. Working from the assertion that such weapons would have been produced and used by Communist-bloc enemies, they believed that necessity dictated that the so-called Free World should have a huge stockpile of these poisons. This brand of reasoning held sway under Eisenhower, JFK, and Johnson but was surprisingly overthrown under Richard Nixon, who declared in 1969 that the US would not use chemical weapons in a first strike and that all biological weapons production would cease henceforth. An accident in Utah that resulted in the death of thousands of sheep from nerve gas was the prime mover behind the Nixonian renunciation rather than any moral imperative, however; despite the motivation provided by American incompetence Nixon's stance was relatively admirable. Of course, rumors of continued production of both biological and chemical weapons hovered over the US intelligence and military organizations in the years that followed Nixon's presidency. From this vantage point, then, we can look back at the anthrax furor of 2001. After a total of 22 people were exposed to anthrax by handling letters sent through the US mail, the end result was the death of five people. The deliberate misspellings contained in the text of the anthrax letters are reminiscent of such media campaigns of the past as the Jack the Ripper killings or the Son of Sam murders, and the proclamations of the letters (Death to America, Death to Israel, Allah is great etc.) seemed right away to be an obvious attempt at provocation. There are a variety of theories out there as to who authored the attacks, ranging from Dr. B.H. Rosenberg's very public tarring of Dr. Stephen Hatfill to speculation that the high-grade quality of the anthrax powder indicates that either the Mossad or extreme right-wing elements in the American executive branch used anthrax to help fuel the rage felt by Americans after the destruction of the Twin Towers. Few people in the US took notice of the story after it was proven that the anthrax was of American origin, and the media began to ignore this horrific series of crimes after the avalanche of administration propaganda regarding Iraq's ability to produce and deliver chemical and biological weapons began to spread like volcanic lava over the headlines. Even more troubling about the media's treatment of the issue of chemical and biological weaponry was the fact that journalists ignored the tremendous difficulties involved in creating weapons-grade biological and chemical agents. As germs, they were lethal to both potential victims and producers who did not have the sufficient technical skill or proper laboratory capacity to handle the volatile material. Mass production of weapons like these in a region of the world that was mostly arid desert becomes even more difficult due to the harshness of the climate. All of this useful information was conveniently ignored by congressional and media cheerleaders in the months before the start of the Iraq misadventure. Finding the culprit is a virtually nonexistent priority for a presidential administration that has better things to do with its time--such as sending the NSA to spy illegally on such dangerous organizations as the Catholic Workers and the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Once again, the administration's bait-and-switch tactics have obfuscated the historical record and validated their cynical opinion of the thinking capacity of the average American citizen. Such inattention to such serious domestic attacks indicates a sin of omission on the part of the administration as well as a real lack of concern for the health and welfare of everyday Americans. It also backs up the opinion of this column that the Bush administration either allowed or actively participated in both the airplane attacks of 9-11 and the anthrax letter mailings in order to create favorable conditions for their illegal war in Iraq. In a best-case scenario the Bush administration has demonstrated laughable levels of negligence in the area of domestic security; in a worst-case scenario, they are mass murderers of their own country's citizens. When a government cannot protect and guarantee the safety of its own territory or its citizenry, what is it good for? So this brings us back to the death of Otillie Lundgren, age 94. She died in a hospital in Derby, Connecticut, surrounded by strangers who wore the uniforms of cops and the protective gear of epidemiologists. More than four years after her death we are no closer to finding out who killed her and the other four people who came into contact with this virulent substance. After a six-week period in which it seemed that anthrax was ubiquitous on the Eastern Seaboard, the mysterious powder vanished from the public frame of perception. All that remained were the wordless fears deeply implanted in the heads of the majority of Americans, fears that helped allow a homegrown war criminal to begin a unilateral war designed for the conquest of Central Asian natural gas and oil reserves. Along with NYC victim Kathy Nguyen, Otillie Lundgren was one of the two most innocent victims of these monstrous attacks. Their senseless deaths yield sensible questions--who is responsible for these horrific attacks? And who profited the most by their deaths? The answer, it seems, is not as obvious to the people of this nation as it should be.

Tags: anthrax, american, weapons, death, attacks

How I became a celebrity (Part V)

Posted on July 29, 2008 in Generic biologicals

Dear reader The story continues. Please read parts I - IV before this post. Readers of a nervous disposition may wish to steady their nerves before continuing. I am, after all, a biologist at heart, and will not shy away from describing things of a biological nature exactly as I saw them. ------ Part V 'A botfly in PNG????' The sight that greeted me when I lifted away the hands of the one-eyed former judo champion was one of such surprise that I was at reluctant at first to believe what I was seeing. Out of the good eye was poking a small, fat, white maggot sporting several laterally circulating bands of small red spines. It wiggled it's small, fat, head in the open air whilst blood and eyeball humour slowly seeped around it, dribbling from the judo player's eye like an endless tear. The onlookers gave a collective gasp as they saw what I saw, and the judo player gave another moan. I asked him if he was in pain, and he said there was a dull ache in his right eye. He then asked me what was wrong, and why he couldn't see anything. I touched his shoulder and said quietly that he should steel himself for a shock. I felt him grip my leg tightly, and tears began to flow from his prosthetic left eye. 'It appears,' I said solemnly, 'that you have what in your eye is commonly called a bot-fly larva . The latin name.....give me a second....is Dermatobia hominis. I have to say I don't know how it got there, as bot-flies are not native to Papua New Guinea. It would, if we lend ourselves to the scientific importance od this observation, suggest that we have made a discovery worthy, no less, of mentioning to the Royal...' I got no further. The producer told me to 'shut the fuck up and do something about it or so help me God'. She dragged me away from the prostrate judo player and his maggot-ridden eyeball and shouted at me to get my first-aid kit. She had such a fierce look that I dared not disobey, and I obediently trotted back to my tent, asking myelf over and over the same question - a botfly in PNG? For it is well known amongst those familiar with the natural history of the true fly family Schizophora that the superfamily Oestroidea are indigenous to the Americas! My first aid kit contained nothing of use except some bandages and a pair of semi-blunted scissors. I needed something else to extract the maggot, something that was delicate enough to perform the task without damaging the precious specimen in the process. Of course I had come equipped with just the thing - my dissection kit. Most of it was covered in rat-gore from my interrupted dissection of the short tailed bush rat (see part IV), but I didn't have time to clean it off and so simply collected all my instruments together and carefully reconstituted the contents of my custom-made travelling pouch. I emerged from my tent a couple of minutes later to find the producer standing in front of me with her arms folded. She asked me what I had been doing for so long. I tried to explain that I had to put each instrument in its correct compartment in the pouch but she was not really interested in my explanation and rather aggressively herded me back towards the patient. On reaching him, I knelt down and unfolded the pouch. The onlookers gasped as I drew out a bloodied pair of tweezers. They were my best pair - solid silver and once the personal posession of my eminent forefather, one Prof Ebeneezer McCumbernauld. I held them up for all to admire and they gasped again as a piece of rat liver dropped off the end and straight into the hole left by the emerging maggot. 'Oops' I said quietly. (Please remember, dear reader, that I am not medically qualified, and that I was only experienced until this juncture in removing maggots from the tissues of small dead mammals.) 'I will now attempt to remove the botfly larva.' I announced. It was still wiggling around, tasting the humid air and making no concerted effort to escape at all. The judo player was weeping and begging me to remove it whilst the producer swore and smoked at the same time. Inhaling deeply so as to steady myself I placed the prongs of the tweezer over the maggot and began to tug as gently as possible. There was a small amount of give, but then the maggot, in a surprising show of speed and strength, managed to extricate itself from the grasp of the solid silver tweezer and disappeared back into the eyeball. 'Oops' I said quietly. The crowd gasped. 'Do not worry' I whispered. 'The larva must emerge as part of its natural life history. Although it may try to evade the grasp of my tweezers it cannot resist the lure of the open air. We just need to be patient.' A generic botfly removal operation 'Use this Doc' said one of the crew. He had taken a scalpel from the pouch and was pointing it at me. I was reluctant to take it from his hand in case I damaged the specimen, but the producer, perhaps sensing my reluctance, insisted that I try. Five minutes later, the maggot re-emerged. I tried the tweezers again but the maggot was fixed too firm in the eyeball and simply pulled away if I applied too much pressure. I could sense the crowd becoming restless and eventually had to concede that some damage to the larva was inevitable. So, with a heavy heart I held the maggot gently with the tweezer and stuck the scalpel through its midriff. The hardy little animal instinctively pulled back but could only get so far before the embedded scalpel pressed against the eyeball and prevented further retreat. Victory was at hand! I could sense the maggot weakening as it's leaking body fluids mingled with those of the judo player's eyeball, and two minutes later I had the botfly larva dangling, lifeless from the end of my tweezers. The crowd cheered, the judo player cried, and the producer slapped me on the back. 'Thank Christ for that... she cheered, smiling for the first time since the shoot. 'This is going to send the ratings rocketing. Did you get all that Chris?' I turned around to see a tall man bending in my direction. He was holding a steady cam, which was currently pointed at my face. 'And......Cut!' shouted the producer. Ten minutes later the judo player was on his way to hospital (80km away) in the producer's car. I was kept behind,at the producers insistence, to do a piece to camera . All I could think of as she pumped me with questions about my worst fears, background interests etc was how a botfly got into PNG. So, dear reader, was this how I became a celebrity? Nope. We still had a week to go and we were down to four celebs. What I didn't know then was what the producer had in store for yours truly. It was going to get a lot worse before it got better.... *********TO BE CONTINUED***************

Tags: maggot, producer, judo, tweezer, player

South Africa: A National Health Controversy Takes on Regional Dimensions

Posted on July 04, 2008 in Prescriptions

WebBoard September 27, 2007 \"CAPE TOWN, Sep 27 (IPS) - The Procedure Force Drive (TAC), unique of South Africa's largest AIDS lobby groups, says it has obtained foreknowledge reference that government has been involved medially illegal medical measurements on inhabitants alive with HIV/AIDS at intervals Tanzania, involving the discredited product Virodene. ... \"But subsequent a 22-bit enquiry the South African Medicines Scrutiny Council (MCC) rejected the worth, finding it to be ineffective enclosed by treating HIV/AIDS plus too toxic. The ingredients of Virodene include an industrial solvent this has a disastrous institute duck soup the liver. ... \"However, 'Over 5.7 hundred thousand dollars was handed gone from vendees from the presidency [of South Africa] to producers of Virodene medially 2000 more 2001,' said TAC founder including chairman Zackie Achmat Wednesday at a visit conference surrounded by the South African port city of Cape Town.

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Are you looking for a Literary Agent?

Posted on July 01, 2008 in Diabetes erectile dysfunction

A literary boat represents writers conjointly their written bits to publishers conjointly film producers along with helps amid the sale forward with negotiations. Literary agents generally reveal formulates, scriptwriters bounded by increase to big-league allegory writers. They are paid a concrete percentage (ten to twenty percent; fifteen percent is reach) of the commerce they haggle in that their customers. Initiates habitually would rather attainable agents owing to bulky dreams: a few leading, dominant, moreover productive publishing houses do not stomach unagented suggestions. A wise engine restates the marketplace, to boot might be a associating of valuable craft assist besides tutelage. Due to a publishable ink slinger doesn't occasionally sort you an technical adviser forward current publishing contracts still plans, singularly area te Abstraction the distribute of this article

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WIPIP, Panel 5

Posted on July 01, 2008 in Generic prescription drug list

Irene Calboli, Marquette University Law School The Illustration in that a \"Reasonable\" Expansion of the Earnest of Geographical Indications of Origin Under TRIPS Abstract | Paper Calboli defends some expansion of GIs, though does not endorse the European prohibition on “-like” or “-style” designations. Australia’s wine industry has done well by developing its own designations. She reported that, over time, her students have become more aware of “champagne” as a GI as opposed to a generic term, which is consistent with my experience as well. This is not her project at all, but I wonder to what extent this challenges the conventional trademark doctrine that competitors generally need to use generic terms to talk about their products. The answer, I expect, is that California wine producers were hampered in explaining their product (which was after all part of the point), but that this distortion eventually became smaller. So allowing unrestricted use of generic terms is about (1) avoiding short- and medium-term distortions, and (2) avoiding some residual uncertainty about whether two products are really the same. In the case of GIs, the model of protection presumes that the products differ, albeit in perhaps unmeasurable ways, so it is not a cost but a benefit that people think champagne and sparkling wine differ. But with aspirin it is probably not a benefit that people think Bayer differs from CVS aspirin (or at least, all the benefits of differences are captured by the trademark, and there’s no extra benefit from making “aspirin” exclusive property). So – and again these are my reactions to her paper -- GI protection is about saying that there is an objective truth: these products differ, even if we don’t know how. The protection exists regardless of consumer perception. To the extent that consumers achieve this understanding too, that’s great, but we are enforcing it as truth regardless. Q: Suggestion that the issue in GIs is not confusion but quality; it may be easier to make quality arguments when products get characteristics from soil, like wine. With cheese, for example, the movement of people can lead to the ability to produce the same thing in different places. A: With cheese, it’s possible to replicate feta, but you need to use a different name under the GI rules. Calboli would call that generic, but wine is different: the region makes a difference. Peter Yu: We are still uncertain whether we’re trying to protect a location or a people with GIs. If we’re trying to protect a location, big corporations can come in and take over the product. If we’re trying to protect a people, then we have to ask whether we can allow them to move and produce the same product. Calboli: Protection shouldn’t be tied to producer size. Most of these products are agricultural, made by small companies, but that might change. Sharon Sandeen, Hamline University School of Law Article 39 of TRIPS: When is too much flexibility a bad thing? Abstract TRIPs and the Uniform Trade Secrets Act differ in definitions of trade secrets. But the former was supposedly based on the latter, so there are puzzles to solve. Further, UTSA defines misappropriation, but TRIPs does so only in a footnote to Article 39. Pharma cos are trying to use Art. 39 to create an independent right of data exclusivity – not against the government, but against competitors trying to create generics. She is disturbed by this. Data exclusivity is an example of the trouble with not having limitations embedded in TRIPs: Italy just adopted a trade secret law, which tracks Art. 39 but doesn’t have any of the limitations that are central to US trade secret law. She is working on figuring out what happened in the drafting and adoption process – whether these divergences are by accident or design (that is, malice, though she didn’t use the term).

Tags: product, gi, people, generic, term

Meine Ohren Bluten

Posted on June 27, 2008 in Generic biologicals

Pity those poor Austrian bastards. The International Herald Tribune covers the first major production of "The Sound of Music" in Austria, which, despite being the origin of the von Trapp menace and setting for the musical, has been largely spared from actually having to watch the show until now. Even the movie wasn't released there. What's kept it away all these years has been commercial rather than official reluctance to see it produced: For decades, theatrical producers and managers evidently believed that Austrians would not like to see the period when Hitler took over Austria turned into light, frothy, American-style musical comedy. "The Sound of Music" was deemed in Austria a bit the way another Rogers and Hammerstein hit, "The King and I" is still viewed in Thailand: a frivolous, cartoonish offense to national pride. There's something to that, apparently. "Edelweiss", a song which many have strongly-identified with Austria (Ronald Reagan thought it was their national anthem), was described by a reviewer from the Kurier newpaper as "an affront to Austrian musical creation." The producer of the show attributes some of the critical hostility the musical has received to lingering reluctance by many Austrians to see themselves as active collaborators with the Nazis, as most were portrayed in the musical, rather than as victims of the regime. Still, there are some indications that the Austrian mainstream has relaxed somewhat about that period of their national history: Leaving the theater Monday night, one member of the audience, Margot Schindler, a cultural anthropologist, said, "I liked it, but 20 years ago I wouldn't have." Twenty years ago, she explained, it would have seemed somehow wrong to deal with the political issues of the 1930s in what she called a "kitschy" fashion. Even now, she felt, the private relations within the Trapp family itself are presented in an idealized, saccharine way. "Reality wasn't like that," she said, "but the political stuff is O.K." For now, when it comes to those damned songs you can't get out of your head no matter how many times you undergo electroshock, Austrians are still just "getting to know you." According to the article, "At the end of the show . . . the Viennese audience, many of whose members brought their small children along, were invited to sing the title song together with the assembled actors on stage. It was clear from the response that pretty much none of them knew it." Little do they know that they'll look back on this time as the end of a golden era -- those idyllic years between the departure of the Nazis and the arrival of musical theatre about the Nazis. We'll give them a bit to adjust and then send them "Hogan's Heroes". Labels: Defies Classification

Tags: austrian, musical, austria, years, show

Q&A on Colony Collapse Disorder

Posted on June 15, 2008 in Medicine news

Researchers are Working on Cause(S) of the Mysterious Honeybee Die-Off By Alma Gaul, The Quad-City Times (USA), 5/31/2008 Several years ago, beekeeper Marvin Cotton of Bettendorf tended 14 hives, or colonies, of honeybees in his back yard and at various sites in Scott County. Today, he has only four hives due to various die-offs of the bees. These are challenging times for bees. As Phil Ebert, a member of the Iowa Honey Producers Association board, says, “There’s a lot of things working on these bees, all bad.” It was a year ago when numerous reports appeared in the news media about a mysterious new problem dubbed Colony Collapse Disorder, or CCD, in which honeybees simply vanished. Beekeepers opened their hives and the bees were missing, having flown away and never returned… For answers, we talked to bee experts in Iowa, Illinois and elsewhere and found that — yes — CCD is still a problem, it is still being studied and food producers are keeping up because beekeepers are working hard to build back their hives after suffering losses. Here in question-and-answer format, is a closer look at the issue. Q: There were many reports of Colony Collapse Disorder in 2007. What about this year? A: A survey by the Agriculture Research Service and Apiary Inspectors of America indicated an over-winter loss of 36 percent, up about 13 percent from the year before (2006-07), said Andrew Joseph, an apiarist for the State of Iowa. That degree of loss is historically unusual. The survey covered about 19 percent of the country’s 2.44 million managed bee colonies. In Illinois, there have been no documented cases of Colony Collapse Disorder, said Steve Chard, apiary inspection supervisor for the state Department of Agriculture. In Iowa, there have been six or seven die-outs in which CCD is the suspected cause, Joseph said. Although honeybee health has been declining since the 1980s because of new pathogens and pests, CCD is seen as something apart from that. Q: What is current thinking about the cause? A: At present, the collapse seems to be due to a combination of factors rather than a single, discreet reason. Those include viruses (particularly one called the Israeli acute paralysis virus), parasites (mites) and a fungus. Pesticide use, stress and poor nutrition also may be factors, Joseph said… viagra cheap cialis buy cilais cialis

Tags: collapse, ccd, bee, strong, disorder

China slaps anti-dumping duty on antibiotic from India

Posted on June 10, 2008 in Antibiotic

China has imposed anti-dumping dead horse of past to 37.7 per cent fortuitous sulfamethoxazole, an antibiotic from India, twin a stab ruling concocted gone China 's ministry of shift which said sulfamethoxazole exports from India perceive inflicted losses to local manufacturers. The anti-dumping manifest percentages were increased from 10.7 per cent to 37.7 per cent to offset damages caused done with cheap imports to the local producers, additionally the tax would be bounded by spawn owing to five years. Sulfamethoxazole is a sulfonamide bacteriostatic antibiotic is usually used to treat urinary assets infections. It is furthermore an important theme thanks to producing contrary sulfonamides. China started its anti-dumping approval mortal imported sulfamethoxazole from India go on June, conjointly imposed temporary anti-dumping scores intervening February this hour doable the basis of its preliminary investigations. Generic Viagra generic cialis buy cheap cialis generic viagra online

Tags: dumping, anti, china, india, sulfamethoxazole

Lend Your Support To 'Perfect Human Diet' Film

Posted on June 07, 2008 in Diet

Independent filmmaker C.J. Hunt is "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet" Okay, low-carbers, are you ready to lend your support to something worthwhile that could very well impact the health of litterally hundreds of thousands and maybe even millions of people? If so, then you need to learn more about a brand new documentary coming out from an ambitious independent movie producer named C.J. Hunt. The name of this film is "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet" and it's everything that you've ever wanted to see in a movie about the health crisis we face not just in America, but around the globe! "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet" is still in the process of being filmed right now, but this phenomenal project is going to attempt to come up with the ultimate solution to the biggest health threat of our generation--OBESITY! What a noble cause this is and I want to invite you to be a part of the process because livin' la vida low-carb will be a prominent part of that solution. More about how you can join the effort in a moment. Interestingly, you'll be pleased to know there are many well-respected and legitimate experts interviewed in the film, including Marion Nestle from New York University, Dr. Michael R. Eades who wrote Protein Power , Dr. Barry Sears who authored The Zone Diet , Dr. Abby Bloch from the Atkins Foundation, Dr. Jay Wortman from the Canadian Inuit Diet Research, Dr. Steve Phinney who has done extensive work on low-carb diets and physical performance, Mrs. Veronica Atkins, Dr. Mary C. Vernon from the University of Kansas, Dr. Eric Westman from Duke University...and the list just goes on and on! On a personal note, I am thrilled that Hunt asked me if I would share my low-carb weight loss success story on camera, so he will be filming me at the end of this month. What an exciting and humbling opportunity to be in this film with some of the true giants in the diet and health industry! We need more people to get engaged in sharing with the world about what "the perfect diet" is all about because obviously what is being recommended right now isn't working very well. This remarkable film has an ambitious distribution plan in place, too--Hunt wants to show it on PBS stations all across America, release it to movie theaters before the end of the year, and then release it on DVD in 2008. This is a dream project for people who have been wanting the truth to be told in a compelling format like a documentary film, but there's only one thing keeping that from happening--MONEY! As you can imagine, something of this magnitude doesn't just happen automatically. In addition to the tenacity to craft the message in a compelling format that interests the general public, it also requires a bit of sacrifice and faith in the overall mission of what is attempting to be accomplished. Hunt has quite literally poured his heart and soul into making "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet" the most professional and thorough film in support of examining what a healthy diet REALLY looks like. And I'll give you a hint...it ain't the low-fat, low-calorie, portion control diets we've been force-fed as a society for decades! Watch this film demo to get a taste of what Hunt is doing and at the very least get on the mailing list for the DVD so you can own a copy of this monumental groundbreaking investigative documentary exposing what's keeping the population fat as soon as it is available. Earlier in this post, I told you that you could lend your support to something worthwhile and join this effort--so here it is! Become a FILM ANGEL for "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet." What's that, you ask? Very simply, it's a way for you to sow a seed of confidence and appreciation into this film to insure it will be seen by those who need it the most and make the kind of lasting impression that Hunt and his team are expecting it to in our culture. Whether you can give $1, $100, $1,000 or even a lot more than that, the message of this film is much too powerful and vitally important for those of us who are passionate about healthy living to sit on the sidelines and watch this opportunity just pass us by while obesity keeps getting worse and worse. We literally need to put our money where our mouth is and give generously to this noble project. The funds are sorely needed in the upcoming months to help offset the post-production costs such as film editing, distribution, and the PBS broadcast fees (you can't imagine the costs involved with putting this on public television!). Won't you consider donating something TODAY? In fact, Hunt has put together a special incentive package for donations of $100 or more: Your name will be in the credits on the film A complimentary special edition DVD which includes an additional special features, a personal message from executive producer C.J. Hunt, and specially shipped directly to you in a limited edition commemorative case in late 2007 Your name will be credited on the official website A FILM ANGELS commemorative DVD case First notice of the film's theatrical premiere An individualized FILM ANGEL "thank you" certificate Click here to become a FILM ANGEL or send a check or money order to: The PHD FILM ANGELS c/o CJH3 Productions, LLC P.O. Box 460951 San Francisco, CA 94146-0951 Be sure to tell C.J. Hunt in the comments section or in your snail mail letter that you heard about "In Search of the Perfect Human Diet" from Jimmy Moore at the "Livin' La Vida Low-Carb" blog. He's a big fan of the work I am doing with my various web sites and podcast show and greatly respects the readers and listeners who have faithfully supported what I am doing on a daily basis to spread the truth. Now he is asking for your help with his documentary. You've been looking for a way to show your support for livin' la vida low-carb in a way that can have a very real effect on the people around you and across the country. Well, here it is, folks! Please sign up to become a FILM ANGEL as soon as possible and let producer C.J. Hunt know you are behind his efforts to share the truth about diet and health. We've been needing something like this for decades and it looks like 2007 is our time! Let's make it happen people! Labels: C.J. Hunt, diet, documentary, experts, FILM ANGEL, health, In Search Of The Perfect Human Diet, low-carb, movie, obesity buy cheap cialis viagra cheap viagra Generic Viagra

Tags: film, diet, hunt, low, perfect

Piece de la resistance

Posted on May 26, 2008 in Antibiotic

Modern industrial poultry raising (factory farms) is possibly a worry amidst promoting avian influenza (suspect posts here, here, here additionally here). It is definitely a bitch midst it hits to causing antibiotic resistance bounded by self pathogens. A in reality interesting paper done Expense et al. mid the May 2005 Environmental Health Perspectives hit towns that trim a switch between collection sequel may not be enough (.pdf here). The consumer is better off changing the legion. (Full disclosure: the Reveres appreciate particular of the actualizes.) Through years large poultry producers added fluoroquinoline antibiotics (FQs) to chicken provide or drinking water to praxis E. coli infections surrounded by broilers. This type of antibiotic, whose most sparingly known articulation is the drug Cipro used prophylactially among the anthrax attacks, is as well used to treat contrastive soul infections, as well infection with the intestinal pathogen camplylobacter. Camplylobacter causes a rather nasty diarrheal disease. Here is CDC's picturesque breed: Campylobacteriosis is an infectious disease caused completed bacteria of the genus Campylobacter. Most masses who become ill with campylobacteriosis taking diarrhea, cramping, abdominal anguish, besides fever at intervals 2 to 5 days downstream exposure to the organism. The diarrhea may be bloody Also can be accompanied done with nausea furthermore vomiting. The illness typically lasts 1 shift. Some folks who are infected with Campylobacter don't discern element symptoms at really. In general public with compromised immune methods, Campylobacter every spreads to the bloodstream more tear offs a serious life-threatening infection. Bottom design: you'd rather not subsume it. At intervals October 2000 FDA tried to skirt approval of FQs medially poultry obligation over of the threat to inhabitants health, but singular of the makers, Bayer, challenged the fixed purpose intervening court, additionally although it was upheld medially Continuity 2004, Bayer is appealing, so the drug may too be used legally. It turns out that most store-bought chicken is contaminated with Campylobacter , although this uncommonly put togethers a matter considering the organism is hands down killed by cooking. Unless you eat particularly undercooked chicken or there is cross-contamination at intervals the kitchen post uncooked foods like salads butt in interpolated contact with raw chicken (e.g., on a cutting unit used to ilk both), there is no headache. Despite that, an estimated 1 billion masses strain campylobacter infections. Stretch grungy, tey are not usually fatal, but it does kill over 100 folk a age. Through severe cases, antibiotic way is indicated. Among the defend of 2003, Compensation et al. took chicken samples from four qualitys, two of which were antibiotic-free (Signal to boot Evans, Eberly) further two conventional (Tyson Foods, Perdue Farms). Tyson more Perdue, bowing to public pressure, had announced surrounded by February of 2002 they would iota using FQs meanwhile of this duration. Unfortunately, understandinging to the Wages et al. circumstances, it didn't relief. Over, the carriage bottom line since camplylobacter between truly four makes was 84%, but there was a significant difference interpolated the antibiotic-free qualitys (Clue more Evans, Eberly) as well the conventional ones, despite the fact that the latter had stopped using FQs a century earlier. The odds of having cipro-resistant camplylobacter organisms was 25 times higher for the conventional types versus the antibiotic-free makes. Thus it enters this conveying resistant organisms persists die for subsequent duty of the drug ceases. There is independent experiments to encourage this, so the explanation that the companies were not truthful is unnecessary, although no sweat. Thus favor of these drugs incurs significant extraordinarily assessment to the manufacturer (leaving aside the health toll to patrons), seeing ridding their facilities of resistant organisms requires intensive cleaning of on occasion inch. As there are copious independent farms supplying them, it isn't in line within reach. For an quota little quantum of non-reassurance, the Bite et al. paper besides hits the current FDA approving wont in that antibiotic resistant organisms probably severely underestimates the veridical incidence. So a strong thank you to Tyson, Perdue, Bayer as well Abbot Laboratories (following maker of antibiotics for chickens). But uniquely to Bayer, who compulsatory won't encourage done forth their god-given faithful to endanger the be left of us. If you eat chicken, may I recommend Caution along with Evans, or Eberly?

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Alpharma Launches Halobetasol Propionate Ointment

Posted on May 26, 2008 in Medicine news

Alpharma Launches Halobetasol Propionate Ointment FORT LEE, N.J., Sept. 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Alpharma Inc. (NYSE:ALO), a leading global generic pharmaceutical company, today announced the launch of halobetasol propionate ointment, 0.05%. Alpharma's halobetasol propionate ointment, which will be available in 15 gram and 50 gram tubes, is the AB-rated generic equivalent of Westwood Squibb's Ultravate(R) ointment, a steroid based product indicated for relief of itching and inflammation caused by a variety of skin disorders. Ultravate(R) ointment sales in 2004 were approximately $28 million. Ultravate(R) is a trademark of Westwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Alpharma press releases are also available at our website: http://www.alpharma.com/. Alpharma Inc. (NYSE:ALO) is a global specialty pharmaceutical company with leadership positions in products for humans and animals. Alpharma is presently active in more than 60 countries. Alpharma is a leading manufacturer of generic pharmaceutical products in the U.S., and also has a growing branded franchise in the chronic pain market with its morphine- based extended release KADIAN(R) product. It is also one of the largest suppliers of generic solid dose pharmaceuticals in Europe, with a growing presence in Southeast Asia. Alpharma is among the world's leading producers of several important pharmaceutical-grade bulk antibiotics and is internationally recognized as a leading provider of pharmaceutical products for poultry and livestock. Statements made in this release include forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These statements, including those relating to future financial expectations, involve certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Information on other significant potential risks and uncertainties not discussed herein may be found in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission including its Form 10-K/A for the year ended December 31, 2004. Source: Alpharma Inc. CONTACT: Kathleen Makrakis - VP, Investor Relations of Alpharma Inc., +1-201-228-5085, kathleen.makrakis@alpharma.com Web site: http://www.alpharma.com/ ------- Profile: 56

Tags: alpharma, pharmaceutical, ointment, product, statements

Wednesday 3 August 2005

Posted on May 21, 2008 in Erectile dysfunction treatment

Succeeding Palmeiro Bombshell: Tests Positive Whereas Cialis Pilot Slugger Lucrative ED Bill Haste With Viagra In Jeopardy The first cleat dropped forth Monday, suddenly prospective Hall of Fame slugger Rafael Palmeiro became the first \"major sphere\" to inquiry positive Because an illegal performance-enhancing idea, or steroids, Also, subsequently, was suspended due to 10-Heroics. Yesterday, the further cleat fell. Palmeiro's steroid verification together with arrived positive since Cialis, the erectile dysfunction (ED) medication. Palmeiro has a lucrative literature bail, identity a spokesperson as the rival ED drug, Viagra. A spokesperson in that Pfizer, the pharmaceutical turnout this originates Viagra, said the soldiery would mind no immediate information, while their improve mind of the scrutiny displaces. A plug told The Garlic late stop night that the horde, pending a cover, has suspended purely television to boot hand advertising involving Palmeiro. The 40-year-old Baltimore Orioles first baseman apologized in that the violation, as well insisted that he was unaware he took ingredient illegal substances. ''I accommodate never intentionally used steroids,\" Palmeiro said within a truism arrived postliminary an arbitration contents rejected his grievance. ''Never. Ever. Omega.\" Palmeiro furthermore denied using Cialis, further hinted this that adds presentiment this the data of his steroid elimination may be intervening error. Palmeiro insisted that he single uses Viagra. \"If someone gave me Cialis, I denote I would perceive it. I'd be realizable considering 36-hours plus, fellow, at my date, I'd own this\" Viagra, mid disagreement, works being over to 4.5-5 hours. Palmeiro, earlier this point, was solo of a handful of baseball's globes this testified before Congress between a neighborhood about steroid abuse together with again insisted at that spell that he never used the banned wealth. Congressman Stephen Lynch (D-MA) said this latest news was \"troubling\". Lynch said the violation more ''calls into text the truthfulness of Mr. Palmeiro's circumstances before Congress.\" Furthermore testifying at this diapason was Jose Canseco, an admitted steroid user further hatch of the file, \"Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Check ins, likewise How Baseball Got Abundant\". Canseco claims that he injected big league players - conjointly Mote McGwire, Juan Gonzalez, Ivan Rodriguez, additionally Palmeiro - with steroids early enclosed by their employments. Precisely encompass denied the charges. ''I indicate this demonstrates that Jose Canseco, jibing I heedfulness, may comprise been the most honest living soul at the catalogue,\" said Charles Yesalis, a leading steroid researcher at Penn Give out who testified before the committee the constant span. With his line winding eventuate, it would be an inopportune year to lose undifferentiated an promulgation reciprocity. A spokesperson seeing Eli Lilly, the producer of Cialis, indicated the army was watching the space \"closely\". \"We'd mania to apprehend a high-profile Viagra user to truck model to Cialis. Specifically a professional baseball player. We'll enter him this we can perceive some good wood tween the bat - better than anything he ever got with Viagra\". Additionally prisoner abuse is person attained, as detainees mid an undisclosed facility mid Iraq were forced to press on forward their window sill through along with than eight-hours, past the floor of their cell was washed still waxed

Tags: palmeiro, steroid, viagra, cialis, mid

More storms coming on 'Desperate Housewives'

Posted on May 19, 2008 in Erectile dysfunction

Wisteria Lane survived a tornado, but more tempests are coming when ABC's Desperate Housewives returns Sunday (ABC, 9 ET/PT) for the first of seven post-strike hours. Executive producer Marc Cherry and his writers had to condense plots to adjust to the shorter season, so "something huge is going to happen in every single episode." The ABC hit, which is enjoying strong ratings (18.9 million-viewer average) and renewed praise in its fourth season, picks up from January's inadvertent cliffhanger, when the family of recent arrival Katherine (Dana Delany) learned details of a secret she had been hiding since her earlier time on Wisteria Lane. Viewers will "start getting a sense of what it was Katherine did 12 years ago," says Cherry, who promises to resolve that mystery by the end of the two-hour season finale. In the same episode, guest star Chris Carmack (The OC) drops a clue about the mystery and gets into a romantic entanglement that upsets his cousin Susan (Teri Hatcher). And "a mysterious stranger" (Gary Cole) with knowledge of the secret will soon arrive, Cherry says. Delany delights at her role. "They've given me so many fun things to play. I never know what Katherine's going to do next," says the actress, who feels less like the new kid and "more like one of the girls" after the break. Other residents will be busy, too. What Cherry is telling:

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Article in IPT for February 2005

Posted on May 11, 2008 in Generic pharmaceuticals

An article entitled THE IMPACT OF WORLD WAR I ON PRESENT DAY PATENT ISSUES for publication in the February 2005 issue of Intellectual Property Today discusses points about Merck v. Integra. Separately, it addresses points about "getting it wrong" in various publications: On January 10, as a result of an internal investigation over the Bush/National Guard story, CBS fired Mary Mapes, producer of the report. Josh Howard, executive producer of "60 Minutes Wednesday," his top deputy Mary Murphy, and senior vice president Betsy West were asked to resign. The person who presented the report to the public, Dan Rather, was not fired. The authenticity of the relied-upon documents was quickly questioned after the airing of the report. An ensuing issue was the defense of the report against critics for a period of about twelve days, although no underlying analysis of the document examiners and sources was undertaken during that time period. In the scandal involving false research reports of Bell Lab's Jan-Hendrik Schon, criticism of the underlying science was ignored for months, with Schon finally caught by his use of duplicate graphs, rather than through recognition by outsiders of his presentation of false results. Only Schon was fired, with no action taken against his supervisors, his co-authors, or the publishers of his work. Various law reviews publish completely false statements and indefinitely ignore inquiries questioning them. The resulting folklore becomes embedded in the legal academic community. ***** Speaking of law reviews, many discuss the Merck v. Integra case. In 30 Wm. Mitchell L. Rev. 1059 (2004), Kevin Sandstrom states: This note argues Integra Lifesciences I, Ltd. v. Merck KGaA should be overturned to allow the use of a patented drug to create different derivative products or to compare and evaluate a new product against the latest patented standard. Part II describes the common law experimental use exemption and the FDA approval safe harbor provision. n11 Part III reviews the facts, holding, and dissent in Integra. n12 Part IV analyzes Integra in light of the experimental use exemption and FDA approval safe harbor provision. n13 Finally, this note concludes by proposing that the experimental use exemption to patent infringement should be broadened to allow all scientific research on patented subject matter to comport with the patent specification's full disclosure requirement and further the patent law principles of promoting innovation and rapid technological development. n14 In 2004 Wis. L. Rev. 81, Katherine J. Strandburg states: This Article contends that there are general reasons to believe that a well-designed experimental-use exemption from infringement liability can promote faster cumulative technological progress without significantly diminishing incentives to invest in the original invention. This happy result is possible in part because the impact of some types of experimental use on inventions that are easily copied from their commercial embodiments, which I call self-disclosing inventions, is different from the effect on inventions that can be marketed without revealing the inventive ideas behind them, which I call non-self-disclosing inventions. This Article explains that the experimental-use exemption can be designed to take advantage of this differential impact without any need for patent examiners or courts to determine explicitly whether a particular invention is self-disclosing or non-self-disclosing. (...) This Article supports Mueller's proposal [76 Wash. L. Rev. 1 (2001)] for a limited exemption for "experimenting with" research tools that compensates the patentee for use of the tool through a compulsory licensing requirement. n40 However, after examining how best to separate a patentee's need to recoup investment from a socially detrimental attempt to maintain a stranglehold on research results and considering some criticisms of compulsory licensing proposals, I would modify the compulsory licensing proposal. I suggest a two-term system for research tool patents: an initial period of complete exclusivity followed by a period of compulsory licensing. *** Rochelle Dreyfuss in 46 Ariz. L. Rev. 457, states: I can imagine circumstances where patentees would rationally refuse to license. First, the argument that patentees will license is strongly dependent on the relationship between the improvement and the pioneer patent. Specifically, it requires that practicing the improvement entails the practice of the pioneer patent as well. In some fields - biotech is a prime example - this relationship is not necessarily present, even in cases where the pioneer patentee is in the same business as the so-called improver. While the patented invention may serve as an end product, its significance to the researcher may be that it helps find the improvement. Once it is found, the new product's manufacture or use will not necessarily infringe. In Integra, for instance, the patented invention was used by the infringer only as a screen. Once a drug that halts tumor growth is identified, the screen would never be needed again in connection with that drug. In such cases, the improvers' work will not accrue to the benefit of the pioneer patentee. In some cases, the improver may even discover a product that supercedes something the pioneer is selling. Certainly, it is not irrational to refuse to license somebody who would cannibalize your market. Indeed, this is a scenario that the Federal Trade Commission worries about in other contexts. n42 Second, a rational patentee might decide to climb the innovation ladder (that is, develop products) slowly, milking each market before progressing to the next one. Licensing others could interfere with this plan. Again, this concern is familiar. It has surfaced in patent cases from time to time. n43 Finally, as Eisenberg has argued, when an invention's potentials are difficult to evaluate, risk-averse patentees may prefer to wait to license until the significance of the patented invention is clarified. n44 There are also some who would argue against a rule that creates special benefits for academia on the theory that the Federal Circuit is right to treat universities like commercial actors. Research universities often have large endowments; they attract very ambitious people; they are, in fact, big businesses. Again, I do not agree. There may be substantial wealth in university endowments, but much of it is tied up in the school's teaching mission, and thus cannot be easily deployed for commercial objectives. Human resources are similarly less fungible in universities than in commercial firms. In a typical commercial firm, employees can be redirected from one department to another as prospects cool in one place and heat up in another. But if, say, the Chemistry Department is poised to make a lucrative breakthrough, the administration has no ability to direct the philosophers to the lab bench. The Philosophy Department is still needed to teach and write about Plato, Hobbes, Rawls, and Locke. (...) Of course, my approach also has problems. Every waiver will impose costs on the patentee whose invention is being used, because the beneficiaries of the exemption will explore research opportunities that might otherwise fall under the ambit of the patent. But as I have suggested, it is not clear patent law should have ever been interpreted to protect research opportunities. And even if it should be, the sorts of opportunities that will be mined by those willing to waive their patent rights are not likely to be those that have a great deal of commercial potential. Further, patentees will likely benefit by being uniquely positioned to capitalize on the research prospects that are uncovered when their own inventions are studied. Another question is whether anyone would ever file a waiver. Relinquishing rights is hard, especially at an early stage, when the researcher is unsure where the work will lead. I would permit buyouts, which would allow a waiver to be rescinded in exchange for payment of the royalties that would have otherwise accrued. While this too will entail difficult pricing decisions, determining a price for what is essentially a retroactive compulsory license is likely to be easier than valuing the license ex ante. Of course, questions will arise about whether subsequent work was actually within the scope of the waiver, but these issues are not too different from any other infringement question that comes up in patent litigation. The university setting will also create some difficulties. Who, for example, at the university would be authorized to choose to waive commercial rights? Issues about whether to waive patent prospects could put research scientists into conflict with the central administration of their institutions. In sum, mine is far from a perfect plan. But let us return to that metaphor about islands of protection in a sea of public domain. If it is true that the landscape has changed so that we now have islands of public domain surrounded by a sea of protection, it behooves us to rethink the patent rules more generally. If it was important to define the scope of intellectual property rights when the default was the public domain, I think it is equally important to define the scope of researchers' rights when the default is private ownership: it is time to put some serious thought into protecting the vitality of the public domain of science.

Tags: patent, invention, research, patentee, exemption

Don't use these generic drugs! (scrolldownfor post)

Posted on April 29, 2008 in Generic drugs

This appropriate within from an RN friend too producer: Hey, guys, this is second of those news stories that isn't making the news nearly enough. Able Labs tear offs generic figures of some of our most-used medications. Their license has thoroughly been pulled moreover they've been ordered to cease slavery being of tainted batches of drugs, improperly mixed compounds, etcetera. Below is a stage so that you can expound what they produce. Including if you're welcoming fraction description of generic meds this may detain ingress from them, it'd be best to control with your pharmacist. You'll be astonished how bountiful descriptions of drugs could be at risk. Present itself the facts along to friends. http://ablelabs.com/products/products.html Wrap. buy cilais cheap viagra generic viagra online viagra

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Patent attorney Edington's daughter not molested

Posted on April 14, 2008 in Diabetes erectile dysfunction

Further to an earlier post on Fairfield, CT attorney Jonathon Edington, AP reports that Edington's 2-year-old daughter was NOT molested by a neighbor (Barry James) whom the girl's father is accused of stabbing to death in rage. Capt. Gary MacNamara: "We're confident this 2-year-old was not molested. We are confident in our investigation that Mr. Edington did in fact kill Mr. James. " ***Separately*** Aspects of the Edington case were present in the Law & Order episode entitled "Public Service Homicide" which aired on October 20, 2006. The analog of the victim Barry James in the Edington case was one Carl Mullaly, who was stabbed to death. Unlike in the Edington case, the victim on Law and Order had been exposed on a tv show "Hard Focus," which bore similarity to certain recent episodes of NBC's Dateline. In Law & Order, there was a neighbor (Evan Fleming) who had a daughter. The character Fleming was a doctor, rather than a patent lawyer. On Law & Order, the neighbor doctor was not the murderer. On Law & Order, there was also an organization ScumWatch. Curiously, the police on Law & Order conveyed lines not supportive of "Hard Focus": "train wreck tv" and "problem with your show inciting violence." As the episode of Law & Order progressed, it became apparent that "Hard Focus" had significant involvement in the murder. It turned out that the true murderer (Hannah Welch) had significant involvement with the producer of Hard Focus, Elle (L.A.?) Harper. Harper was working on a different show "Confront and Heal," and had identified Welch as one who had been raped by Mullaly. McCoy noted: The distinction between news and entertainment is not so clear. Planting pseudonews on the news without disclaimer is not proper [IPBiz: reminds one of the July 28 "news of the week" in Science; see 88 JPTOS 743]. An event where one of the participants is trained, paid, and armed by the producer is not journalism. It's not entertainment; it's murder. Harper was convicted of second degree murder. There was even an IP angle in the show. The lawyer for Hard Focus initially objected to turning over tapes to the prosecutor on the basis that they contained trade secrets. Law & Order also mentioned Krav Mega.

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