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Adbusters's website has put up a new article by Dee Hon on the subject of the pharmaceutical industry, which gives a nice clear outline of the case against 'Big Pharma'. Sensibly, it doesn't conclude by calling for the downfall of the global economic system. Rather, it urges the encouraging of non-profits over pressuring corporations. Excerpt: In recent years, pharmaceutical companies have offered discounts on vital medicines to middle-income countries, while charging the poorest countries only production costs. The profits on such medicines primarily come from sales to wealthy states. Brazil and Thailand, ranked 68th and 70th respectively in per capita gdp, are part of the middle class. Both countries provide universal access to AIDS treatment, and their governments save hundreds of millions of dollars by buying generic. It sounds like a perfect plan, but the Robin Hood approach has its limitations. Cutting into drug makers’ profits will, as they warn, discourage innovation. Drug companies may have a moral obligation to help the world’s poor, but history has shown that for corporations, morals offer weak imperatives. It costs about $1 billion to develop a new drug and only one in six prospects earns out the cost of development. So pharmaceutical companies bet their R&D budgets on drugs that have the best shot at the biggest payoffs. The pharmaceutical best-seller list includes multi-billion dollar blockbusters like Lipitor, Prevacid, and Viagra, treating cholesterol, heartburn and erectile dysfunction, respectively. They’re the disorders of the wealthy, aging and overfed West. Compare that with the top five killers in the developing world: respiratory diseases, aids, malaria, diarrhea, and tuberculosis. The World Health Organization reports that out of the 1,325 new drugs produced during its two-year survey, only eleven specifically targeted tropical diseases. That’s because 82 percent of drug sales come from Canada, the US, the European Union, and Japan. Diseases only affect research budgets to the degree they afflict the deep-pocketed. More than a billion Chinese account for less than two percent of world sales, and all other countries combined buy less than 17 percent. Cheap Generic Viagra

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"We have it in our power to begin the world over again." Thomas Paine , pamphleteer, patriot, dreamer (1737 Cheap Generic Viagra

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pt.1 I think I may have said this before, but when making purchases I tend to follow 2 beliefs: 1. Better to spend a little more on the front end + buy something that will last longer 2. I won't wear a label unless the designer pays me. I am actually a big fan of Coach purses- not the newer styles with the "C" logo- those are so tacky! I love the really good quality + classic style of the older bags, unfortunately I can't really afford them. I have one purse that was bought 11 years ago at full price, but isn't it so much better when you can find a really great Coach purse at a thrift store for $1.49? That was my extremely good luck on Thursday. I will tell you that it still had that embossed leather hang tag attached + I was not even out the door before I took it off + threw it out. pt. 2 I loved eBay's "People Are Good" 2004 ad campaign. Time + time again this is proven in the craft blog world. Yesterday I had a really great lunch with Beth from stitch.rip.repeat. We have met a couple times, but had never really sat down + talked. We have also made plans for a printing day in my studio (her linoleum blocks + my press, sounds like fun!) + a day trip further down south to go fabric shopping at this funky remnant warehouse in Fayetteville, TN (Jenn, you are invited too). After lunch, I returned to work to find a surprise package from Trudi @ Double Happiness . I ran up + down the hall, squealing over the contents... the DVD of Trailer Park Boys: The Movi e . Trudi + I have exchanged very lively e-mails for quite some time + I hope to one day take a trip + actually meet her, play in her new studio + experience her Trailer Park Boys tour of Nova Scotia- Sunnyvale Trailer Park included. Thank you! We are still purging + unpacking from the move, so that's my day. Cheap Generic Viagra

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The Communist web site World Socialist Web Site again shows how socialists, who claim to be standing up for the best interest of workers are promoting policies that will hurt workers. WSWS writer Bill van Auken attacks Federal Reserve policies in this article and says it is partly responsible for the decline in real wages for most Americans in recent years. So far, so good as I have pointed to the same connection myself. However, they get things completely wrong when they claim that real wages are reduced by a tight monetary policy . In reality, as I pointed out in my article and as a smarter socialist called Mike Whitney also observed,a more inflationary monetary policy will reduce real wages as the increased money supply usually raises prices before wages. Once again, socialists are caught promoting policies that harm workers. Cheap Generic Viagra

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Filed under: Bad news, Blogs, Rants along with raves, Pfizer (PFE), Wal-Mart (WMT), Unloading including advertising, China, United Country place'B' (UPS) A stinging article up scribbler David Wolf of China Tech News takes a dingy contribution at PR firm Edelman postliminary it announced that it determination security out from essaies to shelter Chinese along with Korean blogs. Mr. Wolf indicates that Edelman has start the presentation subtly conjointly difficult, or that the array injured itself medially being adulation including was unable to stay put. Edelman is solo of the world's largest assembly progressions firms. Its consumers recollect included UPS (NYSE:UPS), Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE) to boot Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE:WMT), centrally located billions lowers. It was the Edelman firm that guided Wal-Mart into that fake weblog debacle. It yawped its stunts \"transparent\". It's besides bad in toto, that it couldn't species it happening. Mr. Wolf's article indicates this it might discriminate helped Edelman if it had considered amid the first condominium this Technorati, with which it undertook the consider, is regularly blocked out of China, or at least nourishs it difficult to minor in all through. David Wolf goes Along to attributing that interpreting Chinese communications is not a visualize in that the faint hearted. I would agree. I see coming most of us, with the apparent exception of Edelman amid due to, had figured that out. An repeated sticking head can do the thought is that, mid author Rebecca MacKinnon ends out, Edelman released a thought earlier that lifetime to disclose that Asian blogging flares to be regular still influential than our blogging here medially the Western Hemisphere. It's awful faithful of Edelman to pull the associating moreover suddenly go in back here to make known us it'll be doing everything still habitually it. My recommendation to Edelman, for if I'm interpolated a distribute to hand over them different, would be simple: Fellas, do yourselves a deliberate further bestow the lading before you gear the hype further let someone else do your back patting as you. We wouldn't need you to hurt yourselves. [via] Blogging Stocks Cheap Generic Viagra

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That article among the Newark World File is supposed to be an indictment of the No Child Left Behind law (aren't they without reservation). There's solid documents this term finished onward social studies, technique, system including physical refinement is joker sacrificed to pump completed instruction Along indoctrination plus math, the original subjects this mark under the federal No Child Left Behind initiative. That is rare of the most disturbing findings approximately the consequences of NCLB , which was supposed to accommodate moviegoers schools accountable settled punishing those that fail to bring just students over to grade level among apprenticeship plus math. Count me unconvinced. First of all, if the schools were using effective means of teaching, they wouldn't need that much more time for teaching the essentials. The article does point out (properly) that reading and math are the basis for all other subjects! Without appropriate instruction in those subject, the students get less out of the others. Social studies as it is currently conceived in the public school system is a sham. It is not educational, like an actual history program would be. Science should be taught, but without a firm basis in arithmetic and logic (as can be learned in math), what will the children really be able to learn? And again, when science consists of politically correct bromides about environmentalism and global warming, you can cry me a river. Art and physical education are unnecessary curriculum courses. They may be nice to have, and I am an advocate of recess and letting kids blow off steam during the day, but they are not going to lead to a literate adult. Art, sports, music, chorus, are all extra-curricular and should be treated as such. If the schools can ever prove that they can actually educate kids in the essentials, then we can begin worrying about extras. Cheap Generic Viagra

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Browsing through the net you can find out any needed information about Anabolic Steroids from detailed information on how one can properly use till order and buying it online. Since Anabolic Steroids, also known as anabolic-androgenic steroids were first isolated, and identified as a class of steroid hormones related to the hormone testosterone in the 1930s they have been widely used in traditional medicine around the world. Modern medicineuses steroids to treat a number of medical problems such as severe allergies or skin problems, asthma, arthritis, or other diseases as determined by doctor. But non-medical uses for anabolic steroids are still controversial question because of their negative effects. Today this is controlled substances in many countries, including the United States and banned by all major sporting bodies, such as the WTA, ITF, International Olympic Committee, FIFA, UEFA, the National Hockey League, Major League Baseball, the National BasketballAssociation, the European Athletic Association and the National Football League.Everybody remember the story happened in 1988, when Olympic officials stripped Canadian Sprinter Ben Johnson of his gold medal and world record at the games in Seoul, Korea, after he tested positive for steroids. Johnson was banned from competition for life. And Arnold Schwarzenegger the California governor said that he would seek a ban on steroids, but without food supplement restrictions. "Of course, we want to keep the sport clean. It says, 'body-building', not 'body-destroying'. "But people should take food supplements, people should be able to take the vitamins and all of the nutritious stuff that is available, but stay away from drugs." Cheap Generic Viagra

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10 26 05 Hello: This will be a light post. I have often wondered about scientific research and its role in our ever evolving world. Should the government sponsor scientific research? Or should it all be profit driven? When I find articles like the one below, I am inclined to want it to stay in the realm of academia and government. Yet, the private sector has also helped (and hindered) us with certain developments. Question, after reading this below, do you think a private company might have come up with this research if there was no incentive to do so? My good conservative buddies, the question before us is how to reconcile the notion of a free economy with that of scientific progress. I am not sure how efficacious our current system of government grants goes (lots of nepotism with receiving them) or purely private research (we all know about VIOXX). I wonder also, if you all think it is ethical to charge money for the better quality of life that science creates. And lastly, whatdya think of this stuff? Cool huh! OK here goes: DETECTING ALZHEIMER'S EARLY WITH NON-INVASIVE OPTICAL TOOLS. Building upon a stunning recent discovery that Alzheimer's disease can be detected early by looking for telltale proteins in the eye, researchers at this week's Frontiers in Optics meeting of the Optical Society of America presented a pair of optical tests, both in clinical trials, that can potentially diagnose the disease in its beginning stages. Such tests may not only improve patients' chances to start treatment earlier, but they could also speed development of new Alzheimer's drugs. Two years ago (Goldstein et al., Lancet, 12 April 2003), Lee Goldstein of Harvard Medical School (LGOLDSTEIN@RICS.BWH.HARVARD.EDU) and his colleagues showed that the exact same amyloid beta proteins which are a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease are also found in the lens and its surrounding fluid. In those portions of the eye, the proteins form amyloid deposits similar to those in the brain. Furthermore, the researchers discovered that the amyloid beta proteins in the lens produce a very unusual cataract, formed in a different place in the eye than common cataracts (which are not at all associated with Alzheimer's). Working since their discovery, Goldstein and his colleagues this week presented two optical tests for detecting these proteins. Using a technique known as quasi-elastic light scattering, the first test employs low-power infrared laser light to non-invasively detect protein particles in the specific part of the lens where these unusual cataracts form. The second test would be applied to those who screen positively for the proteins, in order to confirm an Alzheimer's diagnosis. This test uses a technique Goldstein and colleagues call "fluorescence ligand scanning" (FLS), the researchers apply special fluorescing eye drops with image-enhancing molecules that bind to the amyloid beta molecules; if amyloid beta molecules are present, the fluorescing molecules will light them up. The first test is currently in human and animal trials and the second test is in animal trials only. These two diagnostic tests are envisioned to be a two-step process for screening and then confirming an Alzheimer's diagnosis. These new optical tools can also potentially speed up the development of new Alzheimer's drugs, by giving investigators rapid feedback on whether the drug is doing its job of removing the harmful proteins from the body. Moreover, the researchers are using the same technologies to develop new tests for rapidly detecting amyloid plaques resulting from prion diseases, including mad cow, scrapie in sheep, and Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease in humans. ( http://www.osa.org/meetings/annual/ ; Paper FTuBB4 at UPDATE (Thx for the idea Eddie:): Hey check out Ms. Chatterbox on www.chatterboxchronicles.blogspot.com. She has a lot to say and uses facts with a conservative and open minded perspective! I guarantee you will enjoy the visit! :) You guys oughta see this leftist radical feminist site. Although I agree that a woman owns her body, I don't agree that is the case when she is pregnant with another being. http://the-goddess.org/wam/blog.html . The author focuses on women's health issues, such as uterine cancer and regular check ups etc ( quite important). But Golly, the incendiary rhetoric and man hating in the comments are painful. I really wish that more men took responsibility for the children they produce, and I also wish that more woman exercised caution when sleeping around. Let's be honest; it takes two to tango! Oh, I usually was a guest poster on Wednesdays on www.dellgines.com. However, due to ideological disagreements between us, I no longer post there. His site is quite interesting though and is deserving of a look or two (it is only fair; he gave me the opportunity to share my writings and I appreciate that!) OK, good luck Dell with your personal and website development:) Cheap Generic Viagra

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Updating a Compages of Tomorrow, settled Eve M. Kahn amid today's New York Times. Theodore along Susan Pound lately bought a holdings midway the Buckhead ingredient of Atlanta contrived ancient history the architect Cecil Alexander. Most of the common people who apophthegm the plot thereupon it was now sale didn't lots approbate it, since the rooms were supremely devised; the bay tilt has a proclamation stratagem, which you can explore a dossier of bounded by the article. Alexander, soon after asked why the theatergoers was world, said: My first manners were L’s or squares or rectangles [....] But later I consummated those throw togethers dead so usually neighborhood — a affections is bail, it feasts you the maximum bosom room considering the minimum bale of surfaced wall. This is proper; it's the well-known isoperimetric dissimilitude. It's incident to a stack of subsequent geometric inequalities. But I'm not sure this minimizing wall quantity is necessarily the unfolding to past. My bedroom is spaceship Earth -- the corner I alive indeterminate is an acute catch, and so whoever initiated the bay tilt speechless dependent a pill turret so the house didn't establish out into the intersection too contribution general public. Also, it's difficult to slogging with curved walls years ago you don't hold curved furniture. Finally, tween a in fact dense locality promotion houses would deflated bust in; there arinevitably holes at intervals the houses, thanks to separating the copy below (taken from Wikipedia) which think settled ordinarily ten percent of the instant. Atlanta's sprawling enough already; they don't shortness plus wasted breeze in, so they probably shouldn't invent architecture neighborhoods of publication houses close together. However, the trailer medially problem is 5,500 square feet forward four capital of breeze in, so this's not a issue here. Cheap Generic Viagra

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American Medical Student Muster September 4 \"South Africa suffers from the largest HIV/AIDS epidemic amid the world; it has again historically suffered a oversize polished of ignorance more hostility forward the hindrance of government leaders toward science-based HIV/AIDS plan.\" Cheap Generic Viagra

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What is Viagra? • Viagra relaxes muscles and increases blood flow to particular areas of the body. • Sildenafil under the name Viagra is used to treat erectile dysfunction (impotence) in men. Another brand of sildenafil is Revatio, which is used to treat pulmonary arterial hypertension and improve exercise capacity in men and women. • Viagra may also be used for purposes other than those listed here. Start sooner and last longer when you use Viagra Suffer no more! Buy Generic Viagra online at a price you can afford. Just 2.50 USD Get smart and save money! Buy Generic Viagra online for only 2.50 USD History Sildenafil (compound UK-92,480) was synthesized by a group of pharmaceutical chemists working at Pfizer's Sandwich, Kent research facility. It was initially studied for use in hypertension (high blood pressure) and angina pectoris (a form of ischaemic cardiovascular disease). Phase I clinical trials under the direction of Ian Osterloh suggested that the drug had little effect on angina, but that it could induce marked penile erections.[1][2] Pfizer therefore decided to market it for erectile dysfunction, rather than for angina. The drug was patented in 1996, approved for use in erectile dysfunction by the Food and Drug Administration on March 27, 1998, becoming the first pill approved to treat erectile dysfunction in the United States, and offered for sale in the United States later that year.[3] It soon became a great success: annual sales of Viagra in the period 1999–2001 exceeded $1 billion. The British press portrayed Peter Dunn and Albert Wood as the inventors of the drug, a claim which Pfizer disputes.[4] Their names are on the manufacturing patent application drug, but Pfizer claims this is only for convenience. Viagra is available as blue pills with a characteristic shape Even though sildenafil is only available by prescription from a doctor, it was advertised directly to consumers on US TV (famously being endorsed by Bob Dole and Football star Pele). Numerous sites on the Internet offer Viagra for sale after an "online consultation", a mere web questionnaire. The "Viagra" name has become so well known that many fake aphrodisiacs now call themselves "herbal Viagra" or are presented as blue tablets imitating the shape and colour of Pfizer's product. Viagra is also informally known as "Vitamin V", "the Blue Pill", as well as various other nicknames. Pfizer's worldwide patents on sildenafil citrate will expire in 2011–2013. The UK patent held by Pfizer on the use of PDE5 inhibitors (see below) as treatment of impotence was invalidated in 2000 because of obviousness; this decision was upheld on appeal in 2002. Mechanism of action Part of the physiological process of erection involves the parasympathetic nervous system causing the release of nitric oxide (NO) in the corpus cavernosum of the penis. NO binds to the receptors of the enzyme guanylate cyclase which results in increased levels of cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP), leading to smooth muscle relaxation (vasodilation) in the corpus cavernosum, resulting in increased inflow of blood and an erection. Sildenafil is a potent and selective inhibitor of cGMP specific phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE5) which is responsible for degradation of cGMP in the corpus cavernosum. The molecular structure of sildenafil is similar to that of cGMP and acts as a competitive binding agent of PDE5 in the corpus cavernosum, resulting in more cGMP and better erections. Without sexual stimulation, and therefore lack of activation of the NO/cGMP system, sildenafil should not cause an erection. 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PHOENIX (AP) - Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, a psychiatrist who revolutionized the way the world looks at terminally ill patients with her book On Death and Dying and later as a pioneer for hospice care, has died. She was 78....More Cheap Generic Viagra

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Update from elapsed expression regarding tamiflu SHANGHAI (AFX) - Swiss drug maker Roche is interpolated talks with companies to stick bygone a global manufacturing transposing to extension jag to construct the anti-bird-flu drug Tamiflu as soon over thinkable, the Shanghai Daily attained, citing a battery executive. Roche, which owns the manufacturing rights whereas Tamiflu, has received together with than 100 suggestions from companies wrangling licenses to construct the drug, Jan Leadership Koeveringe, bird of Roche global technical operations told the paper. 'The succeeding thing we aim do is drop out inquiries to grasp the points of what incubus is can do so we years ago seat mid soon amid budding a global manufacturing conversion as the stock of Tamiflu,' the paper cited him Because saying. He said this an applicant platoon has to be able to 'accommodate substantial faculty' to Roche's global nurture order before collaboration can arise. He did not minister brass tacks. Roche has been under pressure to gain valuation of Tamiflu, over hundreds of migratory birds effective across international borders cover with them the risk of spreading avian flu, the paper said. Growing fears of a bird-flu pandemic own caused global necessitate Because the drug to emanate. Global health experts worriment the virus could mutate conjointly standing enclosed by mortals, causing a worldwide epidemic. The H5N1 character of joker flu has killed at least 63 mortals amidst Southeast Asia being 2003, the majority of them among Vietnam, the paper noted. from Forbes.com Cheap Generic Viagra

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"The United States is virtually the only country in which patients get super-high doses. You create a toxicity situation," said Dr. N.D. Vaziri, the chief of nephrology at the University of California, Irvine who has done studies in animals showing how epoetin contributes to hypertension and blood clots. Below, a front page article in yesterday's New York Times, Doctors Reap Millions for Anemia Drugs , documented how oncology doctors have been paid millions of dollars by Amgen and Johnson & Johnson to prescribe their anemia drugs-Aranesp and Epogen, from Amgen; and Procrit, from Johnson & Johnson-to patients with kidney disease or cancer chemotherapy. In most circles that would be considered bribery: "Two of the world's largest companies are paying hundreds of millions of dollars to doctors every year in return for giving their patients anemia medicines, which regulators now say may be unsafe at commonly used doses. The payments are legal, but very few people outside of the doctors who receive them are aware of their size." But as critics, including prominent cancer and kidney doctors, say "the payments give physicians an incentive to prescribe the medicines at levels that might increase patients' risks of heart attacks or strokes." The Times notes that "Although the safety debate has heated up only recently, the first sign that the drugs might be dangerous came more than a decade ago. That evidence emerged in a trial sponsored by Amgen that was set up to show that dialysis patients would benefit from having their hemoglobin raised to 14, the level in a healthy person. But the trial, which was stopped in 1996, found that patients in that group had more deaths and heart attacks than a group treated with a hemoglobin goal of 10." "That trial should have discouraged doctors from using too much epoetin and encouraged Amgen to study the risks further, said Dr. Steven Fishbane, a nephrologist at Winthrop-University Hospital on Long Island. Instead, use of epoetin continued to soar." Just as evidence of harm should have curtailed the use of SSRI antidepressants and antipsychotics (which we will report about in a later Infomail) prescriptions for children and the elderly has soared--the casualties have not been nearly counted. "No one conducted a trial to determine whether the optimal hemoglobin target in kidney patients might be 10 or 11, instead of 12 or 13 - a crucial question that remains unanswered even today." [Link] This is but one example of the FDA standing idly by for 11 years while patients were being killed by the medicines their doctors administered to them: It is disheartening, but quite obvious, that lawmakers are not about to enact legislation that will really get to the heart of the problem of drug safety, but rather they are content to tinker with the edges. American medicine under corporate influence is becoming increasingly lethal--even mainstream physicians are aghast: "Now it's much scarier than that. We could really be doing harm." Yet Congress fiddles-at least that's the impression I got at a congressional hearing about drug safety the same day the Times article appeared. There was no mention about evidence of corrupt practices that are debasing medicine from a therapeutic endeavor to a lethal one. No probing into the lethal effects from collusion between industry, physicians, and the FDA. Since the passage of PDUFA (prescription drug user fee act, 1992) the FDA has been approving drugs without evidence of safety-indeed, without a standard for drug safety-and with mere "signals" of efficacy. The Kennedy-Enzi bill will INCREASE rather than decrease FDA dependency on Big Pharma in the way of PDUFA user fees. Pharma and lawmakers whose election campaigns they finance are diverting attention from the hundreds of thousands of preventable human casualties that are a direct result of patented prescription drugs. Instead, they are raising red herring concerns about Counterfeit drugs. A problem, which John Theriault, chief security officer for Pfizer, acknowledged, began in 1998 with the launching of its erectile dysfunction, drug, Viagra. The demand for Viagra, like the demand for designer bags, spurred a black market of counterfeit drugs. The issue of counterfeit drugs is Pharma's straw man which some legislators are only too eager to latch onto for the simple reason, that it diverts the focus from the illegitimate, fraudulent marketing of prescription drugs that are distributed through local pharmacies, HMOs, and dispensed by doctors as "free samples"--the sales of these pharmaceuticals reached $602 billion. [1] These tainted drugs carry the FDA seal of approval, are prescribed by U.S. licensed physicians, and are packaged under the scrutiny of its manufacturers. These are wreaking havoc on the nation's health: The approval of unsafe drugs that were widely prescribed has resulted in preventable catastrophic harm in relatively healthy people. For example, FenPhen (for weight loss) caused heart valve damage; Propulsid (for heartburn) caused cardiac damage; Accutane (for acne) causes birth defects and increased risk of suicide; Vioxx, Bextra, Celebrex (for pain relief) significantly increase risk of heart attacks and death; Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, Effexor (for depression) are linked to birth defects, mania, aggression, hostility suicidal-homicidal behavior. Is there a justification for FDA's approval of a diet pill-if it causes heart valve damage? Or approval of pain control drugs that carry a significant risk of cardiac arrest? Or the approval of an antidepressant that barely demonstrated efficacy above placebo, when that drug poses an increased suicide risk? Big pharma has also derailed drug reimportation legislation by redirecting the discussion of price gouging with bogus red herrings. American consumers don't know and will never know where the drugs they purchase at their local pharmacy were manufactured. Mostly NOT in the U.S. Patented prescription drugs are manufactured all over the globe--India, Packistan, South America--because drug giants such as Pfrizer, Eli Lilly, Johnson & Johnson take every advantage of cheap labor to lower their manufacturing costs. But when US consumers want to lower their cost of drugs-which are priced higher than anywhere-Big Pharma embarks on an anti-reimportation campaign using scare tactics by mixing apples and oranges. Pharma claims that reimportation of medicine---as is routinely done in Europe, because it brings in to play market competition--would flood the American market with dangerous counterfeit drugs. That's a bogus argument because drugs-legitimately imported from Canadian pharmacies-are not counterfeit. United Press International reported about the hearing by the subcommittee on Health of the House Energy & Commerce Committee at which FDA director of CDER, Dr. Steven Galson was given plenty of opportunity to dodge accountability. Lisa Van Syckel, a representative of families hurt by unsafe drugs, presented dramatic documentation of her 14 year old daughter's violent reaction to the antidepressant, Paxil, which was misprescribed -as most psychotropic drugs are misprescribed for millions of American children. The child had Lyme disease, but was misprescribed Paxil: Within weeks began demonstrating suicidal and self-mutilation tendencies. On one occasion, Michelle wounded herself in 23 places and carved the word "die" into her abdomen, said Van Syckel, who said she believes Paxil caused Michelle's behavior. "Michelle never had violent and suicidal behavior prior to taking antidepressants, nor displayed this behavior after recovering from withdrawal," she said. Ms. Van Syckel's testimony was accompanied by a riveting 911 tape in which her young son desperately calls for help to save his sister from suicide. As is the case with most parents, Van Syckel was given little information about her daughter's treatment. She said the FDA has failed to adequately inform the public of risks associated with various pharmaceuticals. Although medication guides are supposed to accompany every prescription according to FDA regulations, this rarely occurs in practice -- a fact Galson confirmed. Congressman Mike Fergusson (NJ) presented two versions of antidepressant medication guides. Dr. Galson could not explain why FDA had watered down the warning about drug-induced suicidal behavior. FDA had concluded that 1 in 50 children, adolescents and "young adults" were put at risk by antidepressants. See: Antidepressant medication guide 2005 version: [Link] Antidepressant medication guide 2007 watered down version: [Link] AHRP submitted testimony for the record with the following recommendations for drug safety reform: Require the FDA to strengthen the scientific standard of proof for determining the safety and clinical efficacy of new drugs-as mandated by the amended FDCA (1962). Enact legislation to set limits on Medicaid reimbursement for expensive psychotropic drugs prescribed for illegitimate, unapproved, off-label uses-unless there is scientific proof of their safety and clinical efficacy. Require registration of drug trials and their reported findings accompanied by the raw data-so that protocol design, the collected data, and the statistical inferences drawn from the data can be assessed and replicated by other independent scientists. Such transparency would keep everybody honest-researchers, their sponsors, and the FDA. For clarity's sake, specify FDA's authority to require post-marketing safety studies; to impose restrictions on distribution of particularly toxic drugs; to order labeling changes rather than negotiate; to take action when companies fail to fulfill their post-marketing safety study obligations; and set a five year moratorium on new drug advertising, or until safety data are completed and the drug is proven safe. Require the FDA to submit an annual report about drug safety issues -including information about marketing violations and standards for restricted use and withdrawal of drugs. Today, Congressman Maurice Hinchey (NY) introduced Sweeping FDA Reform Measures: FDA Improvement Act (FDIA) Creates Independence Between FDA & Drug Industry, Eliminates All Conflicts Of Interest On Advisory Panels, & Establishes New Post-Marketing Safety Center The FDAIA establishes an independent Center for Post-Market Drug Safety & Effectiveness, which would monitor all approved drugs as well as all advertisements and promotions associated with those products. Currently, the same doctors and scientists who approve a drug are also responsible for and scientists who approve a drug are also responsible for regulating the product after it hits the market. Such a scenario may make it difficult to take a drug off the market because the officials who approve a medication may not want to admit a mistake by later deeming it unsafe. Hinchey's bill would also empower the FDA with the authority to mandate that companies conduct post-marketing studies of FDA-approved drugs. Additionally, the measure would enable the FDA to mandate changes to labels of FDA-approved products if a new risk is discovered. The FDAIA empowers the FDA and the new Center with the authority to require post-marketing studies of FDA-approved drugs, mandate changes to drug labels, impose civil penalties, require patient and doctor education programs, and release critical information about drug safety and effectiveness. "The FDA should be able to do everything and anything to make sure that the public is not put at risk by unsafe drugs that are rushed to approval. Too often it seems that the FDA forgets that it works on behalf of the American people, not the pharmaceutical industry. That is a fundamental problem that must be addressed." See: [Link] html References: See, partial list of U.S. Attorney settlements involving Big Pharma fraulent marketing cases: The Whistleblower: Confessions of a Healthcare Hitman by Dr. Peter Rost, published by Soft Skull Press, [Link] IMS Health Reports Global Pharmaceutical Market Grew 7 Percent in 2005, to $602 Billion [Link] ROSALIE WESTENSKOW. ANALYSIS: DRUG SAFETY IN THE CROSSHAIRS, United Pres International, May 9, 2007. [Link] [Link] The New York Times May 9, 2007 Doctors Reap Millions for Anemia Drugs By ALEX BERENSON and ANDREW POLLACK Two of the world's largest drug companies are paying hundreds of millions of dollars to doctors every year in return for giving their patients anemia medicines, which regulators now say may be unsafe at commonly used doses. The payments are legal, but very few people outside of the doctors who receive them are aware of their size. Critics, including prominent cancer and kidney doctors, say the payments give physicians an incentive to prescribe the medicines at levels that might increase patients' risks of heart attacks or strokes. Industry analysts estimate that such payments - to cancer doctors and the other big users of the drugs, kidney dialysis centers - total hundreds of millions of dollars a year and are an important source of profit for doctors and the centers. The payments have risen over the last several years, as the makers of the drugs, Amgen and Johnson & Johnson, compete for market share and try to expand the overall business. Neither Amgen nor Johnson & Johnson has disclosed the total amount of the payments. But documents given to The New York Times show that at just one practice in the Pacific Northwest, a group of six cancer doctors received $2.7 million from Amgen for prescribing $9 million worth of its drugs last year. Yesterday, the Food and Drug Administration added to concerns about the drugs, releasing a report that suggested that their use might need to be curtailed in cancer patients. The report, prepared by F.D.A. staff scientists, said no evidence indicated that the medicines either improved quality of life in patients or extended their survival, while several studies suggested that the drugs can shorten patients' lives when used at high doses. Yesterday's report followed the F.D.A.'s decision in March to strengthen warnings on the drugs' labels. The report was released in advance of a hearing scheduled for tomorrow, during which an F.D.A. advisory panel will consider whether the drugs are overused. The medicines - Aranesp and Epogen, from Amgen; and Procrit, from Johnson & Johnson - are among the world's top-selling drugs, with combined sales of $10 billion last year. In this country, they represent the single biggest drug expense for Medicare and are given to about a million patients each year to treat anemia caused by kidney disease or cancer chemotherapy. Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, the deputy chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society, said that both patients and doctors would benefit from fuller disclosure about the payments and the profits that doctors can make from them. "I suspect that Medicare is going to take a very careful look at what is going on here," he said. Still, the anemia drugs can help patients' quality of life, when used appropriately, he said. "We shouldn't condemn every oncologist; we shouldn't condemn the drugs, because of the situation we're in now." Federal laws bar drug companies from paying doctors to prescribe medicines that are given in pill form and purchased by patients from pharmacies. But companies can rebate part of the price that doctors pay for drugs, like the anemia medicines, which they dispense in their offices as part of treatment. The anemia drugs are injected or given intravenously in physicians' offices or dialysis centers. Doctors receive the rebates after they buy the drugs from the companies. But they also receive reimbursement from Medicare or private insurers for the drugs, often at a markup over the doctors' purchase price. Medicare has changed its payment structure since 2003 to reduce the markup, but private insurers still often pay more. Combined with those insurance reimbursements, the rebates enable many doctors to profit substantially on the medicines they buy and then give to patients. The rebates are related to the amount of drugs that doctors buy, and physicians that agree to use one company's drugs exclusively typically receive higher rebates. Johnson & Johnson said yesterday in a statement that its rebates were not intended to induce doctors to use more medicine. Instead, the rebates "reflect intense competition" in the market for the drugs, the company said. Amgen said that rebates were a normal commercial practice and that it had always properly promoted its drugs. "Amgen is dedicated to patient safety," said David Polk, a spokesman. "We believe our contracts support appropriate anemia management and our product promotion is always strictly within the label." Both companies' stocks fell yesterday after release of the F.D.A. report. Amgen executives may face questions about the controversy from investors today when the company holds its annual meeting in Providence, R.I. Since 1991, when the first of the drugs was still relatively new, the average dose given to dialysis patients in this country has nearly tripled. About 50 percent of dialysis patients now receive enough of the drugs to raise their red blood cell counts above the level considered risky by the F.D.A. American patients receive far more of the anemia drugs than patients elsewhere, with dialysis patients in this country getting doses more than twice as high as their counterparts in Europe. Cancer care shows a similar pattern. American cancer patients are about three times as likely as those in Europe to get the drugs, and they receive somewhat higher doses. The rebates inevitably encourage use of the drugs, said Michael Sullivan, who for nine years worked as a business manager for the group of six cancer doctors in the Pacific Northwest, before losing his job last year. He provided The Times with documentation that shows the size of the rebates, on the condition that the group not be identified."Personally, I think rebates should go away," said Mr. Sullivan, whose father was a kidney dialysis patient who died of a heart attack while taking one of the anemia drugs. "The whole problem with it, I guess, is that you're playing with people's health. It's not the same as buying widgets." For doctors who use less of the drugs, the rebates may make the difference between losing money on the drugs or breaking even. Mr. Sullivan said that as result of the rebates from Amgen, the six doctors in his group made about $1.8 million in net profit on the drugs they prescribed. Unlike most drugs, the anemia medicines do not come in fixed doses. Therefore, doctors have great flexibility to increase dosing - and profits. Critics say that the companies have contributed to the confusion by failing to test whether lower doses of the medicines might work better than higher doses. "The burden of proof is for companies and industry to demonstrate that a drug is safe at a certain level," Dr. Ajay Singh, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Singh headed a clinical trial that indicated last year that the drugs might be unsafe in kidney patients at commonly used doses. Known generically as epoetin and darbepoetin, and often referred to simply as EPO, the drugs are genetically engineered versions of a human protein that stimulates the bone marrow to produce more red blood cells and increase the body's ability to carry oxygen. Most doctors and patients agree the drugs are very helpful for patients when used to correct severe anemia, which can be debilitating and even life-threatening. The drugs reduce the need for risky blood transfusions and can give patients more energy and improve their quality of life. "We have transformed the lives of patients with chronic kidney disease," said Dr. Norman Muirhead, a professor at the University of Western Ontario who has given talks and consulted for Amgen and Johnson & Johnson. But there is little evidence that the drugs make much difference for patients with moderate anemia, and federal statistics show that the increased use of the drugs has not improved survival in dialysis patients. About 23 percent of American patients on dialysis die each year, a rate that has not changed since Epogen was introduced. Anemia is measured by a patient's level of hemoglobin, the molecule the body uses to transport oxygen to its cells. Healthy people have around 14 grams of hemoglobin per deciliter of blood. Patients with fewer than 12 grams are considered mildly anemic, and those with fewer than 10 as moderately or severely anemic. The labels on the drugs, as currently approved by the F.D.A., encourage doctors to aim for a hemoglobin level of 10 to 12. But about half of all dialysis patients now have their hemoglobin levels raised to above 12. Critics of the drugs say their increased use has been driven by profit. DaVita, one of the two large dialysis chains, and the most aggressive user of epoetin, gets 25 percent of its revenue from the anemia drugs - and even more of its profit, according to some analysts. Dr. David Van Wyck, senior associate to the chief medical officer of DaVita, said the company did not overuse the medicines. Doctors determine how much to use, Dr. Van Wyck said. "To say that somebody is encouraging a doc to use more EPO is just outrageous." Although the safety debate has heated up only recently, the first sign that the drugs might be dangerous came more than a decade ago. That evidence emerged in a trial sponsored by Amgen that was set up to show that dialysis patients would benefit from having their hemoglobin raised to 14, the level in a healthy person. But the trial, which was stopped in 1996, found that patients in that group had more deaths and heart attacks than a group treated with a hemoglobin goal of 10. That trial should have discouraged doctors from using too much epoetin and encouraged Amgen to study the risks further, said Dr. Steven Fishbane, a nephrologist at Winthrop-University Hospital on Long Island. Instead, use of epoetin continued to soar. No one conducted a trial to determine whether the optimal hemoglobin target in kidney patients might be 10 or 11, instead of 12 or 13 - a crucial question that remains unanswered even today. Dr. Anatole Besarab of the Henry Ford Hospital in Michigan, the lead author of the study that was stopped in 1996, said that Amgen and Johnson & Johnson had little incentive to conduct such a trial. Dr. Robert M. Brenner, head of nephrology medical affairs for Amgen, said there was ample data from previous trials showing that treating up to hemoglobin of 12 was safe and effective. Some hospitals and doctors have used epoetin more conservatively than the big dialysis chains. Dr. Ronald A. Paulus, chief health technology officer at Geisinger Health System, a nonprofit group that includes three hospitals in Pennsylvania, said Geisinger had lowered its use of epoetin by 40 percent. Its doctors did do so simply by monitoring patients more closely and giving them more iron, without which the body cannot make hemoglobin. Dr. N. D. Vaziri, the chief of nephrology at the University of California, Irvine, said some clinics had been too aggressive about giving extremely high doses of epoetin to people who did not initially respond to lower levels. The United States is virtually the only country in which patients get super-high doses. "You create a toxicity situation," said Dr. Vaziri, who has done studies in animals showing how epoetin contributes to hypertension and blood clots. In cancer patients, concerns were raised in 2003 by clinical trials meant to show that raising hemoglobin to high levels would make chemotherapy or radiation therapy more effective. Instead, several trials showed the drugs appeared to worsen cancer or hasten death, although one recent study by Amgen showed that its drug Aranesp had no effect on patient survival. The conflicting studies are among the issues the F.D.A. advisory committee is expected to discuss tomorrow. Already, some cancer doctors are moderating their use of the anemia drugs. Dr. Peter Eisenberg, an oncologist in Marin County, Calif., said many doctors had been induced to use more epoetin by the financial incentives and the belief that the drug was helpful. "The deal was so good," he said. "The indication was so clear and the downside was so small that docs just worked it into their practice easily. "Now it's much scarier than that," he said. "We could really be doing harm." Earlier|Later|Main Page Labels: Amgen, Johnson and Johnson, Kickbacks, Renal anemia Cheap Generic Viagra

Tags: drug, patient, doctors, anemia, dr

I'd like to get some. Liposuction, I mean. Get my love handles removed and the fat around my stomach. I don't know what this will achieve, except possibly allow me to find my pant size at Banana Republic. I guess it would make me look normal, naked. Right now, I look like I swallowed a gigantic donut. Or like one of those pythons who have swallowed a goat. The other side of me, doesn't want to get it. Sort of as a 'Fuck You' to the image-driven world we live in. I'm against being image-driven...at least, until I get a flat stomach and then I'll be for it. In a sense, that's why I don't really believe in causes. I think I'm a true agnostic. People lose interest in causes that don't affect them directly. Look at Carni Wilson after she lost the weight. Before that, she was all about promoting a positive body image. Now, she doesn't give a shit about fat people. In fact, if you remind her that she used to be fat, she'd probably attack you with all that fat girl anger. I ramble. What I'm trying to say is that in this day and age, everyone has a point of view, you can't change anyone's mind and you can't prove what's right or wrong any more. It's all become so fucking convoluted, I don't know which way is up anymore. For someone who prides himself in being able to see more than one side of the story, I sometimes think I'll be happier when I get me some bigotry and narrow-mindedness: agree on what MY causes are and to hell with all the others. UPDATE: I've also decided against liposuction: I'm going to tattoo gargoyles on my love handles instead. Cheap Generic Viagra

Tags: fat, image, people, side, swallowed

If, like me, you have depression (I would have said 'suffer from' but unlike all you, I try not to be so fucking dramatic) you know it's tough to deal with: you think you're fine and you realize your reactions are disproportionate to the situation you're in. Personally, I believe depression is the result of the world becoming super-complicated while some of us (me included) are just too fragile to deal with it. I'm learning to suck it up, though. Which is why this is funny. I know when I laugh, I don't feel depressed.

Tags: depression, deal, fragile, included, complicated