Sciences apologize, but the reputation has already ruined

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http://newsfromrussia.com/science/2005/01/09/57765.html

 

 

Sciences apologize, but the reputation has already ruined

 

14:13 2005-01-09

Doctors are being urged to stop prescribing a new generation of

arthritis drug taken by more than a million British patients as the

future of the medicines hangs in the balance.

An influential doctors- and pharmacist-s publication made the

recommendation after reviewing the safety and performance of cox-2

inhibitors, also known as coxibs.

The Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin (DTB) concluded there were ?few, if

any, situations¦ in which coxibs should be prescribed rather than

traditional painkillers such as aspirin.

Industry analysts Datamonitor issued its own report on coxibs on

Friday in which it looked at the possibility of the FDA pulling the

drugs out of the US market.

It said such an outcome was unlikely, pointing out that when the drugs

were prescribed at the right doses to the right patients they were

safe and effective.

Nevertheless the reputation of the coxib family of drugs had been

seriously damaged, reports the Scotsman.

?Regardless of what the FDA decides, confidence in the cox-2s has now

been dented, possibly irrevocably,¦ said Datamonitor.

Datamonitor said Pfizer-s decision to continue marketing Celebrex had

been seen by many as a ?serious strategic error¦.

According to the Boston, six months after the drug industry vowed to

make its clinical trials more transparent, and three months after

launching a common website to give the public ''unprecedented access "

to studies both good and bad, drug companies have posted unpublished

trial results on the site for just five drugs.

Pfizer Inc., the world's largest drug manufacturer with $40 billion in

revenues in 2003, voluntarily disclosed unpublished study results on

only one of the 29 prescription brand-name drugs it actively markets

in the United States, the antidepressant Zoloft.

Merck & Co. posted a listing for its withdrawn painkiller Vioxx, but

clicking on the link reveals nothing but another link to the product's

label and a list of two previously published studies, but not the

studies themselves. There is no information posted, for example, about

an unpublished, large-scale clinical trial of Vioxx performed in 2000

that showed a six-fold increase in cardiovascular risk. That study has

been cited, among others, by critics who say Merck and the Food and

Drug Administration ignored risks of Vioxx years ago.

 

 

 

 

 

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The human race divides politically into those who want people to be

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