Three launches this year just the beginning of Teva turnaround, CEO says

FiercePharma | By Carly Helfand 

Three new drug launches in 2014 won't save Teva's  sales if generics attack Copaxone later this week. But they certainly will help.

Those launches are just what the Israeli company has on the way, CEO Erez Vigodman told a conference Friday, according to Reuters. And that trio--comprising migraine patch Zecuity, Symbicort generic DuoResp Spiromax, and Adasuve, an inhalation powder to treat agitation in schizophrenia patients--will ultimately combine for peak sales of $1 billion, estimates say.

Of course, that's just one piece of the Israeli drugmaker's plan to get back on track after patent woes, restructuring plans, labor protests, management changes and shareholder unrest rocked the company in the past several months. Vigodman said earlier this month that Teva wants to refocus on its generics business and plunge into the biosimilars race. M&A isn't out of the question, either, and rumors listed Teva as a suitor for India's Cipla just a couple weeks ago.

The Rise Of The Pharmaceutical Un-Sales Force

Forbes | Cory L. Andrews   

In a variation on the old saying “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em,” a number of states have initiated programs where purportedly independent clinicians, pharmacists and other medical personnel pay visits to physicians as a way of countering the information delivered to health care providers by drug company sales people (who are known as “detailers”).  States such as Pennsylvania and South Carolina are funding this “academic detailing” as a tool to reduce those governments’ prescription drug-related health care expenses.  Counter-detailers reportedly inform doctors that older drugs or less expensive generics can be as or more effective in treating some conditions than newer, patented products.  Thanks to the 2009 federal stimulus bill and the ObamaCare law, the federal government is now looking to get into the academic detailing business.