Pharmaceutical spam: Medical disinformation on the internet

Spam advertising of pharmaceutical products is leading patients to seek out information about prescription drugs online, according to a report to be published in the International Journal Business and Systems Research. If those drugs are not available to the internet user through their physician there is a risk that they may obtain such products via illicit means.

The direct advertising of pharmaceutical products to patients is outlawed in several countries, but spam marketing is all-pervasive and wholly ignores national and international laws. It exists because a sale to even a tiny percentage of the hundreds of millions of people targeted every single day with product offers nets the spammers a profit. Now, Sanjoy Ghose and Vikas Lachhwani of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, have investigated how exposure to spam offering prescription pharmaceuticals motivates individuals to seek additional information on the internet.

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Imminent Patent Expiry of Key Blockbuster Drugs to Benefit Generics Manufacturers

The global generic pharmaceuticals market is likely to witness strong growth in the next few years owing to the patent expiration of key blockbuster drugs and the judicious cost containment efforts of governments and healthcare service providers worldwide. At the same time, the balance in terms of healthcare expenditure and sales revenue is poised to shift from developed to emerging markets such as India, China, Brazil, Russia, Turkey and South Korea, as huge potential still remains untapped in these countries.

New analysis from Frost & Sullivan, Generic Pharmaceuticals Market - A Global Analysis, finds that the market earned revenues of $ 123.85 billion in 2010 and estimates this to reach $ 231.00 billion in 2017 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.29 per cent from 2011-2018. Regions covered in the research include the United States, Europe (Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Spain, and Italy) and Asia (India and China).

42 % of Online Consumers Think Pharma Companies Should be Involved in Online Health Communities

NEW YORK, Jan 17, 2012 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- On the heels of the FDA issuing its "Guidance for Industry Responding to Unsolicited Requests for Off-Label Information About Prescription Drugs and Medical Devices", pharmaceutical and healthcare market research company Manhattan Research releases new data exploring how consumers use social media and other online sources for prescription drug information and pharma interaction.

The ePharma Consumer(R) study found that 42 percent of online adults agree that pharmaceutical companies should be involved in online health communities for consumers. Additionally, only 19 percent of online adults disagree that pharma should participate in this type of forum - with the additional 39 percent being impartial to the issue.

The Impact of Pharma Downsizing on Manufacturing Plant Closures

The Pharmalot blog reported that pharma and biotech downsizing, restructuring and outsourcing have resulted in 38 manufacturing facilities in 2011. While this may not sound like a lot given the ongoing tough economy, the post reports that 65 facilities were closed in 2010. According to some estimates, these closures have resulted in the loss of roughly 18,000 life sciences manufacturing jobs in the past two years. Sadly, pharmaceutical manufacturing, like almost all other manufacturing jobs in the US are being lost at an unprecedented rate. Further, many of these manufacturing jobs are being outsourced to multinational CMOs or to manufacturing facilities being built by pharma companies in emerging markets like Latin America, Eastern Europe and Asia.

Not surprisingly, most of the 2011 closures were in the Northeast (8) resulting in the loss of roughly 1,400 jobs. And, not surprisingly again, one of the hardest hit states was New Jersey; home to almost all of the major pharmaceutical companies in the world. The next region that was hit hard is the Mid-Atlantic (7) with notable closures in Maryland (Shire Pharmaceuticals) and North Carolina (DSM Pharmaceutical Products).

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Each month 16.9M access health info via mobiles

According to a new report from comScore, the number of people in the US who access health information from their mobile devices is on the rise. During the months of September, October, and November last year, an average of 16.9 million people used mobile phones to access health information. That number marks a 125 percent growth rate over the same three month period in the previous year. The research firm found that about 3 in 5 or 60 percent of the mobile health information seekers were under the age of 35.

ComScore stated that at that growth rate, mobile health content is “quickly becoming one of the fastest growing content categories.”

UBC researchers identify potential new therapy approach for Hepatitis C that could benefit 170 million people affected worldwide

Researchers at the University of British Columbia have found a new way to block infection from the hepatitis C virus (HCV) in the liver that could lead to new therapies for those affected by this and other infectious diseases.

More than 170 million people worldwide suffer from hepatitis C, the disease caused by chronic HCV infection. The disease affects the liver and is one of the leading causes of liver cancer and liver transplant around the world. HCV is spread by blood-to-blood contact and there is no vaccine to prevent it. Current treatments for the disease are only moderately effective and can cause serious side effects.

“As HCV infects a person, it needs fat droplets in the liver to form new virus particles,” says François Jean, Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and Scientific Director of the Facility for Infectious Disease and Epidemic Research (FINDER) at UBC. “In the process, it causes fat to accumulate in the liver and ultimately leads to chronic dysfunction of the organ.”

Σε δήλωση ανάκλησης καλεί ο ΙΣΑ όσους γιατρούς συνεργάστηκαν με τον ΕΟΠΥΥ

Στον αέρα   είναι  η  συνεργασία  γιατρών και  διαγνωστικών κέντρων με τον ΕΟΠΥΥ. Αμφίβολο παραμένει εάν και πως πρόκειται ν  αμειφθούν τα πολυϊατρεία ,τα ατομικά διαγνωστικά κέντρα καθώς και οι  γιατροί που εντάχθηκαν με μία απλή δήλωσή τους, μέσω φαξ, στον Φορέα. Το τοπίο παραμένει θολό, όσο η συνεργασία τους γίνεται, χωρίς την υπογραφή συλλογικής σύμβασης.
Για το λόγο αυτό ο ΙΣΑ, καλεί τους  γιατρούς, οι οποίοι είχαν υποβάλλει Δήλωση προς τον Ε.Ο.Π.Υ.Υ, προκειμένου να συμβληθούν με τον ως άνω φορέα, όπως προβούν σε Δήλωση Ανάκλησης.

Παράλληλα ο ΙΣΑ με επιστολή που έστειλε στον πρόεδρο του Εθνικού Φορέα Παροχής Υπηρεσιών Υγείας Γεράσιμο Βουδούρη ,ζητά να διευκρινιστούν κρίσιμα ζητήματα που αφορούν την λειτουργία και τη βιωσιμότητα του Φορέα.

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