A busy day, thanks primarily to Avandia, of course. Who says the summer is a slow time? There’s always a lot of pharma, as our name implies. With that in mind, here are a few items to tide you over until the morning…

Patients taking Takeda’s Actos diabetes drug were less likely to suffer a heart attack or need their arteries cleared than those taking Glaxo’s Avandia, a new study finds. The study was discussed at today’s FDA advisory panel meeting to review Avandia. You can read more at Bloomberg News.

The difficulties in generating, and relying on, a meta-analysis are discussed in a piece by BusinessWeek. The issuey illustrates the hard choices researchers must make when analyzing batches of studies. “The biggest issue is how to go about selecting studies to go into the analysis,” says biostatistician Susan Ellenberg of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

Medicare issued final reimbursement rules today that tighten usage and dosing allowances for a class of anemia drugs due to concerns over their safety and potential overuse, Reuters reports. New coverage rules became effective after months of heightened concern over the so-called EPO drugs, which include Amgen’s Aranesp and Epogen and Johnson & Johnson’s Procrit, after they were linked to a higher risk of heart attack and stroke.