This is the time of year when everyone wants to compose a list. And Time magazine is expert at this exercise. One such compendium is the Top Ten Medical Breakthroughs in 2007, which is dominated by discoveries, such as a test for metastatic breast cancer, a clinical trial showing circumcision reduces HIV transmission, a human vaccine for bird flu and research into genetic variants for diabetes. But there are a few drugs, too.

Curiously, the magazine’s editors chose Alli, the diet pill, as the No. 4 breakthrough. Perhaps they liked the marketing effort or the fact that a prescription isn’t needed, but this is hardly a breakthrough. Alli is an over-the-counter version of Xenical, a prescription med that Roche struggled to turn into a success for nearly a decade. Moreover, as the mag notes, Alli offers the same gas and oily discharge - the orange undies syndrome - that one got from Xenical.

Elsewhere, Wyeth’s Lybrel, the first birth-control pill meant to be used continuously and put a stop to women’s monthly periods indefinitely, was listed as the No. 6 breakthrough. The drug, however, generated some controversy over concerns by some women that menstruation would be labeled an unwanted disease. And ranked at No. 7 is Pfizer’s Lyrica, which was already available for treating epilepsy and diabetic neuropathy, and was also approved this year to treat fibromyalgia.