The middle of the week is here and that can mean only one thing - plenty to do. Meetings, deadlines, projects. The list is long. So is ours. All of which tells us that the time has come for our daily cup of stimulation as we peruse the news of the world. Here are some [...]

That’s the implication from the latest news to dribble out of Wall Street. An analyst indicated that Merck’s experimental taranabant obesity pill didn’t yield the hoped-for weight loss of 5 percent at the 2 mg dose the drugmaker hopes to sell, according to Reuters. And this occurred in Phase III testing, according to Aileen Salares [...]

The quest to find the magic diet pill knows no limits. Of course, the path is littered with failures in the form of embarassing side effects, heart and lung damage, suicides, lawsuits and, more recently, FDA rejection. Think fen-phen. Think Acomplia. Think Xenical and orange undies.
But the obsession with looking slimmer and the adverse consequences [...]

The drugmaker held an analyst briefing in Paris, but had little to offer. Although the late-stage pipeline is growing and 31 drugs could be submitted to regulators by 2010, the discussion was a downer. A successor to the Lovenox blood clotter and another for irregular heartbeat show promise but probably won’t be available before 2011. [...]

That’s the concern after hearing the Sanofi-Aventis diet pill, which is linked to suicide, is becoming popular in generic form in India. Six Indian generic drugmakers, including Cipla and Ranbaxy Labs, are exploiting a loophole in local patent laws, selling copies under names like Slimona and Defat, and the pills are sold without prescription for [...]

The drugmaker plans to withdraw its application with the FDA to sell its controverial diet pill in the US, according to a statement issued a short while ago. Nonetheless, the drugmaker vows to resubmit its request “at a future date…Sanofi-Aventis is committed to making all efforts necessary to make rimonabant available to patients in the [...]

The European Medicines Agency plans to re-examine its authorization of Sanofi-Aventis’s fat pill now that an FDA advisory panel refusedt to recommend approval due to concerns over depression and suicide.
EMEA, which identified depression as a possible side effect when it approved Acomplia last year, says its committee for medicinal products for human use would review [...]

Look at it this way - Sanofi’s loss is Glaxo’s gain. Even though the FDA won’t make its final decision on Acomplia until the end of next month, the odds don’t look good that the agency will approve a diet pill that increases suicidal risk. Remember that some people may be depressed about their weight. [...]

The advisory committee unanimously voted against recommending the diet drug after hearing evidence that Acomplia increases the risk of suicidal behavior. Sanofi-Aventis didn’t help its cause by failing to convince the panel that the pill is safe. This is obviously a blow to the drugmaker, which already sells the diet pill in other countries, but [...]

That’s right, even if the FDA advisory panel meeting this Wednesday votes not to recommend the controversial diet pill, Americans can run south of the border for a month’s supply. And the med will cost, on average, only $117! Apparently, the folks who read an online site called ‘The Zimulti-Acomplia Report’ are relating their trips [...]