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| INDIA: Fighting Big Pharma in Little Digwal
by Stan Cox, Counterpunch
February 15th, 2005
In this 50-mile-long stretch of rural India west of Hyderabad, the country's fifth largest city, almost 40 percent of the country's bulk pharmaceuticals are produced (a large proportion of them for export). The progress the the people of Digwal have made in protecting themselves against the industry's wastes puts them in a league of their own. |
| USA: Drug Companies Pushing ADHD Drugs for Children
by Kelly Hearn, Alternet
November 29th, 2004
As public scrutiny of drug companies grows, so do questions about what critics say is a vast over-prescribing of MPH, especially as more adults are taking other MPH-based medicines such as Concerta. Many in and outside the scientific community suspect the dubious marketing tactics of big drug money have fueled the spiraled use of MPH. |
| US: Merck Steps Up Public Relations Campaign After Recall
by Theresa Agovino, Associated Press
November 22nd, 2004
Merck & Co.'s campaign to defend itself in the wake of the recall of the pain reliever Vioxx intensified as it placed a package of three full-page ads in seven prominent newspapers beginning last Friday. |
| US: How Schering Manipulated Drug Prices And Medicaid
New York Times
July 31st, 2004
$345.5 million settlement by Schering-Plough to resolve a government Medicaid investigation provides a detailed glimpse into how drug companies can manipulate prices to overcharge state and federal programs. |
| US: A Record Year for Shareholder Activism
by G. Jeffrey MacDonald, Christian Science Monitor
June 28th, 2004
Question: What single force can get Tyco International to strive for cleaner emissions, inspire PepsiCo to study the impact of AIDS in developing nations, and even get Merck & Co. to declare its intentions to not manufacture an abortion pill? Answer: shareholders. |
| US: Medco Health to Settle Complaints
Associated Press
April 27th, 2004
In a case that could alter how prescriptions are filled, the nation's largest pharmacy benefits manager said Monday that it would pay $29 million to settle allegations by 20 states, including California, that it pressured doctors to switch patients' medications to benefit its bottom line. |
| US: Strengthening Bones, Raising Questions
by Denise Gellene, New York Times
April 23rd, 2004
Last fall, the National Kidney Foundation for the first time set treatment guidelines to prevent a complication from kidney failure that causes damage to bones. The guidelines were tough, and there was no drug on the market that would easily help a patient meet them. |
| USA: Cynical Politics and the Global HIV/AIDS Emergency
by Bill Fletcher Jr., FinalCall.com News
August 6th, 2003
National Public Radio (NPR) recently reported on the dramatic increase of HIV/AIDS in the Caribbean. This story reminds one that fighting the spread of HIV/AIDS is directly related to overcoming poverty and challenging globalization. It also reminds one that cynical politics are afoot on the part of those in power more concerned with corporate profits than with the misery of millions. |
| USA: Drug Patents Draw Scrutiny as Bush Goes to Africa
by Michael Schroeder, The Wall Street Journal
July 9th, 2003
In a five-Nation African tour this week, President Bush is trumpeting his $15 billion program to fight the continent's AIDS epidemic. But that program's gains could be undercut by a separate U.S. effort to impose strict drug-patent protections that make AIDS drugs more expensive and harder to obtain. The Commerce Department is helping shape patent laws in developing countries such as Nigeria -- where Mr. Bush will visit Saturday -- that go beyond global standards in protecting drug makers. The U.S. Trade Representative's office is seeking similarly strict protections in developing nations world-wide. |
| USA: Bush Delivers Emergency AIDS Relief to Republican Allies
by John Tarleton, Indy Media Center
July 3rd, 2003
George W. Bush signed a five-year, $15 billion global AIDS relief bill to much fanfare last week in advance of the G8 Summit in Evian, France. Besides giving Bush a PR boost, the measure may turn out to be of more help to U.S. pharmaceutical companies, faith-based religious groups and the biotech industry than to the citizens of 14 African and Caribbean countries covered by the initiative. |
| South Africa: Indigenous Group Wins Rights to its Healing Herbs
by Mercedes Sayagues, Inter Press Service
March 28th, 2003
ANDRIESVALE, South Africa, Mar. 28 (IPS) -- In a victory for indigenous groups, a landmark profit-sharing agreement has been signed providing credit and compensation to one of South Africa's oldest groups with extensive traditional knowledge of healing plants and herbs. |
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