Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals

Early in March, Bausch & Lomb received a troubling phone call from a New Jersey eye doctor. Dr. David S. Chu, a specialist in cornea diseases, alerted the company that three of his recent patients had been afflicted with a microbe that caused a potentially blinding eye infection. Read More

International drugs companies should seek to reduce prices for medicines sold to the poorest countries and avoid filing for patent protection there, a report prepared for the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Monday. Read More

Two patents granted in the United States between 2000 and 2002 and another for which an application has been filed have put "maca", a high altitude Andean plant that is used by indigenous people in Peru, at the centre of a new battle against biopiracy, which involves the construction of an international network against the misappropriation of traditional knowledge. Read More

The World Health Organization (WHO) has barred a life sciences industry association from participating in setting global standards protecting food and water supplies because its members have a financial stake in the outcome. Read More

A Congressional investigation of the money that drug companies give as supposed educational grants has found that the payments are growing rapidly and are sometimes steered by marketing executives to doctors and groups who push unapproved uses of drugs. Read More

The Food and Drug Administration yesterday released a warning letter it sent to the Guidant Corporation, restricting the ability of the company to win approval for some new medical products. In the letter, sent a week ago, the agency said Guidant, the heart device maker, had not fully responded to its concerns about manufacturing procedures at the company's biggest plant. Read More

Jeff Turk is a small-town boy.He's also a geek to the highest exponential power. The combination of traits has him at odds with his profession. Read More

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 25 - The attorney general of California sued 39 drug companies on Thursday, accusing them of bilking the state of hundreds of millions of dollars by overcharging for medicines. Read More

When individuals sue major corporations, the odds are stacked against them. One woman's fight against an insurance giant details those odds and what it takes to beat them. Read More

Many Halliburton contractors leave Iraq with debilitating injuries and deep psychological scars. Then they return home only to find that the insurance they need to rebuild their lives is out of reach. Read More