Wednesday, May 8
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Canada to Donate Vaccine for Ebola to West Africa

Canada to Donate Vaccine for Ebola to West Africa

Economic and Regional Development, Medicine, Vaccinations and Antidotes
By now, the Ebola virus has clasped its tentacles across West Africa and is beginning to show its tooth in the developed world. The Public Health Agency of Canada and the federal government have begun to share details about a vaccine that’s part of an experiment. The aim is to arrive at the Ebola vaccine which is supposed to be a donation to the people of Africa who have been subject Dr Gary Kobinger who is chief of the special pathogens at the agency as also the Heritage Minister Shelly Glover declared of such a development and made more information available at a news conference in Winnipeg recently. We have tried to accumulate as much information about the vaccine as we could- No. of doses that will be sent It has been made public that Canada will be donating anything between 800 to...
Clinical Trials on tissues of human heart now possible in UK

Clinical Trials on tissues of human heart now possible in UK

Biotechnology, Clinical Trials, Drug Development, Pharmaceutical Research and Development
A UK based new start-up is developing a unique method for testing out the impact of drugs on the cardio-vascular system without resorting to animal testing or through clinical trials of an early-stage human. The company we are talking about is Inocardia, a spin-out from the University of Coventry. Having attracted sufficient funding from the Mercia Fund Management, this organization is still in the process of shaping up the model and commercializing their line of business. The model that they use takes up samples of the human heart attached to a rig. The cardiac tissue is elongated and contracted through electric impulse stimulation so as to mimic a working human heart.Drugs to be trialed are then administered to the tissue to keep a track of adverse effects – a test that could have been...
Preventing HIV/AIDS by Using Liquid Silicone Rubber

Preventing HIV/AIDS by Using Liquid Silicone Rubber

Cure & Prevention, Pharmaceutical Research and Development
HIV/AIDS. True that it isn’t much talked about these days as cancer. But the World Health Organisation still bears data that shows about 34 million people around the globe in 2011 managed to breathe air carrying this disease and 1.7 million lost their lives. It is definitely one of the most fatal diseases that has engulfed humanity since it was first detected. There could be some good news: a relatively recent tool that could help to fight back HIV/AIDS is known to be in the Stage III clinical testing being carried out by the US FDA. It constitutes an anti-viral drug that is mixed in a two-component liquid silicone rubber (LSR) that is injection molded into a vaginal ring that releases the drug. A highly advanced combining process was customized for this drug. The machine, metering syst...
What Can Recent Mergers Mean for the Future of Pharmaceutical Industry?

What Can Recent Mergers Mean for the Future of Pharmaceutical Industry?

Economic and Regional Development, Pharma Industry, Pharmaceutical Business Development
Expensive pharmaceutical deals in the industry are in a mad fury of alliances this year on account of the patent expiries that big drug companies are faced with. In an attempt to make up for the losses, hence, these companies are teaming up with their better off competitors. The world’s most well-known drug maker, Pfizer and London’s AstraZeneca have been heard to contemplate joining hands in a potential $100 billion epic merger which is a sign that the pharmaceutical sector is brimming with many more such deals in the days to come. Mergermarket, the famous research firm, shows data that suggest that five pharmacy deals valuing more than $2 billion in the first four months of 2014 are of the same momentum possibly, like seven deals of the same value that were announced in the entire year...
Low-Cost Genome Sequencing

Low-Cost Genome Sequencing

BioPharma, Biotechnology, Cheminformatics, Drug Development, Drug Discovery, Economic and Regional Development, Pharma Industry
In Silicon Valley, Moore's law appears to remained on equivalent balance with the regular laws classified by Isaac Newton. Intel prime supporter Gordon Moore's notorious perception that registering power has a tendency to twofold — and that its value hence parts — like clockwork has held valid for about 50 years with just minor update. Yet as a model of quick transform, it is the focus of energetic ill-use from genome analysts. In many presentations over the past few years, researchers have contrasted the slant of Moore's law and the quickly dropping expenses of DNA sequencing. For some time they kept pace, however since something like 2007, it has not even been close. The cost of sequencing a normal human genome has plunged from about Us$10 million to a couple of thousand dollars in only...
The Problems with Healthcare Data and How to Manage Them

The Problems with Healthcare Data and How to Manage Them

Pharma Industry, Pharmacetiucal Infotech
People who work with data tend to think in terms which are very structured and linear. They prefer to have B to follow A and C to follow B not just sometimes, but pretty much all of the time. But, healthcare data simply doesn’t work that way. Healthcare data can render linear analysis useless as it is both diverse and complex. There are several characteristics of healthcare data which make it both unique and often difficult to work with. Let’s discuss just a few of those characteristics. Multiple Places Healthcare data tends to be found in a variety of different places. The data tends to come from all over an organisation, from EMRs or human resources software to varying departments such as oncology, radiology or pharmacy. Compiling all of this information into one single central syste...
Why is Good Tablet Design so Important and How to Achieve it?

Why is Good Tablet Design so Important and How to Achieve it?

Combinatorial Chemistry, Drug Development, Pharmaceutical Chemicals and Intermediates, Pharmaceutical Excipients and Drug Formulation, Tableting and Encapsulation
Detailed design of pharmaceutical and nutraceutical tablets is essential in order to produce robust tablets with bespoke designs. Tablet manufacturers should not overlook tablet design because it is key to the quality of the end product. “With sufficient fore-thought and consideration, most potential tablet making problems can be eliminated at the early stage of design. ” I Holland. Good tablet design is extremely important; it has an impact upon anti-counterfeiting, tooling strength,tablet coating, durability and functionality. Good tablet design helps to avoid downstream manufacturing problems such as tablet sticking, picking, lamination, capping and premature tooling failures. It is essential to consider these at the beginning of the process, ensuring a problem free, high quality, e...
Collaborations are a Secret Boon for the Pharma Industry in India

Collaborations are a Secret Boon for the Pharma Industry in India

Economic and Regional Development, Pharma Industry, Pharmaceutical Business Development
After it was recently announced that Bristol-Meyes Squibb and Astra Zenca ended their partnership and Aurobindo Pharma would acquire Dublin-based Actavis, the question on everyone’s minds seems to be, what next? The pharma industry has seen a double-growth in recent times owing to breakthrough patents in the field of cancer drugs and research. Therapies which are closely linked to winter related ailments, have posted strong double digit growths (such as respiratory at over 18.7 per cent, pain or analgesics at over 10.1 per cent), resulting in acute therapies growing faster than chronic segment, for the second consecutive month. For the full year 2013, the pharmaceutical market was reported at Rs 78,644 crore, with a growth of 9.9 per cent, over the same period last year. The Indian mark...
Is South Africa Trying to delay Patents on New Medicines?

Is South Africa Trying to delay Patents on New Medicines?

Economic and Regional Development, Pharma Industry, Pharmaceutical Business Development, Pharmaceutical Distribution and Logistics, Pharmaceutical Patenting
In a recent report by the Guardian, it was revealed that leaked documents showed lobbying proposals to delay laws that would allow fast introduction of generic medicines in South Africa. Shockingly, this means patents on breakthrough (read recently discovered medicine) drugs could be halted, but for what? If the changes to the new intellectual property law take place, this could be a definite reality, warns the Guardian. Drug companies in South Africa have been accused of planning a covert, well-funded campaign to delay the introduction of laws that threaten their profits. Leaked documents show that pharmaceutical companies planned a $450,000 campaign, involving a high-profile consultancy based in Washington, DC, against changes to intellectual property laws that would enable their pat...
Glenmark Gives India the Push by Topping its Anti-Diabetes Drug

Glenmark Gives India the Push by Topping its Anti-Diabetes Drug

Pharma Industry, Pharmaceutical Business Development, Pharmaceutical Collaboration
Whatever Glenmark wanted to prove by introducing Zitamed and ZIta, their new anti-diabetes drugs, they’ve definitely topped this season. Mumbai-based Glenmark Pharmaceuticals introduced the two anti-diabetes drugs in aRs 3,000-crore lucrative anti-diabetes market dominated by multinationals The drugmaker, which is locked in a bitter patent infringement battle with US drug firm Merck Sharp and Dohme's (MSD) over these drugs, has managed to rake in Rs 16 crore in just eight months since it launched them, according to data available with All India Organisation of Chemists and Association (AIOCD). In a sort of kickback, Glenmark has priced these drugs at a third of the price of its competitors. Win? We definitely think so. This move may not only rattle the existing market, but also multina...