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Ozempic cuts kidney disease risk – global study
A multi-year study finding that Ozempic markedly lowers the risk of complications from chronic kidney disease could dramatically increase the pool of patients eligible...
Weight-loss shots linked to unexpected pregnancies
With claims suggesting that weight-loss jabs may be fuelling an unexpected increase in pregnancies, experts have recommended that women pair the use of drugs...
More of Big Pharma's Covid vaccine bully tactics laid bare
With the release of a second tranche of information showing how South Africa was bullied into paying outrageously high prices for its Covid-19 vaccines,...
Justice yet to be served in US osteoporosis drug case
A US court case by 1 000 plaintiffs against pharmaceutical company Merck has been dragging on since 2011, writes Gregory Curfman in JAMA Network,...
CVD benefits from weight-loss drugs a 'game-changer'
Two important studies were presented at this year’s European Congress on Obesity (ECO), based on the landmark Semaglutide and Cardiovascular Outcomes (SELECT) trial from...
SA to import costly cystic fibrosis drug, but few can afford it
Although US drug manufacturer Vertex has reached an agreement with Equity Pharmaceuticals to import and distribute its cystic fibrosis treatment Trikafta in SA, the...
New SAHPRA guidelines planned to address codeine abuse
South Africa’s medicines regulator is developing a new set of initiatives to stem the misuse of codeine, found in certain pain relief medicines and...
Scientists find Paxlovid does not shorten Covid symptoms in fully jabbed
Researchers have suggested that for people who are fully vaccinated but have at least one risk factor for severe Covid, the antiviral drug Paxlovid...
FDA approves new UTI treatment
The US Food and Drug Administration has approved Pivya (pivmecillinam) tablets for to treat uncomplicated urinary tract infections (UTIs), caused by susceptible isolates of...
UK issues side effect alert for men on hair loss, prostate drug
Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) will introduce a patient alert card to boost awareness among men taking finasteride, warning about potential...
Can Big Pharma justify hefty drug prices?
Big Pharma's hefty price tags for some medicines have again come under scrutiny, with a drug developed by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) costing a...
Aspen ready to help shrink global shortage of weight-loss drugs
Aspen, Africa’s largest pharmaceutical company, could potentially help ease a growing shortage of the world’s hot-selling obesity medications, said CEO Stephen Saad recently, even...
US doctors slow to offer newly-approved Alzheimer’s drug
Sceptical American doctors are resisting prescribing the first drug that has been proved to slow the advance of Alzheimer’s – nine months after the...
Call to reduce antipsychotic medicines for dementia patients
Doctors are being urged to reduce prescribing of antipsychotic drugs to dementia patients after the largest study of its kind found they were linked...
Cheap diabetes drug may delay ageing, say US scientists
An inexpensive drug taken by millions of people to control diabetes may do more than lower blood sugar, with research suggesting it might have...
No link between suicide and weight loss drugs – EMA
Evidence does not support a causal association between the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1) – dulaglutide, exenatide, liraglutide, lixisenatide and semaglutide – and suicidal...
Doctor’s HPCSA hearing over Covid vaccine comments begins
A disciplinary hearing against doctor Shankara Chetty began in Durban last week after Wits University Professor Francois Venter lodged a complaint against him with...
Hundreds of websites flog fake weight-loss and other drugs
An Israeli cybersecurity firm has taken down more than 250 websites selling fake versions of popular weight-loss and diabetes drugs in the GLP-1 class,...
Dentist pleads not guilty to patient’s murder in ‘detox’ clinic
The trial of a Durban dentist, charged with murder after a patient died in his detox centre seven years ago, started in the High...
New injectable antibiotic approved for three uses
The US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the injectable drug ceftobiprole medocaril sodium (Zevtera) to treat adults with Staphylococcus aureus bacteremia (SAB), the agency announced...
Short-lived ALS drug faces class action suit after withdrawal
The manufacturer of the world’s newest treatment approved for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), often called Lou Gehrig’s disease, has withdrawn the drug from the...
Costly Ozempic can be made for less than $5 month – UK study
Ozempic, the popular diabetes drug – and similar weight-loss medications – could be manufactured for less than $5 a month, even as Novo Nordisk...
Swedish researchers warn of over-use of antibiotics with newborns
Low exposure to antibiotics in newborns treated in neonatal units over a nine-year period was not associated with an increased risk of early-onset sepsis...
Japanese supplements linked to deaths
Japanese Government health officials have launched investigations and carried out inspections on factories producing health supplements linked to at least five deaths and the...
In search of the slimming Holy Grail
There is not a person on the planet with a few kilograms to lose who does not dream of a quick fix to their...
Eli Lilly warns of insulin shortages
Two formulations of insulin from Eli Lilly would be temporarily out of stock until the beginning of April, the company has said, citing a...
Autism risk may rise with in-utero anti-seizure meds – US study
A study by American researchers suggests that the incidence of autism spectrum disorder is higher among children exposed to topiramate in the second half...
WHO elaborates on resistance to ARV medicine
Although the WHO recently reported that drug resistance to the gold-standard antiretroviral medicine, dolutegravir, “exceeded levels observed in clinical trials”, it has since elaborated,...
FDA flags J&J, Bristol’s CAR-T therapies
US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) staff have expressed concern about Johnson & Johnson’s and Bristol Myers Squibb’s cell therapies, saying it is unclear whether...
FDA approves expanded use of liver disease drug
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the expanded use of Mirum Pharmaceuticals’ medication, Livmarli, to treat itching caused by a liver disorder...
Dependence on Indian-made drugs puts Africa at risk
Africa’s reliance on Indian pharmaceuticals poses a risk to the continent’s security of access to medicine, and this week’s Belgian presidency of the Council...
Acne drug not linked to higher suicide risk – meta-analysis
Users of the acne drug isotretinoin do not experience an increased risk of suicide, according to a recent meta-analysis, but may actually have a...
Large study shows ALS drug failures
The maker of a much-debated drug for Lou Gehrig’s disease said last week that its therapy had failed to help patients in a large...
UK reviews asthma drug after traumatic side effects in children
Activists are demanding stricter controls and more prominent warnings on the commonly prescribed asthma and allergy drug montelukast, which has seen children as young...
Alzheimer’s drug beset by various challenges
Neurologists are voicing “frustration” at core elements of the Alzheimer's drug Leqembi, produced by Eisai and Biogen and which was supposed to be the...
SA urges Pepfar to buy more African HIV/Aids drugs
South African pharmaceutical companies have urged the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar) to shift 2m patients to made-in-Africa HIV/Aids medicines by...
Safety update on medicines containing pseudoephedrine
Britain’s MHRA (Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency) has reviewed the latest evidence relating to the very rare risk of side effects associated with...
ADHD drug shortage continues in USA
More than a year after the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a shortage of the ADHD medication Adderall, doctors and patients say...
US drug companies defend high prices at Senate meeting
In an escalating verbal battle, the CEOs of three major pharmaceutical companies defended the high prices of their drugs in front of the US...
British fatalities in Spain prompt call for inquiry into painkiller
There have been growing calls for a comprehensive national study in Spain to establish the adverse side-effects of the controversial painkiller metamizole, linked to...