Defending Derek
Derek Lowe is a medicinal chemist with ~30-years of industry experience, mainly in Big Pharma. His very popular In The Pipeline blog is a must read for anyone who wants…
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FDA 2018: Busy Busy
Last year was unquestionably an excellent year from an FDA NCE approval perspective. A recent article in Nature Reviews Drug Discovery has the full list. An interactive table (complete with…
On Politics and Prognostications
That didn't take long. In mid-December, we released a short video that summarized a few items of interest from 2018. We also offered a few predictions for 2019. One of…
2018 Pipeline Review
The good folks at Pharmaprojects just published their Pharma R&D Annual Review. A summary of the report, plus a link to the full report, is available here. The report…
Epidiolex Approval: A Turning Point for Cannabis in the US?
Last week, an FDA Advisory committee unanimously recommended the approval of Epidiolex for the treatment of two rare forms of pediatric epilepsy (Lennox-Gastaut syndrome and Dravet syndrome). The full…
All Rise: Viagra at 20
Last week was the 20th anniversary of the launch of Viagra (sildenafil, Pfizer). Formerly known as UK-92,480, sildenafil was first synthesized at Pfizer's faculty in Kent, UK. The press…
Drug Development (Lack of) in Pain and Addiction
Following up on their sobering report on drug development in depression, BIO has released another report in their State of Innovation in Highly Prevalence Chronic Diseases series. This time,…
Innovation in Chronic Diseases: Depressing News
Last week, BIO published an exceedingly interesting report, entitled The State of Innovation in Highly Prevalent Chronic Diseases: Depression Therapeutics. The press release and report are available here. This and…
The Answer Is Digital…Again
Deloitte recently published their annual report on returns generated by big pharma from their R&D investments. The PDF report is available here. The report is divided into two sections.…
Is the pharmaceutical industry risk averse?
Simple question...is our industry risk averse? Some would say, "Yes, absolutely." Look at psychiatric drugs, as an example. When the SSRIs were launched in the early 1990s, it was a…