By Christine Baugh A new Google Chrome extension puts the spotlight on conflicts of interest. The browser app, available for free download here, was created at the Hacking iCorruption hackathon event held March 27-29 in Cambridge, MA. The event, co-sponsored by the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University and the MIT Center for…
By Zack Buck The newest chapter in the legal drama involving Johnson & Johnson, Inc. (“J&J”) and its subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceutical, Inc. (and a subsidiary previously known as Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc.) (“Janssen”) was written late last month. Specifically at issue was whether or not the alleged off-label marketing of its blockbuster antipsychotic Risperdal violated state…
By Arthur Caplan A new piece by contributor Art Caplan on NBC News: Biogen, a Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech company, announced last week that early tests of their new drug aducanumab, a monoclonal antibody, had shown impressive results in treating those with early stage Alzheimer’s disease. The drug significantly reduced the amyloid plaque buildup in the…
By Ameet Sarpatwari and Aaron S. Kesselheim Cross posted from Health Affairs Blog Having saved US consumers over $1.5 trillion in the past decade, generic drugs are one of the most cost-effective interventions in our entire health care system. Using generic drugs instead of brand-name drugs, when a generic is available, has been shown to increase medication adherence…
The “Right to Try” – Compassionate Use of Experimental Medicine 5th Annual Cathy Shine Lecture Thursday, March 19, Noon – 1 p.m. Boston University Medical Campus Instructional Building Bakst Auditorium 72 East Concord Street, Boston, MA Free and open to the public Reception will follow Is it fair to use social media or personal connections…
By Tony Caldwell and Christopher Robertson This new post by Tony Caldwell and Christopher Robertson appears on the Health Affairs Blog, as part of a series stemming from the Third Annual Health Law Year in P/Review event held at Harvard Law School on Friday, January 30, 2015. The Physician Payments Sunshine Act, a provision in the Affordable Care Act, seeks to increase…
By Rachel Sachs Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) recently introduced a new bill, the Medical Innovation Act, which would require pharmaceutical companies who settle with the government after committing certain illegal activities to reinvest additional money into the NIH. Senator Warren views the bill as a “swear jar” for drug companies, seeking to target those who…
By Rachel Sachs At the end of January, the House Energy & Commerce Committee released a discussion draft of the 21st Century Cures Act. This document marks the beginning of the legislative phase of the 21st Century Cures Initiative, during which the Committee has held numerous roundtables and hearings and issued several white papers. The…
By Kelsey Berry It’s time to talk about discrimination again — this time, in insurance benefit design. A recent study in NEJM by Jacobs and Sommers has coined the term “adverse tiering” to describe the use of drug formularies by insurers “not to influence enrollees’ drug utilization but rather to deter certain people from enrolling…
On 26th November 2013, the Danish Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation organized an expert meeting on “Synthetic Biology & Intellectual Property Rights” in Copenhagen sponsored by the European Research Area Network in Synthetic Biology (ERASynBio). The meeting brought together ten experts from different countries with a variety of professional backgrounds to discuss emerging challenges…
