Study questions effectiveness of antidepressants

The Oregonian:

The portrayal of antidepressant drugs in medical journals significantly overstates their effectiveness, according to a study led by Oregon researchers.

Nearly a third of the clinical trials of antidepressants carried out by drug companies produced questionable or negative results that never appeared publicly in print, researchers reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"The doctor and the patient have only been aware of good news about these drugs in terms of efficacy," said lead author Dr. Erick Turner, a former drug reviewer for the federal Food and Drug Administration who now holds positions at the Portland Veteran Affairs Medical Center and Oregon Health & Science University.

The findings do not imply that the drugs don't work, but rather that doctors and patients lack a full, nuanced picture of their effectiveness.

The results also highlight a widespread bias problem in reporting on drug treatments of all kinds, said Dr. David Liebeskind, associate director of neurology at the University of California at Los Angeles.

Denied access to all completed studies, Liebeskind said, doctors and patients can't make the best possible decisions. Doctors may prescribe drugs that patients don't need or recommend drugs that are less effective than alternatives.

And Speaking of Drugs

BBC:

Brazil's president has authorised the country to bypass the patent on an Aids drug manufactured by Merck, a US pharmaceutical giant.

The country will import a cheaper, generic Indian-made version of the patented Efavirenz drug.

Good. People shouldn't be dying because they can't afford life-saving drugs. People shouldn't be going broke to stay healthy.

"This is certainly an important advance in terms of widening access. We are very happy that Brazil is moving in the right direction," said Michel Lotrowska of NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres.

Exactly right.

Merck says this will discourage investment in research for new drugs. Bullshit.

GOP Wants More Expensive Prescription Drugs

Bloomberg:

Republicans are gloating because Democrats haven't managed to get final congressional approval for any of the initiatives the party set as first-round legislative goals this year. ``They are zero and seven in '07,'' said Mississippi's Trent Lott, the Senate's second-ranking Republican. ``They have achieved nothing.''

Democrats, with only a 51-49 Senate majority, are still trying to pass measures that expand embryonic stem-cell research, overhaul immigration laws and allow the government to negotiate lower Medicare drug prices. ``We're going to tangle them up unmercifully'' on drug prices, said Lott, 65.