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Reuters Health Wednesday, June 25, 2008 WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Use of cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins rose by 156 percent between 2000 and 2005, with spending jumping from $7.7 billion to $19.7 billion, the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality reported on Wednesday. "The number of people purchasing statins nearly doubled when comparing 2000 and 2005, rising from 15.8 million people to 29.7 million people," the AHRQ report reads. The total number of outpatient prescriptions for statins rose from about 90 million in 2000 to nearly 174 million in 2005. Each individual spent $484 a year on average on statins...

On June 19, 1987, Ben & Jerry’s introduced Cherry Garcia, in honor of the man who played lead guitar for the Grateful Dead. The Food and Drug Administration struck back three months later, when it approved the first of a new family of statin drugs that curb cholesterol production in the human liver. A synthetic statin licensed a decade later would become the most lucrative drug in history. At its peak, Lipitor was streaming $14 billion a year into Pfizer’s coffers. Let’s not blame the victim: we don’t choose Cherry Garcia; it chooses us. Lipitor is a lifesaver for 600,000...

HOUSTON, Nov 14 Asia Pulse - India is poised to become a major venue for outsourcing in chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturing, a new report by researchers involved in the first joint conference between Indian and American chemical engineers has said. "The chemical-engineering strength in India is definitely something to reckon with now, with very good high-quality personnel in academia and industry," said Doraiswami Ramkrishna, who completed a report for the National Science Foundation about the first Joint conference of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers and the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers. ADVERTISEMENT "...Research and development establishments in India are...

Never has the onslaught against alternative therapies been so virulent. If we do not act now, together and consistently, we will lose access to the therapies we depend on to maintain and improve our health. The goal of the Freedom of Health Foundation is to fight repression of medical freedom with legal, legislative, and educational tactics. When special interests, both here and abroad, try to limit access to nutritional supplements, we will be on the frontline. When practitioners of alternative medicine are persecuted, we will defend them. When the FDA denies access to an innovative therapy to a patient seeking...

Last week, I wrote about a federal agency that most people think is indispensable. In reality, I said, the FDA regulates us to death, literally, by forbidding even dying Americans who can't be helped by established medical treatments from trying innovative therapies. But what's the alternative? Have no oversight? Let any company peddle every dubious medicine to an unsuspecting public? That sounds terrifying. Snake-oil sellers would sell all kinds of harmful stuff. That's why we created the FDA in the first place. Why must we give big government so much power? Couldn't FDA scrutiny be voluntary and advisory? Companies that...