Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
Previous studies on cocaine addiction and efforts to block its addictiveness have focused on dopamine transporters, proteins that reabsorb the brain’s
?reward? chemical once its signal is sent.
Since the drug blocks dopamine transporters from doing their recycling job, it leaves the feel-good chemical around to keep sending the pleasure signal.
Now, the new study has found that cocaine’s effects go beyond the dopamine system.
In the study, cocaine had significant effects on brain metabolism, even in mice that lack the gene for dopamine transporters.
“In dopamine-transporter-deficient mice, these effects on metabolism are clearly independent of cocaine’s effects on dopamine. These metabolic factors may be a strong regulator of cocaine use and abuse, and may also suggest new avenues for addiction treatments,” said Brookhaven neuroscientist Panayotis (Peter) Thanos, who led the research.
To measure brain metabolism in dopamine-transporter deficient mice (known as DAT knockouts) and in littermates that had normal dopamine transporter levels, the researchers used positron emission tomography (PET scanning).
They tested the mice before and after cocaine administration, and compared the results to mice treated with saline instead of the drug.
Prior to any treatment, mice lacking dopamine transporters had significantly higher metabolism in the thalamus and cerebellum compared to normal mice.
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
Bayer said Phase III trials in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) had been stopped because Nexavar, already used to treat liver and some
kidney cancers, “would not meet its primary end-point of improved overall survival.”
Nexavar is one of the group’s best selling treatments, while NSCLC is the most common form of lung cancer.
“While we are disappointed at this outcome … we will continue to investigate its potential across a wide variety of tumors,” Bayer said in a statement.
Shares in the German drug company fell 1.28 percent to 83.46 euros while the overall stockmarket rose nearly two percent.
Source-AFP
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
It is to begin analysing pricing trends of 74 bulk drugs that come under the government-notified price-controlled list every quarter.
The authority’s
comparison will be based on three major parameters — the notified or approved prices of these bulk drugs, the landed cost of the imported bulk drugs and the prices quoted in the trade journals.
NPPA will notify a revised bulk drug price if aberrations are found among these different price points.
It also plans to intensify its surveillance by tracking the cost audit report that drug companies submit to the department of company affairs.
Bulk drugs (the raw material) account typically for over 70 per cent of the cost of a formulation and currently their prices are notified for three years. Interim revisions take place only if the authority detects substantial fluctuations in retail prices.
In other words, it is not the raw material that is tracked for price movements, but the final product. That scheme of things is to change now, Business Standard newspaper reports.
Incidentally, it has been claimed that the NPPA’s price intervention, based on market surveillance, is known to have been very effective between 2005 and 2007. According to an official analysis, instances of drug companies raising prices of price-controlled medicines have come down considerably during this period.
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
Starting virtually from scratch, the pharmaceutical industry in India has over the last 30 years evolved into a world leader in producing high quality
drugs with the lowest cost of production, and now is ranked fourth globally in terms of volume and 13th in terms of value of production.
Despite having emerged as one of the major sectors of Indian economy, pharmaceuticals is still described as a sunrise industry.
‘If the medicine excise duty is removed 100 percent from all the medicines that will be the biggest benefit to Indian communities and Indian people will remember P.Chidambaram forever. My second request to the finance minister is to give adamant upto 60 percent instead of 42.5 percent. If the government is sincere and looking for the benefit for pharma industries they are very much in trouble the excise duty abetment should be free from 42.5 to 60 percent and pharma industries can survive,’said Dipak Padiya, Managing Director, Osho Pharma Private, Limited.
The industry claims that the reduction of excise duty by half (from 16 to 8 percent) would facilitate availability of cheaper medicines in the market.
The pharma sector in Gujarat believes that the pattern in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Sikkim are more convenient than in Gujarat. The small-scale pharma units are demanding to increase abatement to 45 percent to compensate the higher excise duty, as the industry has to pay on tax included in maximum retail price (MRP).
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
There is already a drug on the market, Revia, which treats alcoholism by reducing the body’s ability to enjoy its effects.
This new drug cuts cravings
by taking the edge off of stressful situations which might push recovering alcoholics to pick up the bottle again.
Behavioral stress is a major factor in extending the ‘vicious cycle’ of alcoholism, said lead author Markus Heilig, clinical director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
That’s because alcohol deprivation causes depression and increased sensitivity to stressful situations such as an argument with a spouse or tension at work.
‘Alcohol is a particularly nasty drug because it actually makes you feel better, but it pushes you to feel worse once you’re without alcohol,’ he told AFP.
The drug Heilig and his team tested targets an area of the brain, the neurokinin 1 receptor, which mediates responses to behavioral stress. It had previously been shown to reduce social anxiety but did not enter the market because results were inconsistent.
Helig and his team first tested its effectiveness on mice and then on a group of 50 alcoholics with anxiety problems who had been through detox and remained hospitalized for the four weeks of the trial.
Half were given a placebo and the other half were given the drug.
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
Artery-clogging lesions are a leading cause of heart attack and stroke and death worldwide.
Dr. Lisa Cassis and Dr. Alan Daugherty found the possible
added benefit of the new drug in animal studies.
‘In my many years of atherosclerosis research, this is one of the most striking effects I have seen on preventing the disease under experimental conditions,’ said Daugherty.
‘This contributes to our knowledge of the underlying disease that causes heart attack and stroke,’ he added.
‘Our data shows that renin inhibition is an effective approach to both lowering blood pressure and directly inhibiting atherosclerosis.
‘It will be interesting to determine whether this approach is more effective than the two other commonly used classes of drugs in the angiotensin system; ACE inhibitors and ARBs,’ he said.
Source-ANI
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
Fibromyalgia is a chronic widespread muscle and joint pain that is difficult to diagnose and cannot be cured.
The condition is far more prevalent
in women and the incidence increases with age, reaching 7 percent among women 65 years and older.
The researchers at the University of Manitoba Rehabilitation Hospital conducted the trail on 40 participants and divided them into two groups, nabilone and placebo, and treated them for four weeks.
The findings revealed that the nabilone group showed significant drop in pain and anxiety along with functional improvement in fibromyalgia patients.
However, none of the nabilone-treated subjects had complete relief of their fibromyalgia syndrome.
Nabilone is one of two oral marijuana-based compounds, known as cannabinoids, available in Canada and is approved for treatment of nausea and vomiting during chemotherapy.
The study is published in The Journal of Pain.
Source-ANI
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
The researchers found an important target that holds significant promise for millions of people suffering from allergies, asthma, rheumatoid arthritis
and a range of other inflammatory diseases.
The study showed that a key component of the body’s own response to allergy-causing agents (allergens) can be targeted to reduce allergic reactions in mice.
In the study, the researchers found that by targeting a molecule called p110delta it is possible to interfere in the allergic reaction before symptoms occur, and without shutting down the immune system.
p110delta is a member of a family of eight proteins called PI3Ks, which control important biological functions. Their activity is implicated in many different diseases including cancer, and they are an important target for drugs.
However, drugs that act on all PI3K family members tend to be toxic in the body. For this reason the researchers used genetic techniques to find out which PI3K family members are linked to specific diseases.
By gaining a better understanding of each PI3K researchers hope to target drugs more specifically and reduce the potential for side effects.
The p110gamma member of the PI3K family had earlier been implicated in allergic reactions and was thought to be more important than p110delta.
However, in the current study, it has been confirmed that p110delta, but not p110gamma, is important for allergic reactions in a mouse model.
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
The first hint that the drug might be useful in cutting alcohol cravings surfaced when the investigators noticed that mice who didn’t have NK1R seemed
to have less desire to consume alcohol.
To test their qualms, the researchers gave the NK1R-blocking drug to 25 recovering alcoholics, while giving 25 others an ineffective placebo treatment.
The analysis revealed that those who received the drug reported about 50 percent fewer alcohol cravings.
In the study, the alcoholics who were given LY686017 reported fewer spontaneous cravings for alcohol than did those who received the placebo. But the patients were kept in a hospital, away from the behavioural triggers such as social stress that are present in the outside world.
?They may get into a fight with their spouse or at work, and after that they may abstain for some period of time, but then they go past the bar where they used to drink. We wanted to mimic that in the lab,? Nature quoted Heilig, as saying.
In order to create a stressful situation, the research team led the patients into a room and told them that they had to give a five-minute improvized talk to a committee of people in white coats, as if they were interviewing for their dream job.
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Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel
According to estimates, revenues and profits of drug companies have plunged because of increasing pricing pressure and competition in important Western
markets. A firmer rupee has also added to the problem.
On an average Indian companies earn 50 per cent to 80 per cent revenue from exports, which is very unlikely in present situation.
Cipla?s chief executive officer Amar Lulla says that with the dollar playing havoc, ?we wish the export incentives to pharma companies are extended for another five years.?
Glenmark Pharmaceuticals managing director and chief executive officer Glenn Saldanha said that the discontinuation of this benefit will badly affect those enterprises who are in the process of converting their existing undertaking into a 100 per cent export oriented unit (EOU), ?and those who does not have adequate means to move or set up a new unit in an SEZ.?
The companies are hiving off their R and D units into separate companies to raise capital and reduce innovation-related risks.
However, companies in the country have very limited pipeline and in that too, most of companies are in early stages of development.
Lack of progress in R and D successes has also made raising venture capital more difficult. Now, companies want depreciation-related tax benefits to be available liberally even after such spin-offs.
Source-ANI
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