Passengers travelling via Air France this December will see an in-cabin movie made by Sanofi to raise awareness about the dangers of counterfeit drugs.

According to Sanofi’s video, up to 10% of the world’s medicines can be counterfeit. In industrialised countries, counterfeit medicines are rare and many patients and consumers may not be fully aware of the dangers. In other locations, however, such as some countries in Africa, Asia, Latin America and in emerging markets, counterfeit medicines may comprise 20–30% of the market. Travellers are not always aware of the risk when venturing to another country. Read more »

As third quarter results were being released last week, we hear of several top drugmakers facing hard knocks from the fall off the patent cliff. Pharmaceutical news have been populated with headlines such as the following: Sanofi drops as major patent expiries take hold, Bristol-Myers results fall short as Plavix sales evaporate, AstraZeneca continues to see revenue decline, and Lilly revenues down as generics erode Zyprexa sales. Read more »

Yesterday, Sanofi issued a press statement titled “Sanofi provides information on the adaption of its activities in France through 2015.” Read past the headline and you quickly realise that the ‘adaption of activities’ involves eliminating around 900 jobs at the company’s sites France by 2015. You can read the statement here.

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With 2011 sales of approximately $54.1 billion, Pfizer currently holds the crown as the world’s largest drugmaker, but next year may see the pharma giant usurped from its throne by Sanofi and Novartis, who will claim pole and second position respectively in the global pharmaceutical rankings. Pfizer, meanwhile, will drop to third place, and is likely to remain there for the foreseeable future, according to analysis firm EvaluatePharma. Read more »

It’s getting harder for the pharmaceutical industry to ignore neglected diseases. The globalization of national economies and the rise in air travel are increasing the potential for exposure to these diseases, which previously had been limited to the developing world. “Now is the time to have this discussion,” Kishor M. Wasan, chair-elect of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists’s Pharmaceuticals in Global Health Focus Group, told Pharmaceutical Technology earlier this month. Industry now seems to be getting the message. Read more »

Concern about pharmaceuticals in our water supply has been in the public consciousness for a few years now. In 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency found traces of various drugs in fish caught in rivers that receive effluent from wastewater-treatment plants. The drugs were believed to come from doses that people had excreted or flushed down the toilet. In response, FDA updated its guidelines for disposing of drugs. New research, however, shows another potential source of drugs in our waterways. Read more »

As I wrote last week, the market for vaccines is expanding, and the newswires have stories about these products almost daily. Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline, to name just two major players, are increasing investments in research and manufacturing capacity for these therapies. Kalorama Information predicts that sales of pediatric vaccines will grow even more quickly than sales for adult vaccines. Yet drugmakers have surely noticed that not all publicity about vaccines has been positive. Read more »

Haven’t we heard this story before? Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals faces a class action suit alleging that it discriminates against its female employees. In late May, the class bringing the suit expanded to include female sales representatives and all women in the company’s Consumer Care unit. The employees’ complaint alleges that Bayer is hostile toward women, pays them less than it pays men, and retaliates against women who object to these conditions. Read more »

In 2010, the US House of Representatives’s Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held two hearings after scandalous cGMP violations at McNeil’s Puerto Rico facilities came to light. Former FDA Deputy Commissioner Joshua Sharfstein told the Committee that the agency would review McNeil’s plan for correcting deficiencies to ensure that the corrective actions were effective. “FDA intends to keep a close eye on these facilities until the company earns our confidence back,” said Sharfstein. Read more »

Big Pharma’s sales forecast is not likely to improve anytime soon. Consulting firm Bain and Company predicts that the top 25 drug companies’ annual sales growth will be no more than 1% through 2016. To compensate for reduced revenue, investors are urging manufacturers to cut expenses that do not add value. One such expense, in many investors’ eyes, is research and development (R&D). Read more »